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ST. FRANCISVILLE, LA: JUST THE PLACE TO SLOW DOWN AND SAVOR THE SUMMER

By Anne Butler


Slow down, you’re moving too fast. Summer in the south means dialing it back, says Southern Living editor Eleanor Griffin. She’s talking about abandoning the swift interstates for the picturesque winding back roads, decompressing in venues that don’t insist on round-the-clock activities, slow-cooking those old favorites that don’t come in the frozen-foods section of the local grocery. She’s talking about: St. Francisville, Louisiana, the perfect place to take it easy in the dog days of summer.

There are books extolling the virtues of slowing one’s pace. Go Slow England, a new travel guide recommending that visitors take time to smell the roses, speaks for an entire movement the author describes as “born of a renewed regard for the simple pleasures in life…resisting the homogenization of food and culture, longing for the return to a sense of place.” And if there’s anything St. Francisville has, this little Victorian rivertown between Baton Rouge and Natchez in Louisiana’s English Plantation Country, it’s a sense of place, anchored by an appreciation for the simple pleasures in life.

Tours through the local historic plantation homes and glorious 19th-century gardens remind visitors of the days when a stroll through the hydrangeas and a sip of sun tea in the shade of the gazebo were exertion enough for a hot summer’s day. Six of these splendidly restored antebellum treasures are open daily: The Cottage Plantation, Butler Greenwood Plantation and The Myrtles, all dating from the late 1790s; Oakley Plantation established shortly thereafter and famous for associations with John J. Audubon; and Rosedown Plantation and Greenwood Plantation, grand Greek Revival structures built in the 1830s. Rosedown and Oakley are now significant state historic sites and on most weekends offer living-history demonstrations and fascinating educational programs. In addition, the charming Victorian cottage centering Catalpa Plantation opens by appointment, and Afton Villa Gardens is accessible seasonally.

The St. Francisville area boasts a wonderful assortment of Bed & Breakfasts, ideal for relaxing getaways and romantic retreats. Several of the plantations provide overnight accommodations amidst the ancient live oaks: The Cottage, The Myrtles, Greenwood and Butler Greenwood. In the National Register-listed historic district in town are other B&Bs: Shadetree, Wisteria, Barrow House, St. Francisville Inn, 3-V Tourist Court, each with its own unique charm. Lake Rosemound Inn sits on an enormous lake and entices summertime visitors with fishing, party barge and in-house ice cream parlor, and Hemingbough also features a picturesque lake setting. There’s also a Quality Inn and a lodge at The Bluffs golfing resort. The hosts of all these facilities can provide information on everything the guest might like to do, from massages and spa treatments to horseback riding and hiking in the spectacular unspoiled wilderness areas of the Tunica Hills, and they also have the good grace to accommodate those guests who want to do absolutely nothing at all. Wide welcoming porches with comfortable rocking chairs, hammocks and swings, shady garden nooks and cool swimming pools, picnic areas, barbecue grills…these B&Bs know just what to provide for a relaxing stay.

Local restaurants stress fresh summertime fare, cool salads, homemade ice cream, produce straight from the farmers’ market, which visitors lucky enough to be in the area on Thursday afternoons can patronize themselves for farm-fresh veggies, fruits, flowers, artisanal breads, honey and jellies. An eclectic collection of little shops fill historic commercial structures in the downtown area, offering everything from the nationally famous button jewelry of Grandmother’s Buttons to the lush Victoriana of The Shanty Too, fabulous gifts and housewares from Hillcrest Gardens and Sage Hill, and an extensive collection of regional books and art complementing the museum exhibits at the West Feliciana Historical Society’s tourist information center. There are several fine art galleries purveying paintings and prints, Michael Miller’s exceptional pottery, an artists’ co-op and other small specialty shops. The downtown merchants, in an attempt to make summer shopping as painless as possible, sponsor an enjoyable and effortless shopping extravaganza called White Linen Nights on Saturday, August 22, with the Highlands Bank trolley transporting participants from shop to shop to enjoy live music, art, refreshments, special bargains and a laid-back cool-of-the-evening atmosphere.

