Slave Cabin Assignment (Picture to be added ASAP)

McKenna Wilder

INTD 108

Professor Rainville 

Slave Cabin 

Sweet Briar College is what I would call a historical hot spot. Partially, this is what attracted me to this particular school over any of the others I applied and was accepted to. Before coming to Sweet Briar I had done my share of research on the history of the land and thought I had found out all I needed to know about the plantation and the family that had owned it. I was completely mistaken. Upon my arrival at Sweet Briar I learned so much more about the land than I even knew existed. However, until my Learning on the Land experience I had absolutely no idea that the campus had an existing Slave Cabin right behind the Plantation House. During the two hours we spent exploring the campus I was surprised to learn so much about the history of the slaves at Sweet Briar. While I was not completely naive to the fact that the college was previously a plantation and obviously had slaves, I was surprised to find that we have both a slave cemetery and one of the last standing Slave Cabins. 

Upon reading more about the history of the cabin and what it has gone through over the years I got to thinking, what purpose will the cabin hold in the future? The cabin has already gone through an array of different uses. During the years that the plantation was running it housed an array of different people from overseers like Logan Anderson to families of nineteen or twenty like that of Sterling Jones. More recently the cabin has been used as an Alumnae House, Chapel and a retreat for students. Most recently it has housed a farm equipment museum. Personally, after reviewing much of the history about the cabin I believe that it should be preserved in the way that it is now. I find it so interesting that the cabin was a home to so many different people and is still pretty much all original, minus the minor updates that needed to be completed. The cabin is a historical monument and should be treated as one. This involves light use of the cabin in order to preserve and protect what still exists. Holding onto the rich history of this land is what makes Sweet Briar so special. If the college were to use the cabin everyday or for the purpose of a retreat it is going to deteriorate more quickly which makes it so that the history of the land is going to disappear more rapidly. The rapid deterioration of the cabin would mean that it won’t be around for future generations and if that is the case then the history of the land is going to disappear leaving it harder to explain what went on here.  

When I first learned about the Slave Cabin many different questions came to mind, who lived here? Why did they live right behind the plantation house? How is this the only cabin that is still in existence on the campus? My first two questions were answered both by common sense and a bit of historical knowledge from Professor Rainville. The last question still seems to be a mystery to me. It seems strange that the plantation housed so many of these cabins and this is the only one still in existence. As Professor Rainville stated even the foundations of the other cabins haven’t been found which strikes me as odd. It is obvious that over time things were built over as the educational buildings and dorms came into play but it seems like somewhere over the years other sites of cabins would be found. That is why it is extremely important that this cabin is preserved for future generations. 

Personally, I believe that the cabin needs to remain in the state that it is currently in. I’m not sure if there is any other way to make students want to come and visit the cabin in the future. The history of the cabin is so important that if it were to be made into anything else the campus risks ruining this great piece of history. If anything, the cabin should be made into a museum representing the history of the enslaved that lived on the Sweet Briar campus. It would provide a background to the slave cabin and to the history of the plantation. If this were the case, students would be able to have their questions answered about Sweet Briar history.