When we talk about the formation of America, farming, and the history of people of African descent in this country, Virginia is at the core of it all. My family history goes back to the oldest plantation in Virginia, the Shirley Plantation, settled in 1613 in what is now Charles City.Article continues after advertisement
The history of the Shirley Plantation—which is the oldest family-owned business in America—and its owners demonstrates the sheer wealth and power that some colonist planters accrued. At one time, for example, Robert “King” Carter, whose son John Carter married into the Shirley Plantation, owned almost 300,000 acres of land. Carter used his position in the House of Burgesses to snatch up the best land for his children and grandchildren. King Carter’s descendants include other burgesses, a Virginia governor, an ambassador to Italy, and the Confederate general Robert E. Lee. Thirty-ninth president Jimmy Carter is a descendant as well.
The final fruits of their lives in Africa and the first leaves of our existence in these lands of our initial captivity are generally not well known.
Shirley Plantation at one time was the biggest farming operation in the state. The Carters have owned it since the 1720s, with Hill and Shirley being the other names attached to the property over the years. Carter and Shirley are two of my family’s surnames, as well. I believe some of my ancestors were enslaved at the Shirley Plantation, although as I’ve mentioned before, it is near-impossible for families like mine to find accurate records tracing our roots through this period. But my uncle Charles Shirley shared with me that the family used to receive correspondence from the Shirley Plantation back in the 1970s and ’80s, inviting them down for cookouts. Gran and others would throw away the invitations; they didn’t want to deal with it. Imagining the type of overtones or microaggressions that kind of gathering would have entailed, it was best to protect the emotions of the descendants of the enslaved as well as the emotions of the descendants of the plantation owners.