Even the hummingbirds slow down in the summertime in this birding paradise so beloved by John James Audubon. The Feliciana Hummingbird Celebration, sponsored annually by the Feliciana Nature Society, provides participants with an up-close and personal acquaintance with these tiny feathered friends. Normally among nature’s fastest winged creatures, hummingbirds can fly at speeds up to 34 miles per hour, wings flapping up to 90 times per second and hearts beating as many as 1200 beats per minute. This year hummingbirds were not in great profusion, but the ones captured at the celebration the end of July seemed to welcome the chance to chill before rushing off, as hummingbird biologists banded the birds, weighing and measuring them, to provide useful information on their habits and habitats. Information on next year’s hummingbird event is available at www.audubonbirdfest.com, or by telephoning 800-488-6502.

Migrating ruby-throated hummingbirds have such a high metabolism that they can fly across the Gulf of Mexico non-stop on a 500-mile flight, but they are also capable of slowing down their metabolism by entering a hibernation-like state called torpor, slowing the heart rate considerably, resting and rejuvenating their tiny bodies. Don’t we all need times when the pace slows, the mind rests, the body relaxes and recharges? St. Francisville in the summertime provides exactly that respite from the hustle and bustle.

For visitor information, call St. Francisville Main Street, 225-635-3873, or West Feliciana Tourist Commission at 225-635-4224; online visit www.stfrancisville.us, www.stfrancisville.net, or www.stfrancisvillefestivals.com.

The Day The War Stopped

THE DAY THE WAR STOPPED — IN ST. FRANCISVILLE, LA

by Anne Butler

Volley from black powder rifles. by ptWalsh

Up the steep hill they trudged, sweating in the sticky June heat, staggering under the weight of the coffin, the white flag of truce flying before them in the hot summer sun.  The guns of their federal gunboat, the USS Albatross, anchored in the Mississippi off Bayou Sara, were silent behind them as a small party of officers struggled toward St. Francisville atop the hill.
The procession was not an impressive one, certainly not an unusual event in the midst of a bloody war, and it would no doubt have escaped all notice but for one fact--this was the day the war stopped, if only for a few mournful moments, and the lovely little rivertown of St. Francisville invites the public to join in commemorating the events 146 years ago on the weekend of June 12-14.
In June 1863, the Siege of Port Hudson was pitting 30,000 Union troops under Major General Nathaniel P. Banks against 6,800 weary Confederates under Major General Franklin Gardner, fighting over the all-important control of traffic on the Mississippi River.  Port Hudson and Vicksburg were the only rebel strongholds left along the Mississippi, and if the Union forces could wrest from them control of the river traffic, they could cut off supplies from the west and completely surround the Confederacy.  Admiral David Farragut had attempted to destroy Confederate cannons atop the bluffs from the river, but of his seven ships, four were turned back, one was completely destroyed, and only his flagship and the USS Albatross passed upriver safely, leaving ground troops to fight it out for nearly another month.

Procession at Grace Church by ptWalsh

Lt. Commander John E. Hart, the federal commander of the Albatross, had just the week before posted a touching letter to his wife, left behind with their young son Elliott in Schenectady, New York.  Praising his little boat for getting through the fearsome firing from the batteries atop the bluffs at Port Hudson, Commander Hart promises after the war to take his wife on a trip down the river to see the famous battlefields.  As he writes he can hear the cannons booming to the south, but his attentions are on more immediate matters…how many blackberries his crew have had to eat lately, and how when a “jolly good cow” is spotted, he sends a sailor ashore with a pail, chuckling how some rebel farm folk will be surprised when “old Brindle comes home at night and ain’t got no milk for them”…how hot it is, and how long since he has seen ice, and how he would love a glass of cool claret and water. 
Even in the midst of war, there are mundane little touches of life scattered through the letter from Hart to his beloved wife…the mockingbirds singing around the boat, the little puppy he’d put ashore at Plaquemine to be raised, the shipboard litter of kittens.  After perilously running through the Grand Gulf batteries on the river to the north, Hart writes that the Admiral signalled, “How many killed?”  And he answered none.  The Admiral signalled, “How many wounded?”  And he answered none.  And just then Kitty, ship’s mouser, produced kittens which Hart insisted become part of the official report…important to note the wartime births as well as the all-too-frequent deaths.

