Description
Kingsley Plantation’s barn and kitchen were built with tabby, but the most striking tabby construction is the semi-circle of 32 slave cabins. Kingsley slaves built the cabins in the 1820s.
Whereas many tabby sites are small ramshackle ruins, the tabby has remained largely intact here.
History
In 1814 Zephaniah Kingsley bought Fort George Island and its plantation house from John Houstoun McIntosh, who designed the tabby McIntosh Sugar Mill in St. Mary’s, GA. The plantation produced Sea Island cotton, sugar cane, corn, and citrus. The plantation's manager was Kingsley's wife, Anna, a slave from Senegal whom Kingsley freed. Anna relocated to their Haiti plantation in 1837 after Florida adopted restrictive antebellum slave laws forbidding interracial marriage and the presence of free blacks within state territory. Kingsley sold the plantation to his nephews in 1839.
Location
GPS: N 30.41552 and W 81.42703
Address: 11676 Palmetto Avenue, Jacksonville, FL 32226
Accessibility: Operated by the National Park Service, Kingsley Plantation is located on Fort
George Island and is free and open to the public daily from 9:00am to 5:00pm. Visitors
can sign up for tours.
For more information, see the National Park Service’s website.
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