Kingsley Plantation
Plantation Era Florida
The plantation era was a time in our history of opportunity, political contradictions and great cruelty.
For planters, like Zephaniah Kingsley, it was a time for amassing land and wealth. For enslaved Africans who produced the wealth it was a time of dehumanizing and brutal life, but also extraordinary strength, perseverance and faith. All played a significant role in what happened here during that time in our history.
"It will be allowed by everyone, that agriculture is the great foundation of the wealth and prosperity of our Southern States. ...we are therefore to look for labour to that intrinsically valuable caste of People called Negro Slaves whose productive labour and cheerful obedience has in all cases been measured by the justice & good treatment of their master who is well remunerated for this kindness by rearing up a permanent & profitable Estate."
Zephaniah Kingsley, 1826
"The memory of slavery gives voice to the men and women who experienced slavery directly and tells two great stories. If slavery was violence and imposition - if it was death - slavery was also life. ...slaves did not surrender to the imposition, physical and psychological. They refused to be dehumanized by dehumanizing treatment. On the narrowest of grounds and in the most difficult of circumstances they created and sustained life in the form of families, churches, and associations of all kinds."
Ira Berlin, 2001
Marker can be reached from Palmetto Avenue 2.1 miles north of Fort George Road.
Courtesy hmdb.org