Angolas horses, a favorite to visitors of the annual parade. by ptWalsh

A respected naval officer and graduate of the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis, Commander Hart would have even more lasting impact through his death, which occurred at 4:15 p.m. on June 11, 1863, in the captain’s stateroom as the Albatross patrolled the waters of the Mississippi River near Bayou Sara, just below St. Francisville.  Masonic and naval records list Hart as having “suicided,” died by his own hand “in a fit of delirium.” It had been surmised that perhaps he suffered from dementia induced by yellow fever, for a mere four days earlier his cheerful letter home hardly seemed to exhibit despair, but the surgeon’s log implicates debilitating dyspepsia, perhaps combined with depression. The note left behind by the commander, in those days before antacids and little purple pills to ease the pain of gastric reflux disease, lamented, “God knows my suffering.”
Hart was a Mason, and aboard his ship were other officers also “members of the Craft,” desirous of burying their commander ashore rather than consigning the remains to the river waters, especially since a metallic coffin which might have contained the body for safe shipment home to New York could not be found.  A boat was sent from the Albatross under flag of truce to ascertain if there were any Masons in the town of St. Francisville.  It just so happened that the two White brothers, Samuel and Benjamin, living near the river were Masons from Indiana. They informed the little delegation that there was indeed a Masonic lodge in the town, in fact one of the oldest in the state, Feliciana Lodge No. 31 F and AM.  Its Grand Master was absent serving in the Confederate Army, but its Senior Warden, W. W. Leake, whose “headquarters were in the saddle,” was home on furlough and was soon persuaded to honor the request.  As a soldier, Leake reportedly said, he considered it his duty to permit burial of a deceased member of the armed forces of any government, even one presently at war with his own, and as a Mason, he knew it to be his duty to accord Masonic burial to the remains of a brother Mason without taking into account the nature of their relations in the outer world

Costumed actors participant in the reenactment. by ptWalsh

The surgeon and officers of the USS Albatross, struggling up from the river with Hart’s body followed by a squad of Marines at trail arms, were met by W. W. Leake, the White brothers, and a few other members of the Masonic lodge.  They were greeted at Grace Episcopal Church by the Reverend Mr. Daniel S. Lewis, rector, and with full Episcopal and Masonic services, Commander John E. Hart was laid to rest on June 12, 1863, in the Masonic burial plot in Grace’s peaceful cemetery, respect being paid by Union and Confederate soldiers alike.  And soon the war resumed, Lee’s northern invasion turned back at Gettysburg July 3, Vicksburg falling July 4, and Port Hudson finally surrendering July 9, all in one catastrophic week. 
But for one brief touching moment, the war had stopped at St. Francisville, and this moment will be marked the weekend of June 12, 13 and 14. The commemorative events begin on Friday, June 12, at 7 p.m., with graveside histories in the peaceful oak-shaded cemetery at Grace Church, where Commander Hart’s grave is marked by a marble slab and monument “in loving tribute to the universality of Free Masonry,” and over the years it was decorated with flowers by members of the Daughters of the Confederacy. W.W. Leake in 1912 was buried nearby after a long and honorable career as state senator, parish judge and bank president. An Open House and presentation of lodge history at the double-galleried Masonic Lodge just across Ferdinand St. from the graveyard follows at 8 p.m. Friday evening.
On Saturday, June 13, a lively parade travels along St. Francisville’s historic main street beginning at 10:30 a.m., followed by lunch at the Masonic Lodge from 11 to 12:30. Visitors will be pleasantly transported back in time during the afternoon, as Grace Church’s parish hall is the setting for a concert of antebellum period music and graceful vintage dancing from 11:30 to 1:30. At 1:30 commences the very moving dramatic presentation showing Commander Hart’s young wife in New York as she reads his last letter to their small son and then receives the terrible news of his death. This is followed by the re-enactment of the burial of Hart, with re-enactors in the dignified rites clad in Civil War uniforms accurate down to the last button and worn brogan. Taking leading roles in this ritual, amazingly, are W.W.Leake’s great-great-grandson Robert S. Leake, as well as Frank Karwowski, member of Commander Hart’s Masonic lodge, St. George’s in Schnectady, New York, and Shirley Ditloff who now operates a popular B&B in W.W. Leake’s Royal St. townhouse.

