"Oakland Plantation Bottle Garden" by NPS/Photo , public domain
Cane River CreoleBrochure |
Official Brochure of Cane River Creole National Historical Park (NHP) in Louisiana. Published by the National Park Service (NPS).
featured in
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(Far Left) Narrow lots
gave each planter
river access, cropland,
and woods.
(Left) Enslaved
blacksmith Solomon
Williams brought
"African ironworking
tradition to his finelywrought cross.
Vine was among
Ithe tokens of French
' culture imported by
colonials.
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Colonial Roots
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Genesis of a C u l t u r e
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(Left) Ambroise LeComte
(1760-1834) oversaw his
family's shift from tobacco
to cotton.
(Above) Stencil used to
mark Prud'homme cotton.
(Right) Drill forged at
Bermuda plantation by
an enslaved worker.
M A P : NORTHWESTERN STATE UNWERSITY OF
L O U I S A N A , C A M M I E G. HENRY RESEARCH
j
A vital branch of the New World
culture we know as Creole took
root in the rich soil along Cane
River in 18th-century Louisiana.
It was a culture nurtured by
French and Spanish colonial
ways, steeped in Africanisms, and
nriched by American Indian
ontact. Its survival for nearly
three centuries, depicted in the
stories of the LeComtes, Hertzogs,
Prud'hommes, and other families,
testifies to a resilient community
founded on deep attachments to
Catholicism, family, and the land.
t
Th 1725 Catherine Picard, daughter of
a New Orleans trader, married Jean
Pierre Philippe Prud'homme, a former
marine and trader from Natchitoches.
The French-born couple returned to
the rough-hewn military and trading post—an open crossroads world
where cultural exchanges and marital unions among French, Spanish,
French Canadian, African, and American Indian cultures were producing
a dynamic frontier society with a
distinctive French accent. Ex-soldiers
like Prud'homme moved out from the
post to make a living as traders, hunters, and farmers along the Red River,
known in this area as Cane River. As
King Cotton
Among the tobacco farmers was
Jean Baptiste LeComte, who in 1753
obtained a land grant on Cane River.
From this seed grew Magnolia plantation. In 1789 Prud'homme's grandson
Jean Pierre Emmanuel also received
a land grant on the Cane, the core of
Bermuda—later renamed Oakland—
plantation. After the invention of the
cotton gin in 1793, he and LeComte's
son Ambroise turned to the crop that
forever defined the region.
In the decades after the United States
took possession of Louisiana in 1803,
the cotton culture reached its zenith.
Built on slavery, it was underpinned
by an agrarian ethic of self sufficiency
and land stewardship exemplified
by Emmanuel Prud'homme. In 1821
his enslaved workers built his house
on land he named Bermuda. Creole
families like the Prud'hommes and
LeComtes solidified their positions
by expanding their holdings and marrying into each other's families. In
1852 Ambroise LeComte IPs daughter
Atala married Matthew Hertzog—
whose mother was a Prud'homme—
and Magnolia plantation passed to
the couple and their descendants.
This Creole society combined hard
practicality demanded by frontier life
with Old World joie de vivre and spirited celebration of the rituals of daily
life and Catholicism. The Frenchspeaking enslaved workers had created their own rich culture centered
around the church, family ties, and
preserved African traditions. Yet
even as the Creole culture evolved,
it underwent a gradual but profound
change. Anglo-Americans poured
into the region, bringing their English
language, Protestant religion, and
their own African American enslaved
workers. Life grew more constricted
for non-whites, as U.S. laws removed
colonial-era rights such as self-emancipation by purchase, and gens de couleur libre lost the special status they
had enjoyed under French rule.
In the face of change Creole planters
clung fiercely to their culture while
embracing new technology. In the
1850s Phanor Prud'homme installed
one of the area's earliest steam cotton presses. Neither the press nor the
Prud'homme fortune would survive
the coming storm.
What Does it Mean to be Creole?
Workers found
respite from cotton
fields in juke joints
(at left in picture, ca.
1940) where music
and cold drinks
flowed freely.
(Left) For workers
and planters, telephones, radios, and
phonographs provided entertainment
and links to the
larger world.
Creole
In colonial Louisiana the term
"Creole" was used to indicate N e w
World products derived from Old World stock, and could
apply to people, architecture, or livestock. Regarding
people, Creole historically referred to those born in Louisiana during the French and Spanish periods, regardless of
their ethnicity. Today, as in the past, Creole transcends racial
boundaries. It connects people to their colonial roots, be
they descendants of European settlers, enslaved Africans,
EEDGER: UNIVERSITY OF NORTH C A R O U N A
Civil War
The fires of civil war transformed
life on Cane River. As the Union
blockade of New Orleans cut off
cotton markets, the Confederate
army commandeered slaves and
grain. In the Red River campaign
southern troops burned the planters' cotton before the North could
seize it. Retreating Union troops left
burning plantations in their wake,
including Magnolia's main house and
the gin barn at Bermuda. At war's
end Phanor Prud'homme's sons
Alphonse and Emmanuel II, who
had both fought for the Confederacy,
inherited Bermuda and divided it,
Alphonse naming his part Oakland.
