On Thursday, flames engulfed the Nottoway Plantation in Iberville Parish, Louisiana—one of the largest remaining antebellum mansions in the South. The fire raged for hours, ultimately reducing the 165-year-old structure to ashes. And while local officials mourn what they describe as a “cornerstone of our tourism economy,” many of us—especially those descended from the enslaved—felt something else entirely: release.
The ancestors are speaking. Can you hear them?
To be clear, no one celebrates destruction for destruction’s sake. But what burned that day wasn’t just timber and brick. It was the rotted heart of a narrative that has too often romanticized the horrors of slavery and the brutal systems that upheld it.
Let’s be honest: plantations are crime scenes. Period.
Nottoway, with its opulent architecture and manicured grounds, stood as a monument to wealth built on human suffering. Constructed in 1859 by John Hampden Randolph, the plantation was home to 155 enslaved Black people. Their labor, their pain, their stolen lives—this is the untold story behind every chandelier and Corinthian column.
So when I see headlines describing the mansion as a “symbol of the grandeur and the deep complexities of our region’s past,” I can’t help but ask: for whom?
Because for descendants of the enslaved, grandeur is not what comes to mind when we hear “plantation.” We don’t see elegant ballrooms or bridal photo ops. We see sweat and scars. We hear the crack of whips. We feel the weight of our ancestors’ chains.
That’s the real legacy of Nottoway—and of every plantation that still stands in the American South.
The fire that reduced Nottoway to rubble has been called a tragedy by some, but it may be closer to a reckoning. As crews battled flames that started in the attic and spread throughout the four-story structure, we were reminded of what still smolders under the surface of this country: a…
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