Numerous clowns ride in this annual parade. by ptWalsh

During the afternoon on Saturday, Oakley Plantation in the Audubon State Historic Site offers special related programs, including a Civil War encampment, complete with tents and authentically clad re-enactors, which may be visited from 2:30 to 5. Black powder and musket demonstrations begin at 3 p.m., followed by a demonstration of Civil War costumes at 4. From 6 to 8 p.m. costumed dancers perform stylish dances popular during the Civil War period, and Oakley House, which is never lovelier than by candlelight, opens for special evening tours from 7:30 to 9 p.m.
On Sunday, June 14, Rosedown Plantation State Historic Site from 1 to 3 presents a program on Civil War medical techniques and their all-too-often conclusion, period burial customs. At nearby Locust Grove State Historic Site, a 2 p.m. talk at her gravesite focuses on Jefferson Davis’ young bride, Sarah Knox Taylor Davis, daughter of President Zachary Taylor, who succumbed to yellow fever on their honeymoon visit to his sister’s plantation in West Feliciana. A gravestone rendering class utilizes some of the historic headstones in this peaceful little graveyard.
All of these activities are free and open to the public. Among sponsors are St. Francisville Overnight! (Bed & Breakfasts of the area), the Feliciana Lodge No. 31 F and AM, Grace Episcopal Church, and St. Francisville Main Street. 
The St. Francisville area features a number of splendidly restored plantation homes open for tours daily: The Cottage Plantation, Butler Greenwood Plantation, The Myrtles Plantation, Greenwood Plantation, plus Catalpa Plantation by reservation and Afton Villa Gardens seasonally. Particularly important to tourism in the area are its two significant state historic sites, Rosedown Plantation and Oakley Plantation in the Audubon state site, which offer fascinating living-history demonstrations every weekend to allow visitors to experience 19th-century plantation life and customs. The nearby Tunica Hills region offers unmatched recreational activities in its unspoiled wilderness areas—hiking, biking, birding, photography, horseback riding with rental mounts from Cross Creek Stables. There are unique specialty shops, many in restored historic structures, and some fine little restaurants throughout the St. Francisville area, as well as some of the state’s most popular Bed & Breakfasts for overnight stays, including historic plantations, lakeside clubhouses and beautiful townhouses right in the middle of St. Francisville’s extensive National Register-listed historic district.

For visitor information, call St. Francisville Main Street at 225-635-3873 or West Feliciana Tourist Commission at 225-635-4224; online visit www.stfrancisville.us or www.stfrancisvillefestivals.com. For additional information on The Day The War Stopped, see www.daythewarstopped.net.

Cross-country cyclists

Thank godness we've had good weather to greet some 20 plus cross-country cyclists. Recently had the pleasure of chatting with one such solo cyclist. He's a family/divorce lawyer from the San Francisco area, with his major clients in the music business. Said the recent recession has spurted his business, with many actions seeking to adjust divorce/support settlements. He's using his "alone" time to rethink his own retirement plans. Usually just stays overnight at any one place; but the attractions of SF (and especially the camellias) had induced him to stay over an extra day at the SF Inn.
Wonder if provisions have been made to accomodate cyclists on the new bridge, if the ferry is to be discontinued.