L'Esperance Historic District
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The L'Esperance Historic District, located east of Cruz Bay off Center Line Rd., on Saint John in the
U.S. Virgin Islands The United States Virgin Islands, officially the Virgin Islands of the United States, are a group of Caribbean islands and a territory of the United States. The islands are geographically part of the Virgin Islands archipelago and are located ...
, is a
historic district A historic district or heritage district is a section of a city which contains historic building, older buildings considered valuable for historical or architectural reasons. In some countries or jurisdictions, historic districts receive legal p ...
which was listed on the
National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...
in 1981. It is located within
Virgin Islands National Park The Virgin Islands National Park is a national park of the United States preserving about 60% of the land area of Saint John, U.S. Virgin Islands, as well as more than of adjacent ocean, and nearly all of Hassel Island, just off the Charlott ...
. The listing included two
contributing structures In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing property or contributing resource is any building, object, or structure which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic distr ...
and nine
contributing sites In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing property or contributing resource is any building, object, or structure which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic distr ...
on . It was a prime sugar plantation area, for agricultural purposes, due to the quality of its soil, its permanent spring as a water supply, and its relatively high precipitation. In a compact area the plantation had numerous buildings including two horsemills, a factory, a
cistern A cistern (; , ; ) is a waterproof receptacle for holding liquids, usually water. Cisterns are often built to catch and store rainwater. To prevent leakage, the interior of the cistern is often lined with hydraulic plaster. Cisterns are disti ...
, a
great house A great house is a large house or mansion with luxurious appointments and great retinues of indoor and outdoor staff. The term is used mainly historically, especially of properties at the turn of the 20th century, i.e., the late Victorian or ...
, a cook house, a storage building, a cemetery, and a stone bridge, plus retaining walls and stone fencing. It was deemed architecturally notable for the high quality of workmanship observable in its Great House and in its service buildings' "masonry as well as the use of volcanic
sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...
as a building material. This exotic material to the Virgin Islands was probably imported from the
Leeward Islands The Leeward Islands () are a group of islands situated where the northeastern Caribbean Sea meets the western Atlantic Ocean. Starting with the Virgin Islands east of Puerto Rico, they extend southeast to Guadeloupe and its dependencies. In Engl ...
." With


References

Sugar plantations in Saint Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in the United States Virgin Islands Buildings and structures on the National Register of Historic Places in the United States Virgin Islands Buildings and structures completed in 1719 {{VirginIslands-NRHP-stub