page_title: Belle Meade Plantation
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Belle Meade Plantation / History
caption_attribution_description: Brigadier-General William H. Jackson, CSA
context_page_description: Belle Meade Plantation, located in Belle Meade, Tennessee, is a historic mansion that is now operated as a museum, together with outbuildings on its 30 acres of property. In the late 19th century, the plantation encompassed roughly 5,400 acres.
  A winery and visitors' center have been constructed on the property. Preserved original outbuildings, including the Harding cabin, dairy, carriage house, stable, and mausoleum may also be seen. Since about 2004, the managers of the plantation have begun to concentrate on how to tell the stories of African Americans who were enslaved at the plantation and worked there after the Civil War. This emphasis resulted in reconstructing a typical slave cabin, which held two families.
context_section_description: In 1807, Virginian John Harding bought Dunham's Station log cabin and 250 acres (100 ha) on the Natchez Trace, an ancient Native American path connecting their settlements in present-day Tennessee and Mississippi. He began to develop a plantation, naming it "Belle Meade" — French for beautiful meadow. Harding operated various businesses, such as a blacksmith shop, cotton gin, and grist and saw mills, staffed by slave labor. By 1816, Harding was boarding horses for neighbors such as Andrew Jackson and breeding thoroughbreds, as well as racing them. Middle Tennessee became known for the raising of purebred livestock, including cattle, sheep and others. In 1823 Harding registered his own racing silks with the Nashville Jockey Club (an association of thoroughbred owners). He trained horses on the track at his farm at McSpadden's Bend, which he bought for his son William.
  William Giles Harding first worked the McSpadden Bend property along the Cumberland River. He inherited Belle Meade Plantation in 1839; during the next decades he acquired additional property to total 5,400-acre (22 km²) plantation; by the time of the Civil War, he held 136 enslaved African Americans to provide the labor. In 1859 he incorporated his father's house into a much larger mansion. With the onset of the Civil War in 1861, Harding had to suspend his racing and breeding operations. As a staunch supporter of  the Confederate States of America, he donated $500,000 to the costs of the Confederate States Army. After Union forces took control of the state it 1862, Harding was arrested. He was sent North and imprisoned in Fort Mackinac in Michigan for six months before being released.
  Confederate General James Chalmers occupied Belle Meade as his headquarters during the Battle of Nashville. Harding somehow kept all of his thoroughbred horses, although the horses at most other plantations were requisitioned by both armies. Early on December 15, 1864, Union and Confederate forces fought on the front yard outside the mansion. Damage from bullets is still visible on the stone columns of the house.
  After the Civil War, Harding resumed his successful horse farming operations, although he reduced the workforce as he tried to deal with free labor.  Of the 136 slaves who had lived on the plantation prior to the war, 72 workers chose to work for pay with Harding. Most lived in housing off the property. Those who remained in the former slave cabins as part of their compensation had to sign a contract he drew up of "18 Rules & Regulations" that reduced pay for breaking the rules.
  In 1868, Harding's eldest daughter Selene married widower William Hicks Jackson, who brought a son to the marriage. He had served in the Confederate Army, reaching the rank of general. His first wife Elizabeth, née McGavock, daughter of former Nashville mayor Randal McGavock and owner of Carnton Plantation, had died the previous year.  Harding father agreed to the marriage if the couple agreed to live at Belle Meade following their wedding.  Selene managed the household affairs, and Jackson co-managed the farm with his father-in-law Harding. Among their children were son William Harding Jackson (1874-1903).
  In 1875, Harding and Jackson decided to retire the racing silks and focus exclusively on breeding. Harding held annual yearling sales at the plantation, raising its reputation in the thoroughbred world. The two men developed the plantation into a nationally renowned thoroughbred farm and showplace for high-quality livestock. The farm also sold breeding stock of ponies, Alderney cattle, Cotswold sheep, and Cashmere goats. The estate also featured a 600-acre deer park.
  Belle Meade had many successful thoroughbred studs, including Bonnie Scotland and Enquirer, whose bloodlines still dominate modern racing. Jackson attracted international fame in 1886 by buying the stallion Iroquois to stand at stud; the horse was ranked in 1892 as the leading sire in the United States. In 1881, Iroquois had been the first American-bred Thoroughbred to win the Epsom Derby in England.
  William Jackson died in 19
caption: Confederate General William Hicks Jackson, husband of Selene (née Harding); they were the third owners of the Belle Meade Plantation.
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