Somerset Place
Used by permission of
The Department of Conservation and Development
Pettigrew State Park embraces parts
of two original Lake Phelps plantations -
Somerset Place, home of the Josiah
Collins family, and Bonarva, home of the
Pettigrews. Confederate General James
Johnston Pettigrew, for whom the park
was named, was born and buried here.
The Pettigrew cemetery is the only
remaining relic of the Pettigrew family-
Rev Charles Pettigrew, first bishop-elect
of the Episcopal Church in North Carolina:
his son Ebenezer, congressman and ag¬
riculturist; and Ebenezer's son, James
Johnston Pettigrew, are all buried in this
Cemetery.
Seven of the original buildings of the
Collins Plantation remain, including the
mansion house built about 1830. Somerset
Place was begun by a land company in the
1780's. The "Lake Company”, of which
Josiah Collins Sr. of Edenton was the
chief member, acquired more than 100,000
acres of swampland around Lake Phelps,
most of it by grant, and sent to Africa for
a shipload of slaves to dig drainage works.
The main canal, six miles long and twenty
feet wide, was completed in 1788 at a
reported cost of $30,000. This versatile
canal was used for boat transportation, as
the main channel for draining the farm
land, and in turn for flooding the rice
fields. It was also used for powering a
variety of machinery, such as rice
threshers, corn shellers, granary elevators,
and sawmills. The mills were located a
quarter of a mile down the canal from the
lake shore.
Several years after the plantation was
started, Josiah Collins, who lived in
Edenton, bought out his partners and
began to develop it into a family estate.
He named it Somerset Place in honor of
Somerset County in England where he
was born. At his death he willed
the plantation to his grandson, Josiah
Collins, III, who made it his home after
1829.
Young Josiah at once began to improve
and expand the estate as to both farming
operations and the convenience and
beauty of the dwelling area. New canals
were dug and additional land brought
under cultivation so that by I860 the farm
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