Edmund Ruffin Plantation

Marlbourne
Location 11 mi. NE of Richmond on U.S. 360, near Richmond, Virginia
Coordinates 37°39′15.13″N 77°13′20.92″W / 37.6542028°N 77.2224778°WCoordinates: 37°39′15.13″N 77°13′20.92″W / 37.6542028°N 77.2224778°W
Built 1843
Architect Unknown
Architectural style No Style Listed
Governing body Private
NRHP Reference # 66000837
VLR # 042-0020
Significant dates
Added to NRHP October 15, 1966[1]
Designated NHLD July 19, 1964[2]
Designated VLR September 9, 1969[3]

The Edmund Ruffin Plantation, also known as Marlbourne, was built in 1823 near Richmond, Virginia; it was not purchased by Edmund Ruffin until 1843. He was a planter and a pioneer in agricultural improvements; he also published an agricultural journal in the 1840s named the Farmer's Register. One of a group of intellectuals they called "the sacred circle",[4] he worked to reform agriculture in the South, promoting crop rotation and soil conservation; he is considered to have been "the father of soil science" in the United States.[5] Ruffin experimented with agricultural methods and mixed marl, defined as "a friable earthy deposit consisting of clay and calcium carbonate, used esp. as a fertilizer for soils deficient in lime" to add to soils.

He and his friends: James Henry Hammond, Nathaniel Beverly Tucker, George Frederick Holmes, and William Gilmore Simms, were pro-slavery and promoted a moral reform of the South. They published numerous articles in literary and short-lived magazines, promoting a stewardship role for masters to improve conditions under slavery.[6][7]

Later Ruffin gained more attention as one of a number of secessionist fire-eaters; he traveled to South Carolina and is credited with firing one of the first shots at Fort Sumter in 1861. Despondent after General Lee's surrender in 1865, he left a note proclaiming his "unmitigated hatred to Yankee rule—to all political, social and business connections with Yankees, & to the perfidious, malignant, & vile Yankee race"[8] and committed suicide at Redmoor in Amelia County.

His Marlbourne plantation was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1964.[2][9]

References

  1. ↑ "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. 2007-01-23.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 "Marlbourne". National Historic Landmark summary listing. National Park Service. Retrieved 2008-04-11.
  3. ↑ "Virginia Landmarks Register". Virginia Department of Historic Resources. Retrieved 5 June 2013.
  4. ↑ Charles B. Dew, "Review: 'A Sacred Circle: The Dilemma of the Intellectual in the Old South, 1840-1860' by Drew Gilpin Faust", The Florida Historical Quarterly, Vol. 58, No. 4 (April 1980), pp. 445-447
  5. ↑ Ruffin, Edmund. Nature's Management: Writings on Landscape and Reform, 1822-1859, edited by Jack Temple Kirby, University of Georgia Press, 2006
  6. ↑ Drew Gilpin Faust, A Sacred Circle: The Dilemma of the Intellectual in the Old South, 1840-1860, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1977
  7. ↑ Drew Gilpin Faust, The Ideology of Slavery: Proslavery Thought in the Antebellum South, 1830--1860 (Google Ebook), LSU Press, 1981
  8. ↑ Walther, Eric (1992). The Fire-Eaters. Louisiana State University Press. pp. 228–. ISBN 0-8071-1775-7.
  9. ↑ Lissandrello, Stephen (December 16, 1974). "National Register of Historic Places Inventory-Nomination: Marlbourne (Edmund Ruffin Plantation)" (pdf). National Park Service. and Accompanying five photos, exterior, from c. 1970 PDF (32 KB)

External links