Well-run plantations like Magnolia
and Oakland survived the war, but
low prices and boll weevils brought
mosdy lean times until World War I.
For the plantation workers freedom brought new trials, such as
Freedmen's Bureau labor contracts
whose conditions differed from
slavery mainly in that they required
the worker's consent. Artisans like
Bermuda's blacksmith Solomon
Williams could negotiate their own
contracts for pay and hours. For
those without specialized skills the
or those of mixed heritage, which may include African,
n)ld Ways Pass
Ruin and R e b i r t h
The Prosperous Years
indigo and tobacco farming supplanted
other livelihoods, colonists relied more
heavily on the enslaved African workers who had helped build the colony.
(Left) 1852 Bermuda
ledger reflects the
reality of slavery:
humans treated as
farm assets.
(Top Right) Tobacco
plug cutter from the
Oakland plantation
store.
(Right) Split
oak basket
woven by an
enslaved worker
at Oakland.
French, Spanish, and American Indian influences.
M i g r a t i o n and M o d e r n i z a t i o n
only alternative to the Freedmen's
contracts was to accept sharecropping arrangements. These ranged
from a relatively benign feudalism
to virtual bondage, with the chains
of slavery replaced by endless debt
to the plantation store.
Many workers left the region, but
others stayed and eventually rebuilt
a strong community around church
and family, often within the same
quarters that had housed their enslaved ancestors. The region grew
less isolated, but some older planters
and workers spoke French into the
20th century.
Oakland and Magnolia enjoyed a
brief revival in 1914 as World War I
increased cotton demand, but prices
fell again and hard times returned.
The Great Migration of African
Americans began in 1916 as workers
displaced from failing plantations
moved north for war-related jobs.
Then a downward spiral of overproduction and falling prices brought
depression to the region a decade
earlier than the rest of the country.
As they had during the Civil War,
Oakland and Magnolia became
self-sufficient, and they survived. In
the words of Matthew Hertzog II in
1937: "We're not making the money
the old folks used to make, but we're
making a little, and we're still here."
ing workers left the plantations for
employment in war industries.
The old plantation world was fading.
At harvest time ranks of workers in
the cotton fields of Magnolia and
Oakland were replaced in the 1960s
by mechanical pickers. Yet many of
the old ways persisted. At Magnolia
workers and planters still enjoyed
baseball games and horse races.
Oakland's store was the place to go
for news and mail. The Creole tradition that had sustained planter and
worker for nearly three centuries
endured, and today remains an evolv
ing, vibrant culture.
^av>.
(FAR LEFT) JAMES P R U D ' H O M M E II,
1 9 3 0 s , COURTESY S A N D R A
Modernization came fitfully to Cane
River. Phanor Prud'homme II bought
the family's first car in 1910, while
most people in the area still traveled
by mule-drawn wagon. At Magnolia
in the 1930s workers began driving
tractors in the fields—in many cases
fields where their enslaved ancestors
had labored. By the 1940s machines
were doing more of the tasks long
performed by mules and human
workers, and many of the remain-
P R U D ' H O M M E HAYNIE. OTHER
HISTORICAL PHOTOS: FARM
SECURITY ADMINISTRATION,
1 9 4 0 ; LIBRARY OF
CONGRESS
The scmns of French ancT\Spanish colonists . . . Creoles of French, Spanish, African, and Indian ancestry . . . and generations of African Americans: these are the faces of Cane River's many-sided culture.
a/iove; The slave-built workers'
irters at Magnolia plantation are
d structures with unusual brickrk at the corners and gables.
Cover: The main house at Oakland
plantation, built in 1821.
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O F R E D H I R S C H M A N N ; A B O V E P H O T O A N D A L L A R T I F A C T S : NFS
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The region's flat landscape
allowed the Red River's main
channel to twice shift eastward
in the 18th and 19th centuries.
The land between the earlier
channels—now the Cane and Old
rivers—was called Isle Brevelle.
Embraced and sustained by the
rivers, it became the center of
Cane River Creole culture.
Visiting the Area
An Endless Cycle of W o r k
L i v i n g T r a d i t i o n s on t h e Cane River
A worker gives her children
a drink as she pauses from
her labors in the field.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
The Cotton Year
FARM SECURFFY ADMINISTRATION PHOTO, 1 9 4 0 ,
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FARM SECURITY ADMINISTRATION PHOTO, 1 9 4 0 ;
UNIVERSITY OF A L A B A M A
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Children joined their parents
in the cotton fields when
they were old enough to
haul a cotton sack.
