Up to 94 slaves lived at Poplar Forest during Jefferson’s time. Letters and other documents provide glimpses into the lives of the enslaved workers. However, their housing sites went unrecorded and their homes, like those of poor people both free and enslaved, were constructed of perishable material.
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Despite these obstacles, archaeologists found the remains of two slave quarter sites east of Jefferson’s house and excavated them from 1993-1998. They named one cluster of cabins and yards the “Quarter Site,” and another nearby area “the North Hill Site.”
The North Hill site predates Jefferson’s octagonal retreat. Occupied during the 1770s or early 1780s, there were only a few slave families and an overseer on this part of the plantation at that time.
Archaeologists discovered evidence of a single house at the North Hill site, an erosion gully filled in with trash from the house, and a portion of a ditch believed to have been dug to support posts for a fence made of thin, upright saplings. |
| Archaeologists excavate along the fence in the yard of the North Hill quarter. |
The house, like those found at the newer Quarter Site, was built of logs and probably had a wooden chimney. Wooden chimneys were commonly lined with clay for fireproofing, and pieces of this clay lining were found at both sites.
Slaves had to supplement their food rations themselves, as well as provide the simple furnishings of their homes. Artifacts found in the gully and in the storage cellar include: burned seeds and animal bones, woodworking and farming tools, several silver Spanish coins, and personal items such as buttons, shoe buckles, and beads. |
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Archaeologists found the remains of three cabins at the c. 1790-1812 Quarter Site. The first building they discovered was the largest, measuring 15' x 25', and was divided into two equal-sized rooms. It may have housed members of an extended family, or had separate families living in each room. Each room contained at least one "root cellar," or storage pit (see adjacent photo).
| The two additional structures were smaller in size. One measured 13 feet square, the other was poorly preserved, but appears to have been about 181/2 feet square. Artifacts show that a variety of tasks occurred at this quarter, including sewing, cooking, handicrafts, gardening and probably the raising of chickens and ducks for meat and eggs. The remains of a garden were found behind one of the cabins, and several fences marking enclosed work yards ran along the front of the buildings.
A "ghost" building replicating the location and size of the largest slave cabin helps visitors visualize what the archaeologists have discovered. Signs at the structure describe the documentary history of the slave community at Poplar Forest and the aspects of private life revealed by archaeologists working at this site. |
Conjectural view of the buildings and yardscape of the “Quarter Site” (click to see full size) |
The former Director of Archaeology, Dr. Barbara Heath, has published a book, "Hidden Lives", detailing the private lives of the members of the slave community. A brochure is available to visitors that provides additional information on the enslaved workers at Poplar Forest. Poplar Forest has also contributed information about our Quarter and North Hill sites to the Digital Archaeological Archive of Chesapeake Slavery.
In 2003, archaeologists uncovered evidence in an area 100 yards southeast of the house which they have identified as an antebellum slave cabin. Excavations have revealed that a cabin, likely a log structure with a stone and brick chimney and a small interior storage pit, once stood there. Evidence of the dismantled chimney and adjacent pit survive at the site. Artifacts recovered from the cabin include coins, marbles, tools, ceramics, and parts from a pair of scissors. Archaeologists plan to continue exploration of this site as funding becomes available.
About 20 yards east of the antebellum slave cabin site, archaeologists have found an extensive Jefferson-era site. Domestic artifacts dating to the late 18th and early 19th century have been recovered in that excavation. While these artifacts suggest that someone lived at the site, architectural evidence points to the presence of more substantially built structures than the log slave cabins typical of the period. It was common in that day for a farm outbuilding to double as housing.
The evidence recovered between 2001 and the present indicates that the entire area south and east of two extant 19th-century brick ‘tenant houses’ may have been home to successive generations of farm buildings from Jefferson’s time onward.
