Dungeness Audio Tour Stop 3

Enslaved Africans once toiled in sea island cotton fields where trees now stand.

NPS Photo

Quick Facts

Amenities

1 listed

Historical/Interpretive Information/Exhibits

You are currently standing near the location of one of Dungeness Plantation’s slave quarters. By the late 1700s, slavery had become an important aspect of life on Cumberland Island. Enslaved people were seen as essential for the cultivation of rice and sea island cotton, and as the island’s trees were cleared the number of people who were enslaved grew. Slavery was not legal in Georgia until 1751, so the late 1700s saw an influx of enslaved people to Georgia directly from Africa. The Gullah-Geechee culture that resulted in enslaved communities on Georgia’s coast was a result of the retention of many aspects of African culture and language.

The isolated nature of Georgia’s barrier islands also resulted in distinctive slave management practices. Cumberland Island’s enslaved people worked largely on a task system, which meant that they were responsible to complete a certain task rather than work certain hours.  Enslaved families maintained their own gardens and livestock and hunted and fished to provide food for themselves. An archeological dig in this area has yielded a glimpse into their lifestyle. Along with pieces of iron skillets, glass, clay pipe segments and pottery, bones from small mammals, birds, turtles, frogs and fish were uncovered.

During the Civil War, most of the island’s enslaved people left the island with Union troops, who occupied the island by the spring of 1862, compelling most property owners to flee. A few of the enslaved remained behind, and some freed peoples returned after the war. Those returning lived off the land as subsistence farmers in the following decades. Many African Americans moved to the Settlement on the island’s north end when land became available for purchase in the early 1890s. By this time, work was more plentiful. Settlement residents made a living in a variety of capacities: as employees for Hotel Cumberland, servants for wealthy island residents, and working for various timber operations.