the family was called the vincent deere family. they came to maryland to escape civil unrest associated with the slave uprising that begin in 1791 and also with the french revolution. the best farm was acquired by the national park service in 1993. it's a fairly recent acquisition. beginning in 1998-1999 is when we started doing a substantial amount of historical architectural and archaeological research here at the farm. we were aware there had been at one time a substantial enslaved population. we knew a little bit about the vincent deere family and their origins and their relocation here to maryland, but what we didn't know was very much more than that about the family. we had very little information about the enslaved population and certainly one of the key research questions with regard to the archaeological research was where were these 90 enslaved people living. i had a graduate student working with me. part of her research focused on the family occupation trying to understand their origins and the context of their relocatio

it was established by a family of french -- family was called the vincent deer family. they came to maryland. and also with the french revolution. it was acquired by 1993. it is a fairly recent acquisition and beginning in about 1998 or 1999 is when we started doing a substantial amount of historical architet architectur architectural research here at the farm. we knew the origin and their relocation here to maryland. what we did not know was very much more than that about the vincent deer family, we had little information of the enslaved population and certainly one of the key research questions regarding to these researches were where were these 90 enslaved students were living. >> i had a graduate student working with me focusing on the vincent deer and of their contact here to maryland. she managed to uncover a pretty obscure account that was written by a polish ex-patriot who was traveling around the 18 century. he kept sort of a travel memoir of all of his travels. he happens to be traveling on the georgetown road which we know today as maryland route 355, althoug

can then start working the land and being productive and ultimately generating income for the vincent deere family. there are not a lot of instances out there where you have a complete collection of multiple dwelling houses preserved in an archaeological context so there's a great deal of research potential here in terms of understanding more about the context and the study of slavery in general. there are not that many national park service units that have this kind of resource preserved so we're just really fortunate that as a result of this land being set aside and preserved, as a result of the battle of monocacy, we also have these other stories and other resources that are preserved as well. and even though the laramie taj plantation was long gone by 1864 when the battle of monocacy was fought, the story of the family and the enslaved people and the vincent deere family is still a great platform from which to talk about slavery as a causative aspect of the civil war. at the park level we're going to be working on developing some new interpretive programs and other interpretive products

the family was the vincent deere family. they came to maryland to escape civil unrest that begin in 1791 and also with the french revolution. the best farm was acquired by the national park service in 1993. it's a fairly recent acquisition. beginning in 1998-1999 is when we started doing a substantial amount of historical research here at the farm. we were aware there had been at one time a substantial enslaved population. we knew a little bit about the vincent deere family and their origins and their relocation here to maryland, but what we didn't know was very much more than that about the family. we had very little information about the enslaved population and certainly one of the key research questions with regard to the archaeological research is where were the 90 enslaved people living. i had a graduate student working with me. they were trying to understand their origins and the relocation to maryland. and she managed to uncover a pretty obscure account that was written by a polish expatriate who was traveling around

the family was called the vincent deere family. they came to maryland for unrest -- to escape civil unrest with the slave uprising that began in 1791 and also with the french revolution. it was acquired by the national park service in 1993. it's a fairly recent acquisition. beginning in 1998-1999 is when we started doing a substantial