Boone Hall

Boone Hall is a historic plantation property in Mount Pleasant, Charleston County, South Carolina. It is recognized as a historic district and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Rather than being a conventional consumer brand, Boone Hall functions as a heritage destination, agricultural operation, and public-tourism enterprise. The site remains associated with cultivated land, historic buildings, gardens, and visitor programs. The property’s documented origins reach back to 1681, when a 470-acre land grant from Theophilus Patey to his daughter Elizabeth and her husband, Major John Boone, established the land later known as Boone Hall Plantation. John Boone had arrived in the South Carolina colony in 1672 and held several colonial offices, although historical accounts also connect him with the illegal trafficking of enslaved Native Americans, piracy associations, and the concealment of stolen goods. The property passed through descendants of the Boone family before being sold in 1811. During the nineteenth century, Boone Hall became closely connected with brickmaking, pecan cultivation, and the plantation economy of the Charleston region. Henry and John Horlbeck acquired the property and directed enslaved workers in agricultural labor and brick production. Those workers made millions of bricks by hand and contributed skilled labor, including carpentry and construction expertise, to buildings in and around Charleston. The historic brick cabins at Boone Hall are therefore not simply architectural remnants; they are evidence of the labor system that created and sustained the property. The site’s interpretation must account for the fact that much of its landscape, buildings, and agricultural output were produced through the forced labor of African Americans. The property is especially identified with its Avenue of Oaks, a long allée of southern live oaks leading toward the main residence. Planting began in the eighteenth century and was completed under the Horlbeck family in the nineteenth century. The landscape also includes crop fields, wetlands, creeks, ponds, formal gardens, a smokehouse, former agricultural buildings, and brick cabins that were used by enslaved people and later by sharecroppers. The present main house dates from 1936. Canadian owner Thomas Stone commissioned a Colonial Revival residence after purchasing the plantation in 1935 and replacing the earlier wooden house. The building incorporated salvaged and historic materials while presenting an idealized architectural image of a Southern plantation. This distinction between the modern house and the older agricultural and residential remains is important to understanding Boone Hall’s physical history. Ownership changed several times in the twentieth century. Georgian prince Dimitri Jorjadze and Audrey Emery Jorjadze owned the property from 1940 to 1945, during which the prince operated a thoroughbred racing stable under the Boone Hall name. After subsequent ownership by Henry Deas, Harris M. McRae and Nancy McRae acquired the plantation in 1955. The McRae family opened Boone Hall to public tours in 1956 and continues to own the property. Today, Boone Hall combines historic-house and landscape tourism with agricultural activity and public programming. Visitors can tour the grounds and historic structures, view the Avenue of Oaks and preserved cabins, and learn about more than three centuries of agricultural and social history. The property was designated an African American Historic Place in South Carolina in 2009 because of its importance to African American history, particularly the survival of the slave cabins and the site’s connection to enslaved labor. A renovated former cotton gin building reopened in September 2023 as a visitor center, museum, and gift-shop facility, expanding the site’s interpretive infrastructure.

Boone Hall’s recorded history begins with a 1681 land grant of 470 acres to Elizabeth Patey and Major John Boone. Boone had arrived in the South Carolina colony in 1672 and later held colonial public offices. The land became known as Boone Hall Plantation, although the date of the first residence on the site is not established in the available reference material. After John Boone’s death, the estate was divided among his family, and the plantation remained with Boone descendants for generations. In 1811, Sarah Gibbes Boone sold the property to Thomas A. Vardell. The property was subsequently acquired by Henry and John Horlbeck, whose period of ownership connected Boone Hall with large-scale brickmaking and agricultural production. Enslaved African Americans were compelled to perform much of the plantation’s field labor, brickmaking, gardening, carpentry, and construction work. By 1850, the workers associated with the Horlbeck operations were producing approximately four million bricks per year by hand. Those bricks were used in Charleston-area buildings and public spaces, although historical credit was often assigned to the owners and overseers rather than to the enslaved craftspeople who performed the work. The Horlbeck period also shaped the landscape that defines Boone Hall today. Enslaved gardeners and field laborers planted live oaks along the approach to the house, while the Horlbecks directed the cultivation of pecan trees as a commodity crop. By the end of the nineteenth century, Boone Hall was described as one of the leading pecan producers in the United States. A surviving 1842 property description identified a wooden dwelling, brick stables, barns, brick kilns, and other buildings across roughly 1,442 acres. Thomas Stone purchased Boone Hall in 1935. During the Colonial Revival era, Stone and his wife, Alexandra, replaced the surviving wooden residence with a new house designed to evoke an earlier Southern architectural tradition. Architect William Harmon Beers designed the building, and Cambridge M. Trott served as builder. Completed in 1936, the house is a two-and-a-half-story Colonial Revival structure incorporating materials from older farm buildings and salvaged brick. The Stones also concentrated agricultural activity on a smaller pecan operation and constructed a tidal electrical plant for the property. In 1940, Stone sold Boone Hall to Georgian prince Dimitri Jorjadze and Audrey Emery Jorjadze. Jorjadze operated a thoroughbred racing stable under the name Boone Hall Stable, and the horse Princequillo became associated with the stable during this period. The Jorjadzes sold the property to Dr. Henry Deas in 1945. Harris M. McRae and Nancy McRae purchased it in 1955 and continued agricultural use, shifting emphasis toward peach production. The McRaes opened Boone Hall for public tours in 1956. Boone Hall’s historic district includes the 1936 main house, the Avenue of Oaks, gardens, agricultural fields, wetlands, ponds, a mid-eighteenth-century smokehouse, a nineteenth-century cotton gin building, and brick cabins constructed approximately between 1790 and 1810. The cabins were occupied by enslaved people and later by sharecroppers, remaining in use into the 1940s. Their survival gives the site particular importance for interpreting the history of forced labor, emancipation, agricultural tenancy, and African American life in the Lowcountry. The McRae family continues to own Boone Hall and has undertaken preservation and visitor improvements. In 2009, the property was identified as an African American Historic Place in South Carolina. In September 2023, the former cotton gin building reopened after renovation as a visitor center, museum, and gift-shop facility. Boone Hall therefore operates simultaneously as a preserved historic landscape, a working agricultural property, and a public destination whose interpretation must balance the visual appeal of its architecture and gardens with the realities of slavery and the labor that created the plantation.

