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In 2010, the Oak Hill History Day focused on the African-American experience, with presentations on research into enslaved people and their experiences on the plantation. Since then, a succession of owners have upheld the commitment to its preservation. It was eventually sold at auction and rehabilitated. Bulova also organized a project to record the history of the county’s Braddock District, in which Oak Hill is located, in the early 2000s.īy 2008, even after the historical easement was in place, Oak Hill had fallen into disrepair and the house was damaged by vandals. “You can name something an historical property up the ying yang, but people can still develop it,” says Sharon Bulova, who orchestrated the easement on Oak Hill when she served on the Board of Supervisors. Merely declaring that a site is of historic significance does little to protect it. It’s a minor miracle the house wasn’t razed (or deliberately burned down) in the development of this particular tract of suburbia in the early 1960s, and has escaped the wrecking ball since. ”I’ve been going down the roads that border this property for decades,” he says in the video. Even its current owner, Joe Braceland, who was born in a hospital not far from the neighborhood and has lived in Fairfax County his entire life, was unaware of Oak Hill’s existence until shortly before buying the property with his wife, Laura. It’s easy to miss Oak Hill, which is hidden away from the roads that border it. That won’t be easy, and will require a new approach to how its history is researched and interpreted.

That’s playing out at the national level, in state capitals, at county and municipal government offices, and at sites like Oak Hill and another historic community nearby whose centerpiece was eventually replaced by a Pizza Hut.įairfax County officials have pledged to add more Black voices to its story. The United States is in the midst of an awakening about its history, especially when it comes to issues of race. Walkinshaw then reads the names of 41 enslaved people who were listed among the property on the plantation in 1856. “As we appreciate the architecture of the home, and the natural beauty of the site, we also acknowledge that human beings were held here in bondage,” he says. “This colonial gem is quietly set back from busy roads with 200-year-old boxwood bushes lining a driveway that leads up to the property.”Įlsewhere in the video, though, James Walkinshaw, a representative on the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors whose district includes Oak Hill, delivers a more sobering message. “The property is an anomaly within the development of Northern Virginia,” the narrator of the video intones. Last year, the open house requirement was met through a video virtual tour due to the pandemic. These “Oak Hill History Days”’ are festive affairs, with costumed volunteers, music, children’s activities and presentations with historical information such as the fact that Thomas Jefferson stayed at the home multiple times during his presidency. It requires the owners of the house to preserve its past, and open it to the public every year. In 2004, county officials entered into a unique arrangement with Seville Homes, the developer that then controlled the property, under which the county paid $730,000 for an historical easement. And it's still a privately owned and occupied residence-a plantation house smack in the middle of a Fairfax County subdivision.

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It’s still standing, although a series of renovations have altered its original look. Oak Hill, built around 1790, is not lost to history. My wife and I live within easy walking distance of Oak Hill, and an 1862 map indicates the presence of a field where our house now sits-with a yard that backs up to a stream. Newbury eventually set off to find a source of water.Īlong the way, he walked across what is now my not-so-manicured suburban lawn.Īctually, there’s no way to know for sure whether Newbury did or not. Edwards was shot in the back, and he and Newbury fled to a nearby cornfield. The two men hid in the house’s detached kitchen, and as night fell found themselves in a firefight. From her, they learned that the home’s owner was expected to return that evening. Newbury and Edwards made their way to the house, where they encountered an enslaved Black woman who was tending to her ill son.

They’d heard that a group of Confederates were gathering at the house, whose owner had left the property due to its precarious location in the no man’s land of northern Virginia. Thomas Edwards of the Third Infantry Regiment of the New Jersey Volunteers went on a scouting mission to Oak Hill, a plantation house in Annandale, Virginia, outside Washington, D.C.

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