Mount Holly (a.k.a. Dudley Plantation) was a historic Southern

plantation Plantations are farms specializing in cash crops, usually mainly planting a single crop, with perhaps ancillary areas for vegetables for eating and so on. Plantations, centered on a plantation house, grow crops including cotton, cannabis, tob ...

Foote, Mississippi Foote is an unincorporated community in Washington County, Mississippi, United States. Variant names include Colmere and Dudley. Location Foote is located on the east shore of Lake Washington.Google map On the West side is Yazoo National Wildli ...

. Built in 1855, it was visited by many prominent guests, including

Confederate A confederation (also known as a confederacy or league) is a political union of sovereign states united for purposes of common action. Usually created by a treaty, confederations of states tend to be established for dealing with critical issu ...

President

Jefferson Davis Jefferson F. Davis (June 3, 1808December 6, 1889) was an American politician who served as the only President of the Confederate States of America, president of the Confederate States from 1861 to 1865. He represented Mississippi in the Unite ...

. It was later acquired by ancestors of famed Civil War novelist

Shelby Foote Shelby Dade Foote Jr. (November 17, 1916 – June 27, 2005) was an American writer, historian and journalist. Although he primarily viewed himself as a novelist, he is now best known for his authorship of ''The Civil War: A Narrative'', a three- ...

, who wrote a novel about it. It burned down on June 17, 2015.

Location

It is located in Foote, Washington County,

Mississippi Mississippi ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Deep South regions of the United States. It borders Tennessee to the north, Alabama to the east, the Gulf of Mexico to the south, Louisiana to the s ...

.Jim Fraiser, ''The Majesty of the Mississippi Delta'', Pelican Publishing, 2002, p. 4

/ref>Woody Woods, ''Delta Plantations - The Beginning'', 2010, pp. 40-41
/ref>City of Greenville: Mount Holly
/ref>
, Mississippi Heritage TrustDavid Horace Harwell, ''Walker Percy Remembered: A Portrait in the Words of Those who Knew Him'', Chapel Hill, North Carolina: University of North Carolina Press, 2006, p. 118

/ref> It is situated on the Eastern shore of Lake Washington (Mississippi), Lake Washington.

History

The land was patented by John C. Miller in 1831. By 1833, he sold it to Henry Johnson and his wife, Elizabeth Julia Flournoy. In 1854, their widowed daughter, Margaret Johnson Erwin Dudley, acquired 1,699 acres of land known as the Mount Holly Plantation for US$100,000. It came with outbuildings, livestock, and 100 enslaved laborers. A year later, in 1855, she married Dr. Charles Wilkins Dudley, the son of Kentucky surgeon Benjamin Winslow Dudley. Charles commissioned the construction of the

mansion A mansion is a large dwelling house. The word itself derives through Old French from the Latin word ''mansio'' "dwelling", an abstract noun derived from the verb ''manere'' "to dwell". The English word ''manse'' originally defined a property l ...

as a present for his wife. Made of red bricks and built with the forced labor of

enslaved people Slavery is the ownership of a person as property, especially in regards to their labour. Slavery typically involves compulsory work, with the slave's location of work and residence dictated by the party that holds them in bondage. Enslavemen ...

, it has two stories and thirty-two rooms. It was designed in the Italianate architectural style, either by architect Samuel Sloan or

Calvert Vaux Calvert Vaux Fellow of the American Institute of Architects, FAIA (; December 20, 1824 – November 19, 1895) was an English-American architect and landscape architect, landscape designer. He and his protégé Frederick Law Olmsted designed park ...

, after the Dudleys consulted with both architects. The Dudleys entertained guests such as

President

Albert Sidney Johnston General officer, General Albert Sidney Johnston (February 2, 1803 – April 6, 1862) was an American military officer who served as a general officer in three different armies: the Texian Army, the United States Army, and the Confederate States ...

, John C. Pemberton,

Ulysses S. Grant Ulysses S. Grant (born Hiram Ulysses Grant; April 27, 1822July 23, 1885) was the 18th president of the United States, serving from 1869 to 1877. In 1865, as Commanding General of the United States Army, commanding general, Grant led the Uni ...

, and

William T. Sherman William is a masculine given name of Germanic origin. It became popular in England after the Norman conquest in 1066,All Things William"Meaning & Origin of the Name"/ref> and remained so throughout the Middle Ages and into the modern era. It is ...

. In the 1880s, it was purchased by

Hezekiah William Foote Hezekiah William Foote (a.k.a. Henry Foote) (1813–1899) was an American Confederate States Army, Confederate veteran, attorney, planter, slaveholder, and state politician from Mississippi. Early life Hezekiah William Foote was born on Dece ...

, a wealthy planter,

veteran, and member of the

Mississippi House of Representatives The Mississippi House of Representatives is the lower house of the Mississippi Legislature, the lawmaking body of the U.S. state of Mississippi. According to the state constitution of 1890, it is to comprise no more than 122 members elected for ...

and

Mississippi Senate The Mississippi State Senate is the upper house of the Mississippi Legislature, the State legislature (United States), state legislature of the U.S. state of Mississippi. The Senate, along with the Lower house, lower Mississippi House of Represen ...

. It was later inherited by his son,

Huger Lee Foote Huger Lee Foote (April 24, 1854 – July 18, 1915) was an American planter and politician. He served in the Mississippi Senate. He later sold his plantations to pay for his gambling debts. Early life Huger Lee Foote was born on April 24, 1854, i ...

, a planter and member of the Mississippi Senate. His grandson was the author

, whose 1949 novel ''Tournament'' is based on his father's loss of the family home.Visit the Delta: Mount Holly
/ref> From 1903 to 1956, the mansion belonged to Mary Griffin Lee. In 1927, it was used as a relief shelter during the

Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 was the most destructive river flood in the history of the United States, with inundated in depths of up to over the course of several months in early 1927. The period cost of the damage has been estimate ...

. It was later inherited by Lee's granddaughter. She turned into a bed and breakfast. The plantation mansion burnt down on June 17, 2015.The Associated Press
Fire destroys Mount Holly Plantation near Greenville
''

The Sun Herald The ''Sun Herald'' is a U.S. newspaper based in Biloxi, Mississippi, that serves readers along the Mississippi Gulf Coast. The paper's current executive editor and general manager is Blake Kaplan, and its headquarters is in the city of Gulfpor ...

'', June 17, 2015 The ruins remain privately owned.

Heritage significance

It has been 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 ...

since August 14, 1973. The house contains a historical marker commissioned by the National Society of Colonial Dames on an outside wall which reads: "Mount Holly, Ca. 1856, Excellent example of Italianate style steeped in history of the Mississippi Delta, built for Margaret (Johnson) Erwin Dudley, an early settler's daughter, used as headquarters for relief committees in 1927 flood, marked by Mississippi State Society, National Society of Colonial Dames XVII Century, October 10, 1998."Abandoned Mississippi: Mt. Holly, Lake Washington
''Preservation in Mississippi'', February 25, 2010

References

{{National Register of Historic Places Houses on the National Register of Historic Places in Mississippi Houses in Washington County, Mississippi Houses completed in 1855 Italianate architecture in Mississippi Plantation houses in Mississippi Burned houses in the United States Demolished buildings and structures in Mississippi National Register of Historic Places in Washington County, Mississippi Demolished but still listed on the National Register of Historic Places 1855 establishments in Mississippi 2015 disestablishments in Mississippi