Overview
Location
Vacherie, St. James Pa., LA
Date Constructed/ Founded
1805
Associated Surnames
Duparc, Gore, Locoul
Historical notes
In 1804, the Laura "Big House" was erected "with Indian huts surrounding it." The neighboring Native Americans (Colapissa's) lived alongside the French settlers with the last, full-blooded native Colapissa remaining on the property until 1915. The first enslaved Africans (from French Senegal) arrived in the 1720s. Selected for their agricultural and construction skills, their work created the colony and shaped Creole culture.
This sugar plantation started in 1805 with 7 slaves (6 west-African and 1 Amerindian). By the start of the Civil War, 185 enslaved workers were employed on this farm. Descendants of these enslaved persons remain near the Laura Plantation today.
The widely popular folktales of "Br'er Rabbit" originated at Laura Plantation. The characters in these tales (originally Compair Lapin and Compair Bouki) and the near perfectly-preserved plots have been traced to Senegal, West Africa.
Associated Slave Workplaces
none
Associated Free Persons
- Guillaume Duparc - founder of Laura Plantation
- Laura Locoul Gore - great granddaughter of Duparc, whom the plantation was named after; author of "Memories of the Old Plantation Home" 1936
Associated Enslaved Persons
Research Leads and Plantation Records
- Gore, Laure Locoul. Memories of the Old Plantation Home. In 1936, Laura Locoul Gore compiled an account of nearly 100 years of life on a Louisiana sugar plantation named after her: "Laura Plantation."
Her manuscript, only recently discovered in St. Louis, Missouri, details the daily life and major events of the inhabitants, both free and enslaved, of the plantation that she and her female fore bearers ran. Laura's writings offer an insider's perspective into a Creole household, spanning four generations of love and greed, pride and betrayal, heroism and pettiness, violence and excess. And, her words are also an explanation to her children as to why she rejected the traditional confines of the Creole world to become a modern American of the 20th Century. From Laura Plantation online, http://www.lauraplantation.com
Miscellaneous Information
References
Users Researching This Workplace
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