Pharsalia (Tyro, Virginia)

Pharsalia is a historic

It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2009.^[1]

Slavery

The property was ordered constructed by American planter and

Those enslaved at Pharsalia produced wheat, oats, hemp, tobacco, potatoes, bacon, whiskey, wool, apples, and other crops, and raised animals for the Massie family. William was also a prominent slave barterer, breeder, and seller in addition to owner, keeping meticulous records on those enslaved at Pharsalia and the crops they produced, and occasionally would detail their lives including their deaths and if they were sold and why in his "Negro Book."[6] Over the course of his ownership of Pharsalia, William maintained numerous bills of sale for enslaved men, women, and children, many of whom were related and were thus separated from their family members upon sale.^[7]

Women and girls who were enslaved at Pharsalia were forced to have children as young as fourteen years old and would be forced to continue to have children for up to thirty years after; giving birth every one to two years. The higher the rates of survival for their births, the longer they were used by the Massie family for breeding.^[8]

In 1859, three years before his death, William Massie recorded that he had 62 enslaved people working in the fields who earned him an average of $81.41 yearly each—an amount totaling $5,047.42 or the equivalent of $181,226.70 as of 2023.^[9]

Civil War

During the American Civil War, Pharsalia was opened to Confederate troops for quartering and feeding by William's widow, Maria Effinger, who provided Confederate soldiers in the region food and shelter.^[10] Maria also contracted enslaved people at the Pharsalia plantation for laboring and impressment on Confederate fortifications, for horse maintenance and goods production during the war.^[11]

References

External links

• Pharsalia website