Varner-Hogg Plantation

Brazoria County may not be the most happenin' place, but it certainly has some interesting history. Today Brian and I decided to take a motorcycle ride out to Varner-Hogg Plantation in West Columbia, TX. It is a beautiful piece of land, and we enjoyed a nice quiet afternoon there learning a bit of Texas history.
Varner-Hogg was originally owned by the Varner family. It was part of the Austin Colony (as in Stephen F. Austin). Basically Varner took on a contract that he had to live on the land for 10 years. He raised live stock and made distilled rum from sugar cane. After the 10 years was up Varner had had enough of the place and sold it off to Columbus Patton.
Patton owned the plantation during it's sugar mill years. 60-80 slaves worked on the plantation, about 1/3 of those being children. One of the slaves, Rachel, was his live in mistress. It is believed that he had 2 children by her. One was sent off to Europe when Patton died, and there is a young child buried in the family plot that is thought to be by her as well. Apparently Rachel felt she was the woman of the house and proceeded to treat the slaves poorly. Patton knew of this but didn't seem to do much about it. After a time Patton went "insane" and his family put him in an assylum in South Carolina. (Actually he had a brain tumor, but this was not known about at the time.) When he was sent away, the family members, who were not fond of the Rachel situation, sent her out to be with the slaves. I'm sure you can imagine that did not go over very well for Rachel considering her prior treatment of the slaves. Upon Patton's death (of Typhoid fever) a will was found. It did not release Rachel from slavery but it did give her and three other slaves annual stipends.
The sugar mill is gone, however some of the large bowls used to cook up the sugar into the form we use in cooking/baking with it in remain. They seem to only provide the purpose of mosquito breeding now...as well as a historical reminder of a very troubled time in our history.
When slave labor could no longer be used the state of Texas allowed plantation owner to use convict labor. This didn't last very long though. After an investigation into the treatment of the convicts this method was disposed of. One convict at the Varner-Hogg Plantation was found with over 600 lashes on his back from whippings.

Several people owned the plantation after Patton, but no one held on to the place for long. After slavery was abolished the land value in Brazoria dropped drastically, and then almost everythign there was lost after the hurricane in 1900 with the exception of the main house.
A former TX governor, James Hogg, bought the plantation hoping to find profit in the oil industry there. (More on that further down.) Eventually the plantation came into the hands of his daughter, Ima Hogg, and she left it to the state of Texas.

Texas Tea

Hogg bought the plantation after a slew of random people owned it for a while after Patton. This was the Hogg family swimming hole. It was fed by a spring. My thoughts...a giant mosquito breeding ground. No longer used as a sugar plantation (The huricane of 1900 destroyed the slave cabins and the sugar mill. Although slavery had been abolished for a while at this point.) Hogg decided this was the place to find oil. Unfortunately he never found any, but he told his kids to never get rid of the land because someday it would prove to be profitable. Low and behold the man was right. The Hogg family struck black gold. Ima Hogg, the daughter who took over the estate, didn't have any children so she gave the plantation to the state of Texas.
"Didn't she have any nieces or nephews to leave it to?" you might be asking. That's a great question. I asked our guide. Apparently their family had a history of TB. Thinking that this was genetic she and her three brothers never married for fear of having a family and passing on the disease.

Relaxing before our house tour.

The Plantation House

The view of the plantation house from the sugar mill. Patton used to watch his slaves work from the widow's walk. When Patton owned the house it was all brick, and the posts were wood. It wasn't until the Hogg family owned that plantation later that they covered the inside and out with stucco and changed the wood posts to columns. You can see those columns in the final picture. The portion of the house facing the river is actually considered the front as most people came in on barges. The river used to come up to where the ground begins to slope...yeah, it's not even close to that now. It doesn't even seem to flow much. We're glad we visited now before the mosquitoes come out. I asked our guide about the mosquitoes and she said it's terrible because they aren't even allowed to fog in the park. Since it is protected land they can't kill any living species.

This is the rear of the house, but it is the first side you see upon entering the "park."