Life on Oakland and Magnolia
plantations revolved around the
demands of the crop, with the
labor cycle encompassing virtually the entire year. In his 1858
book Fifty Years in Chains; or,
the Life of an American Slave,
Charles Ball, who had worked
on both tobacco and cotton
plantations, wrote: "The tasks
[for tobacco] are not so excessive as in the cotton region, nor
is the press of labour so incessant throughout the year." In the
20th century powered machines
made the tasks easier, with picking the last to be mechanized.
too dark to see. (A full moon
could extend the labor well
into the night.) Workers had to
repeatedly bend over to pick
low cotton, and the hard, sharp
bolls holding the cotton could
cut deeply. Drivers, themselves
enslaved workers, made sure
the pace didn't slacken. The
pickers emptied their sacks into
the baskets, which they carried
to the gin house for weighing.
The overseer expected adults to
pick at least 200 pounds a day.
Other workers ginned the cotton
(removed the seeds by machine)
and pressed it into bales.
The cotton year began in late
March and early April as workers plowed fields and planted
seed. After two or three weeks
they used hoes to "chop" the
seedlings—thin them out—and
remove weeds. This typically
happened four times during
the summer.
The cotton had to be picked
three or four times as the bolls
continually opened, and the
job was usually not finished
until after the new year. In
January and February some
workers pulled and burned the
harvested plants, while others
mended fences and machinery
and harvested cypress from the
plantation's timberlands. Then
in March they began the cycle
again as they hitched mules to
the plows to ready the fields
for planting.
When picking began in August,
^wery available worker was put
'tn the task. Each picker was
sued a cotton sack and a bas5t for the grueling work, which
lasted from first light until it was
P
The historic landscapes and
dozens of structures preserved
at Oakland and Magnolia plantations are the setting for the
stories of workers and families
who farmed the same land for
over two centuries, adapting to
historical, economic, social, and
agricultural change. Today their
descendants carry on many of
their traditions.
The Prud'hommes and
LeComtes had their homes
built atop the natural levees
along the Cane River. On the
rich floodplain sloping down
to the cypress swamps they
grew their crops. Much of this
land remains in production
today. The visitor first encounters Oakland through the working part of the plantation, "back
of the big house." Sheds, shops,
and storehouses recall the ceaseless round of tasks—from carpentry to the tending of livestock—
that supported plantation life.
In the house, fine interior details
and artifacts evoke the French
colonial culture these people
maintained for generations.
At Magnolia it is easy to imagine
workers at their tasks serving
King Cotton. In the gin barn
they handled tons of the fiber
every day, feeding the steampowered gin and producing
bales in the mule-powered, and
later steam-powered, presses.
At day's end they walked to
their quarters, eight of which
still stand in neat brick rows.
After emancipation the quarters
housed plantation laborers,
many of them descendants of
the enslaved workers. The larger
overseer's quarters nearby provides tangible evidence of the
plantation hierarchy.
Magnolia and Oakland are part
of Cane River National Heritage
Area. Homes, military posts,
churches, and the still-agricultural landscape support a broad
understanding of the area's history and culture. The heritage
area includes Magnolia's big
house, which is outside the park
boundary. Burned during the
Civil War, it was rebuilt in 1896
by the Hertzog family.
Oakland Plantation
Visitor I n f o r m a t i o n
Oakland and Magnolia are open
daily except Thanksgiving, December 25, and January 1. Visitors can
take self-guiding tours of b o t h
sites f r o m 8:00 a.m. t o 4:00 p.m.
Call for i n f o r m a t i o n on wheelchair
accessibility and programs in sign
language.
Magnolia Plantation
Directions
The park visitor contact station is
10 miles south of Natchitoches at
Oakland Plantation in Bermuda,
La. From l - 4 9 t a k e Exit 127, Flora/
Cypress. Head east o n La. Hwy.
120. Cross over La. Hwy. 1 o n t o
La. Hwy. 494. Oakland is on Hwy.
494 f o u r miles east of Hwy. 1 on
t h e left. Magnolia Plantation is 20
grniles south of Natchitoches. From
1-49 take exit 119, Derry, and cross
Hwy. 1. Magnolia is on La. Hwy.
119 t w o miles east of Hwy. 1 on
t h e right.
Safety
Preservation and restoration of
historic structures is a continuing
project. This w o r k and t h e plantations' uneven terrain can make
t o u r i n g t h e park hazardous.
Also be aware of snakes, bees,
and fire ants. Temperatures can
Cane River National Heritage Area
be very h i g h d u r i n g summer.
Visitors should w e a r w a l k i n g
shoes and bring water, sunblock,
and insect repellent.
For M o r e I n f o r m a t i o n
Cane River Creole
National Historical Park
400 Rapides Drive
Natchitoches, LA 71457
318-356-8441
www.nps.gov/cari
Cane River Creole National
Historical Park is one of over 380
parks in the National Park System.
The National Park Service cares
f o r these special places saved by
t h e American people so t h a t all
may experience our heritage. Visit
www.nps.gov t o learn more a b o u t
parks and National Park Service
programs.
B A C K G R O U N D PHOTO NPS. PHOTO FAR LEFT © J O H N ELK D
•>GPO2
:007—330-3580
/0607
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