• 2023

  Cotton Gin building reopens as visitor facility

  [1]Boone Hallen.wikipedia.org

  The former cotton gin building reopened after renovation with a visitor center, museum, and gift shop.

• 2009

  African American historic recognition

  [1]Boone Hallen.wikipedia.org

  Boone Hall was named an African American Historic Place in South Carolina in recognition of its African American historical significance.

• 1956

  Public tours begin

  [1]Boone Hallen.wikipedia.org

  Harris and Nancy McRae opened Boone Hall to public tours after purchasing the property in 1955.

• 1936

  Colonial Revival main house is completed

  [1]Boone Hallen.wikipedia.org

  A new Colonial Revival residence designed by William Harmon Beers was completed on the site of the earlier house.

• 1935

  Thomas Stone purchases Boone Hall

  [1]Boone Hallen.wikipedia.org

  Canadian owner Thomas Stone acquired the plantation and initiated a major change in the residential architecture.

• 1842

  Horlbeck ownership is documented

  [1]Boone Hallen.wikipedia.org

  A property transfer among Horlbeck family members described Boone Hall’s dwelling, barns, kilns, and other structures across approximately 1,442 acres.

• 1811

  Property leaves Boone family ownership

  [1]Boone Hallen.wikipedia.org

  Sarah Gibbes Boone sold Boone Hall to Thomas A. Vardell for $12,000.

• 1681

  Land grant establishes the Boone Hall property

  [1]Boone Hallen.wikipedia.org

  A 470-acre grant from Theophilus Patey to Elizabeth Patey and Major John Boone became the basis of the property later known as Boone Hall.

A historic South Carolina plantation and working agricultural property positioned as a heritage-tourism destination. Its public identity combines architectural and landscape preservation, agricultural continuity, visitor experiences, and interpretation of the lives and labor of enslaved African Americans and later sharecroppers.

• Heritage tourism · 1956

  Historic house and grounds tours

  Public tours provide access to Boone Hall’s historic landscape and visitor areas, including the 1936 Colonial Revival residence, formal grounds, agricultural setting, and notable landscape features. The experience presents Boone Hall as both an architectural property and a continuing agricultural site rather than as a detached museum.

• Historic landscape · 1743

  Avenue of Oaks

  The Avenue of Oaks is Boone Hall’s best-known landscape feature. The tree-lined approach extends for roughly three-quarters of a mile and leads toward the house through a formal arrival sequence. Its beauty is inseparable from the labor history of the plantation, since enslaved gardeners and field workers planted and maintained the trees.

• Museum and visitor services · 2023

  Cotton Gin visitor center and museum

  The former cotton gin building was adapted for visitor use and reopened in September 2023. It houses a visitor center, a museum presenting more than three centuries of Boone Hall history, and a gift shop.

• Agriculture

  Agricultural operations

  Boone Hall remains a working agricultural property. Its historical production has included pecans, peaches, cotton-related activity, and other seasonal crops. The broader property includes cultivated fields as well as preserved wetlands, creeks, and ponds.

1. 1Boone Hallen.wikipedia.org