KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Known as “the Finest House in Tennessee”, the Historic Ramsey House was first occupied by Colonel Francis Alexander Ramsey, his family and his slaves.
An agricultural family, the Ramsey's grew cotton, flax, sheep and raised cattle and other livestock.
The Ramsey farmland sat on 2,000 acres and was tended to not only by slaves but by tenant farmers.
“In terms of the enslaved, he had six individuals mostly helping inside the home, helping with the children. They also would have helped with the cooking and cleaning of the house and the caring of the things inside, as well as the herb garden and the things immediately related to food preparation,” the Ramsey House Board of Directors Education Chair Jan Loveday-Dickens said.
Ramsey's six slaves were Venus, Cato, Dorcas, Levy, Hannah and Saphrona. Venus was Ramsey's wife Peggy's personal maid.
"Cato was more involved with the fields. We know that Levy was actually the carriage driver for the family. A lot of the household duties were done by Venus and Hannah and Dorcas and others,” Loveday-Dickens said.
The slaves lived in cabins on the Ramsey property until the Ramsey home was complete. They then moved into a loft above the kitchen.
Although Francis Ramsey owned slaves, documents show that he often struggled with the idea of enslaving people.
“We have letters that reflect his questions that he asked his pastor and questions that he had asked concerning the ethical and moral idea of owning another individual,” Loveday-Dickens said.
The Historic Ramsey House is currently working on an exhibit in the slaves' loft in the hopes it will help put into context the stories of those who once lived in the area.
“Opening up that loft will allow us to have better insight to what the daily life of an enslaved was like. It’s a complicated issue. It’s not easily resolved with our own minds today. Our goal is to not convince anybody of anything. It’s just to provide information so that we can all continue to process this time period and what it meant," Loveday-Dickens said.
Francis Ramsey died in 1820, and slaves continued to come and go from the Ramsey House until slavery was abolished. Some even stayed with the family after they were freed.