The Material Basis of the Postbellum Tenant Plantation: Historical Archaeology in the South Carolina Piedmont

xvii+322 pages with charts, diagrams, tables, maps, illustrations, plates, bibliography and index. Royal octavo (9 1/2" x 6 1/4") bound in original publisher's dark blue cloth with gilt lettering to spine in original pictorial jacket. First edition. Charles Orser begins his study by presenting the historical context for Millwood Plantation and for the system of postbellum black farm tenancy it supported, a system that uneasily combined the hopes and needs of the freedmen with the entrepreneurial ambitions of the plantation owners. Orser then deepens the portrait of the black tenant system with a careful reconstruction of Millwood's postbellum society on the basis of available documentation and on the material culture-settlement patterns, housing, personal possessions-uncovered by the archaeological investigation as it relates to each of the plantations' major labor groups: landlord, manager, wage hand, servant millwright and tenant farmer. Condition: A fine copy in like jacket.