The Danville-Pittsylvania County Regional Industrial Facilities Authority voted Monday to purchase 290 acres comprising the former Oak Hill Plantation for nearly one-point-nine million dollars.
Pittsylvania County Economic Development Director Matt Rowe says even though the land is adjacent to the Southern Virginia Megasite at Berry Hill, they do NOT plan to develop it with industrial uses nor to include it in the Megasite.
Instead, Rowe says they’re working with the Hairston family to determine the property’s future. “We will be putting together some form of a concept plan to determine its use with input from family members and other key stakeholders,” Rowe said. “ Obviously, our number one priority will be protecting, conserving, and enhancing historical features. This is extremely important to RIFA.”
The former Oak Hill plantation in Pittsylvania County has more than 100 graves, mostly unmarked, where many enslaved people and sharecroppers are buried. It’s the only piece of property south of Berry Hill Road and north of the Dan River that is not part of the Mega Park.
Rowe says owning the property will also help RIFA enhance the Route 311 corridor which serves the Megasite. It will also give RIFA more control over what will open adjacent to the park.
Earlier this year, the Commonwealth’s Board of Historic Resources this weekend added ten sites to the list—including Oak Hill. The Federal plantation house was built in 1823 by Samuel Hairston near the Dan River in in the Berry Hill area, not far from the North Carolina line. Oak Hill was gutted by arsonists in 1988 and was taken off of the list. Findings made by archaeologists in the past few years have restored it.
According to researchers, Oak Hill “provides a rare opportunity to study the lives of enslaved and free individuals who lived and worked on the property, as well as the rise and decline of the planter class from the 18th and 19th centuries.” The entire property encompasses nearly 300 acres.
In October, developers signed an agreement with a company that will move over a hundred graves at another parcel already in the Berry Hill Megapark site. RIFA will spend up to 353-thousand dollars to move graves on Lot Three of the park.
RIFA and New York-based WSP have worked with the family descendants the past several months to reach an agreement on relocation. Rowe says this will make it easier for the family to visit the remains after the megapark lands clients.
The Hairston II Cemetery has 17 graves. The Adams-Wilson Cemetery has at least 119 and possibly 170.
They plan to remove the remains and put them in archival boxes for reburial. A backhoe with a smooth bucket will remove the topsoil from each grave. The graves will then be mapped using GPS technology, flagged, and covered with plastic sheeting. WSP will deliver the remains to Fisher and Watkins Funeral Home for reburial on nearby land.