State

On the left, above, is Somerset House, the Josiah Collins home place on Lake Phelps. To the right is the huge four- story bam, the finest existing type of an early nineteenth-century barn and granary. erset Plantation luinous phinfuf ion of Slavery Паук Is to be preserved. Visitors to that section this sum¬ mer will find in. -inv tiling's of interest about tlie old-tinic plantation. BEGUN bv Josiah Collins II in the early part «Г the last ecn- tury and completed by his son and namesake, Josiah Collins III. about the year 1S30, one of the most interesting Colonial mansions in northeastern North Carolina, to¬ gether with its mighty burn ami out¬ buildings are to he restored. The Collins house, known as Somerset, on the shores of Lake Phelps in Tyrrell and Washington counties, is one of a numWr of ancient land¬ marks in North Carolina's newest State park, known as the Lake Phelps or Pettigrew State Park. It is stipu¬ lated in the 99-year lease of the new park area from the Federal govern¬ ment to the State, that the N. C. De¬ partment of Conservation and Devel¬ opment begin the restoration of all building in the trnet within two years. As a matter of fart. $2,100 lias already been expended on the old manse by Scupperimng Farms, the government’s Final Uesett lenient Project in the two counties. The First Josiah Collins It was in the year 1777 that Jo¬ siah Collins I. an English gentleman of wealth and culture, came to Amer¬ ica, from Somersetshire in England, settled in Edenton ami hoonmc at¬ tached to the country and its people. He had not long been over here be¬ fore he discovered Lake Phelps (then known as Lake Sotippcnmng), in Tyrrell County. Part of Tyrrell ha* since gone to form Washington III / W. O. SAIMIKIIS County, and most of Lake Phelps to¬ day is in that county. Like Phelps i» u picturesque body of water seven miles long and four anil a half miles wide, located on that vast plateau in Washington and Tyrrell counties known as East Dis¬ mal Swamp. Way tack yonder in the long ago. in a period of great drought, the dry peat eaught lire and burned the vast hole in the ground which filled with water drained from 25,000 acres of the surrounding hog. The average depth of the lake L 12 feet at high water, ten feet at low water. The peaty soil sloping from its eastern boundary is the most endur¬ ing soil in a region famous for its rich and productive lands. Hut it is without natural drainage». Josiah Col¬ lins I diil not attempt to build on the shores of Lake Phelps, blit his son. Josiah Collins II. did. He began the construction of the mansion in the early part of the last century. Ilis son, Josiah Collins III. completed it; hut not until the plantation and other lands adjoining it had I . . drained by a system of noble ennnls from Lake Phelps to the Seuppernong Fiver, a distance of approximately six miles. These eanals, dug by slave 1а1н»г, were wide enough and deep enough for targes or scows to take produce from the farms to the river. Nathaniel Allen and Samuel Dickin¬ son, wealthy Edentonians. joined with Josiah Collins II in the con¬ struction of these canals. Hundreds of black slaves toiled for years in the construction of those canals, their only tools being spades and shovels. There were no drag lines in those days. A Luxurious Place Somerset was a marvel of luxuri- ousiiess in its day. It was heated l>\ fireplaces in all of its major room*, for wood was plentiful, and two slaves were employed in cutting the wood and keeping the fires going This information is imparted by aged Uriah Bonnet, of Creswell. w ho was a slave boy on the plantation. In the rear of the mansion were the slave quarters, a smithy and cabinet shop, a tannery, a meat house, bak¬ ery and kitchen. And there was a grist mill, a sow mill, and a two- story hospital. There were several hundred slaves on the plantation, and a sick slave is a liability. The slaves Were not only well fed and warmly clothed, but did not lack for medical care or hospitalization when they needed it. Somerset got it- drink¬ ing water from a carefully kept cistern built underneath the house. Somerset Plantation raised not only corn, sugar-cane, pork and pota¬ toes for its masters and slaves, but exported thousands of bushels of oats, wheat and rice to the old coun¬ try ; importing its carpets, its furni- (Conlinurd nn pane nineteen) 13