Best Historyhouse Poems
The Finest Antebellum Mansion in the South
By Elton Camp
Windsor was near the banks of the Mississippi River
Extreme luxury, size, beauty and comfort it did deliver
The manor was completed just before the Civil War
It’s builder, Smith Daniell, couldn’t asked for more
Only a few weeks after his palatial home was complete
Its wealthy owner became ill and his own death did meet
His heirs were left a four-story house & a huge plantation
It depended on slave labor that was ruining the nation
Windsor had twenty-five rooms, each with a fireplace
And running water and inside baths the house did grace
A rare feature indeed: that two dumbwaiters were found
From floor-to-floor more easily to move the food around
A ballroom on the fourth floor had an observatory atop
The rigors of a civil war threatened to bring it to a stop
It came to be used by rebs and yanks, so it did survive
And the family who owned it managed to stay alive
The mansion become a social center for the entire state
Invited guests arrived early, partied and the stayed late
But, in 1890 to Windsor the greatest disaster then befell
A guest left a lighted cigar on the balcony and it then fell
After the fire, only the thirty-foot-high columns did stand
And an architectural treasure disappeared from the land
The magnificent ruins remind of the South’s glorious past
And that no civilization built on human suffering can last
If a glimpse into the way planters lived you wish to see,
Go only a few miles from Port Gibson and there it will be
The ruins will remind us of some ancient Grecian temple
But built at the expense of slaves kept uneducated & simple
For pictures of the mansion go to http://www.scribd.com/doc/57710764/The-Finest-
Antebellum-Mansion-in-the-South
The picture of the ruins was taken years ago by the noted
writer Eudora Welty of Jackson, Mississippi. Some of the
English faculty at my college actually knew Eudora and had
studied under her at various workshops.
We started going house to house and freeing all the
slaves, then killing all the white folks left with
hatchets, knives and chains,
we only used blunt objects to conceal our wave of
smoke, I'll surely be the father to the mom of all
revolts.
I speak of 'we' because by now we numbered 7-0,
and had the whiteness falling to the ground like
heaven's snow,
we went through 55 caucasians and their pretty
wives, we also killed the kids but there were some
who didn't die.
The poor white families were spared, we left them
all intact, they didn't think no better of themselves
than they did blacks,
the point of this to whites was our reality in chains,
reality depicting the brutality of slaves.
We only got 2 days before revolting was
suppressed, by white mobs and militias causing 56
black deaths,
along with others killed and beaten numbered many
more, I think it was 200 but I really can't be sure.
I ran eluding capture for another couple months, the
white folks swore that I would pay for all these
sick'ning stunts,
until the day October twenty 1831, they found me in
this ditch I'm hiding in, I guess I'm done.
They tried me and they found me guilty, sentenced
me to death, this happened on November 5th, there
wasn't much time left,
was hung on the 11th and for days that's how I
stayed, until they cut my head off and my body
chopped and flayed.
I look around at blacks folks in this modern day and
age, and there may be some freedom but y'all still
are truly slaves,
for me though death is nothing seeing those get
killed for drugs, remember me Nat Turner for the
man I really was.
There once was a house up on that hill.
Just a stones throw away from the old saw mill.
It stood so tall, majestic and bold
with tales and fond memories waiting to be told.
Four generations had called it their home.
Most born by a fireplace handmade from stone.
Reared with firm hands in comfort with care,
I'll bet they ate lunch somewhere right over there.
The walls were all painted in yellows and blues.
There was an old woodstove once thought of as new.
Many a night voices echoed from the porch
beneath a dimly lit lamp from a brass antique torch.
Quite often the house was filled with music and glee.
No doubt in my mind it was really something to see.
There were laughter and tears, hearts mended and broken. T
Times of sorrows and joy though rarely spoken.
Oh I swear if that house had two eyes and could speak,
the tales it would tell of all it had seen.
But we'll never know. No unfortunately not.
For now it's a Safeway with a huge parking
lot.