Danville and Pittsylvania County hope to jointly buy property next to the Southern Virginia Megasite at Berry Hill that contains the former Oak Hill Plantation site.
The 289.47-acre parcel in southwestern Pittsylvania County contains an important part of local African American history, featuring the remains of an old mansion, a cemetery containing graves of enslaved people, quarters for enslaved people and what was once a terraced garden.
On Monday, the Danville-Pittsylvania Regional Industrial Facility Authority passed a resolution to enter into a sale contract with members of the Hairston family to possibly purchase the property.
Oak Hill Plantation site in southwestern Pittsylvania County has the remnants of a main house built in 1823, a barn, slave quarters, the foundation of an old hunting lodge, terraced gardens and other features. The Danville-Pittsylvania Regional Industrial Facility Authority, which owns the neighboring Southern Virginia Megasite at Berry Hill, hopes to purchase the larger 289-acre property the plantation site sits on for about $1.89 million.
Officials have no plans to develop the site or attach it to the 3,528-acre mega park, but instead protect the property’s historic features, said Pittsylvania County Economic Development Director Matt Rowe.
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“The purchase by RIFA of the property is not to expand the Southern Virginia Megasite’s boundary and the property will not be included within its development area,” Rowe said. “RIFA purchased the property to control it to ensure that there would be no non-compatible uses adjacent to the Southern Virginia Megasite.”
The goal is to enhance the site with input from a Hairston Family Advisory team that would be created, Rowe said. The sellers of the property include Waller S. Hairston, William Hunt Hairston, Allen Waller Hairston, Anne Bartlett Hairston-Strang and Sallie Hairston Miller.
“No grave sites on the Hairston property will be touched or impacted,” Rowe said. “RIFA has been proactively working with the Hairston family descendants regarding grave sites and will likely enhance these sites by removing underbrush and improving access to descendants based upon the family’s explicit wishes.”
The Hairston family includes descendants of enslaved people and the family who owned Oak Hill Plantation when it operated.
“RIFA’s goal is to first work with the Hairston family to ensure that the long-term use of the property meets their needs and desires, and other stakeholders to protect and enhance the cultural and historical assets of the property, while also protecting its megasite investment from non-compatible neighboring uses,” Rowe said.
The white Hairstons, who enslaved Black people at the plantation, supported the Confederacy during the Civil War and had 45 plantations and held more than 10,000 enslaved people in Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee and Mississippi at the height of their empire. The family was worth about $5.2 million in 1852.
The mansion and 20 acres of land were listed in the state and national registers in 1979 for the architectural significance of the Federal-style structure that was built around 1823-1825, according to the Virginia Department of Historic Resources website.
The property had been removed from the state register in 1988 following a fire started by arsonists. But on March 21, 2024, the Virginia Board of Historic Resources relisted it.
It’s now being considered for relisting into the National Register of Historic Places.
Danville Economic Development Director Corrie Bobe said the purchase would help enclose RIFA’s ownership of land segments divided on the southern side of Virginia 311, or Berry Hill Road.
“It’s not contiguous on the southern side,” Bobe said. “It [the purchase] allows us to have contiguous acreage on the southern side of 311.”
The contract includes a 90-day due diligence period for RIFA to review the property before deciding whether to purchase the land, with an option of two consecutive 30-day extensions. RIFA also agrees to pay a non-refundable $50,000 deposit for the review period, which would be credited toward the $1.89 million price, Bobe said.
Each 30-day extension would cost $16,500, for a total of $33,000, and would be added to the deposit.
Preservation Virgnia, a statewide historic preservation group, had previously attempted to purchase the 20-acre historic mansion site within the larger property.
Rowe added that proposed roadway improvements for the north side of 311, or Berry Hill Road, will not affect the site.
“Our goal will be to relocate current historic visual buffer easements on the megasite property north of Route 311/Berry Hill Road to the south side of the roadway on this property, which will further protect and enhance it,” Rowe said.
Plans could also include creating and/or restoring wetlands within the property’s floodplain area, he said.
In addition to the 1988 fire, there was another unfortunate situation in January 2015 that led to efforts by the property’s owners, preservationists and state officials to protect the site.
Confederate treasure hunters shooting a television series in 2015, the Discovery Channel’s “Rebel Gold,” dug up artifacts and damaged the former plantation property.
The dig disrupted the arrangement of artifacts at the site, which is important for historic interpretation of the area, a state archaeologist said during an interview with the Register & Bee at the site in 2016.
The treasure seekers had permission from family members who owned the land and did nothing illegal. That spurred those who wanted to preserve the site into action.
Work to reexamine the site included a professor and students from Mary Washington University measuring, photographing and documenting the quarters for enslaved people and other parts of the site in early 2016. State archaeologists and historic preservationists were also there.
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