Burgesstown Plantation was a large forced-labor farm of in northern

Leon County, Florida Leon County is a county in the Panhandle of the U.S. state of Florida. It was named after the Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de León. As of the 2020 census, the population was 292,198. The county seat is Tallahassee, which is also the state cap ...

, United States established by Frederich R. Cotten between 1850 and 1855. Cotten used the forced labor of enslaved people to work his land, which was primarily devoted to growing cotton as a

cash crop A cash crop or profit crop is an Agriculture, agricultural crop which is grown to sell for profit. It is typically purchased by parties separate from a farm. The term is used to differentiate marketed crops from staple crop (or "subsistence crop") ...

Plantation location

Burgesstown extended to the west as far as the

Ochlockonee River The Ochlockonee River ( ) is a fast running river, except where it has been dammed to form Lake Talquin in Florida, originating in Georgia and flowing for before terminating in Florida. Background The name is from the Hitchiti language words ...

, to the east it would cross what is now Meridian Road and border the southern edge of

Lake Iamonia Lake Iamonia is a large, subtropical prairie lake in northern Leon County, Florida, United States, created during the Pleistocene epoch. History Forming Iamonia Lake Iamonia's base was established during the Early Pleistocene through submerg ...

. The boundaries would continue east and include the development of Luna Pines and the northern reaches of the development of Killearn Lakes Plantation and would protrude south into the development of Golden Eagle Plantation and Golden Eagle Country Club. The smaller southern section of the plantation bordering Lake Jackson encompasses what is now the western edge of Phipps-Overstreet Park, the western part of Miller Landing Rd. and E. Rollins Point Rd.

Plantation statistics

The Leon County Florida 1860 Agricultural Census shows that Burgesstown Plantation had the following: *Improved Land: *Unimproved Land: *Cash value of plantation: US$22,000 *Cash value of farm implements/machinery: $200 *Cash value of farm animals: $600 *Number of enslaved persons: 274 *

corn Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 10,000 years ago. Th ...

: 13,000 bushels (460 m³) *

cotton Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus ''Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure cellulose, and can contain minor perce ...

: 825 bales Frederick Cotten also had control over a farm of his deceased brother which produced 185 bales of

. Cotten's total real estate was valued at $100,000. During the dry season of April and May, Cotten took advantage of his property being located on two lakes which would dry in to

prairie lake A prairie lake is a somewhat shallow lake that will empty naturally during dry seasons, allowing a variety of terrestrial plants to flourish upon the rich nutrients in the exposed lakebed, and the lakes eventually refill with water returning to t ...

s. Cotten used the now extra area to graze his $17,600 worth of

livestock Livestock are the domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to provide labor and produce diversified products for consumption such as meat, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The term is sometimes used to refer solely to animals ...

including over 1000 swine, 16 work

oxen An ox ( : oxen, ), also known as a bullock (in BrE British English (BrE, en-GB, or BE) is, according to Oxford Dictionaries, "English as used in Great Britain, as distinct from that used elsewhere". More narrowly, it can refer spec ...

, 60 dairy cows, 72

mule The mule is a domestic equine hybrid between a donkey and a horse. It is the offspring of a male donkey (a jack) and a female horse (a mare). The horse and the donkey are different species, with different numbers of chromosomes; of the two pos ...

s and asses, and 15 horses. In addition to growing cotton, in 1860 Cotten harvested: *4000 bushels (140 m³) of

sweet potatoes The sweet potato or sweetpotato (''Ipomoea batatas'') is a dicotyledonous plant that belongs to the bindweed or morning glory family, Convolvulaceae. Its large, starchy, sweet-tasting tuberous roots are used as a root vegetable. The young sho ...

*75 tons of hay *2000 bushels (70 m³) of peas and

beans A bean is the seed of several plants in the family Fabaceae, which are used as vegetables for human or animal food. They can be cooked in many different ways, including boiling, frying, and baking, and are used in many traditional dishes th ...

*30 bushels (10 m³) of Irish

potatoes The potato is a starchy food, a tuber of the plant ''Solanum tuberosum'' and is a root vegetable native to the Americas. The plant is a perennial in the nightshade family Solanaceae. Wild potato species can be found from the southern United ...

The owner

Frederich R. Cotten who had moved with his wife Elizabeth to Leon County in 1841 from

North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia and So ...

. Frederich was the son of Spencer D. Cotten of

Tarboro, North Carolina Tarboro is a town located in Edgecombe County, North Carolina, United States. It is part of the Rocky Mount Metropolitan Statistical Area. As of the 2020 census, the town had a population of 10,721. It is the county seat of Edgecombe County. The ...

. On May 26, 1845, Cotten participated in the first statewide election for state representatives and was one of six elected from Leon County. In 1851, Cotten purchased 35 people trafficked for enslavement: Old Penny, young Penny, Wilkes, Enoch, Molly, Sarry, Sylvia, Albery, Nancy, Rosetta, Betsy, John, Franklin, Jacob Sr., Jacob Jr., Jerry, Frederick, Penelope, Lucy, Jenny, Lydia, Guni Seaborn, Susan, Washington, Aga George, Martha, Sarah, Louisa Winna, Mourning, Scipio, Davy, Parthana, and Margaret. Cotten's enslaved people were valued at $164,000. Paisley, Clifton; ''From Cotton To Quail'', University of Florida Press, c1968. Cotten died July 7, 1878.

Ownership transfer

The plantation property was kept by the Cotten heirs, the Whiteheads, until they sold the portion which ran along the south shore of Lake Iamonia to Lloyd Griscom who named it

Luna Plantation Luna Plantation was a quail hunting plantation located in northeastern Leon County, Florida, United States established by Lloyd C. Griscom. Lloyd C. Griscom was the son of Clement A. Griscom from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Clement was a shippi ...

References

External links

Rootsweb PlantationsFlorida Historical Markers programFile on slave trade
(

PDF Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems. ...

) {{Coord missing, Florida Plantations in Leon County, Florida Cotton plantations in Florida