Aiken-Rhett House: African Americans

Aiken-Rhett House: African Americans

The Aiken-Rhett House is the most intact urban townhouse complex in Charleston, with some of the best-preserved slave quarters in the Southeast. It provides a vivid record of slave life in an urban antebellum household.

William Aiken, Jr., was a governor of South Carolina, a member of the U. S. House of Representatives, and one of the states largest slaveholders. On the eve of the Civil War, he owned more than 700 slaves at his Jehossee rice plantation, located on the South Edisto River. A small group of approximately 12 skilled slaves maintained his mansion house at 48 Elizabeth Street.

In 1874, we learned the names of Governor Aiken's former domestic slaves, whom he listed in a petition to the U.S. government. They were Ann Greggs and her son, Henry; Sambo and Dorcas Richardson and their children, Charles, Rachel, Elizabeth and Julia; Charles Jackson; Anthony Barnwell; and two carpenters, Will and Jacob. Mr. Aiken probably "hired out" Will and Jacob to locals in need of their services from time to time.

In a Charleston residence like the Aiken-Rhett House, a hierarchy existed among the slaves. A former slave who lived across the street from the Aikens recalled that the first rank consisted of the household servants, the butler, maids, nurses, chambermaids and cooks, all of whom worked in the main house. The second rank included those who labored in the work yard, the carriage drivers, gardeners, carpenters and stablemen.

The slaves at the Aiken-Rhett House had to work to maintain the Aikens' high standards for elegant living and entertaining. In recording the visit of Jefferson Davis to the Aikens in 1863, diarist Mary Boykin Chestnut noted, "Governor Aiken's perfect old Carolina style of living delighted him... [The slaves] and their noiseless automatic service, the result of finished training - one does miss that sort of thing when away from home, where your own servants think for you; they know your ways and your wants; they save you from all responsibility even in matters of your own ease and well doing."

Such romanticized views reveal the unique situation of enslaved domestic servants. Unlike their plantation counterparts, they were on call twenty-four hours a day and enjoyed little time away from the master's watchful eye.

The back lot of the Aiken-Rhett House is where the slaves worked and lived. The two largest buildings were the stable and carriage house and the kitchen and laundry building. The enslaved residents probably took their meals communally in the kitchen.

The slaves slept in rooms arranged dormitory style above the kitchen and stable. Many of the rooms had fireplaces and paint evidence suggests that many of the rooms were painted vibrant colors. The kitchen and laundry appear to have been painted light blue, a common nineteenth-century color for such workspaces. The gothic revival façades added to the buildings illustrate the slave owners' attempt to put the best possible face on urban slavery.