Pierce Mease Butler Plantation

Butler's Island, Hampton Point, Experiment (between Hampton River & Buttermilk Sound) & Five Pound Tree Plantations

Major Pierce Butler inherited these lands from his grandfather (Pierce Butler who married Mary Middleton). His grandmother's family had many slaves, and this assisted Pierce Butler in his start.

This plantation house still stands. It is located on the Altamaha River Estuary, and faces Hwy 17 North into Darien (on the left). Pierce married Fannie Kemble, an actress, who wrote a derogatory book criticizing plantation life. She hated being the wife of a planter. During the war, the family left the plantation, and Pierce and his daughter, Frances, returned in 1866.Pierce died in 1867, shortly after the War Between the States. He purchased from John and Frances Graham of Savannah for 6,000 pounds, Hampton Plantation which was located on the north end of St. Simon's Island, which he had as early as 1774. Cotton and rice was grown on his plantations, and he had many slaves. Butler's Island, surrounded by the Chamney and Altmaha Rivers, was designed to grow rice, having many irrigation ditches dug, and flood gates. Roswell King was the manager of the Butler plantations from 1802 to 1819, when he was succeeded by his son, Roswell King, Jr.