Sure Was Nice to Get Together with Civil War Folk Again-- Part 3: Stephen A. Douglas Gets a Plantation

I was unable to find out how Stephen Douglas' wife's father living in North Carolina ended up with a large plantation in Mississippi.  Regardless, Douglas now was property manager of  a 2,500 acre plantation with 100 slaves in Mississippi.

As a senator from a free state with presidential aspirations, Douglas found that having this plantation posed a problem for him.  He created distance by hiring a manager to operate the plantation, while using his allocated 20% of the income from it to further his political career.

He only made one lengthy visit to the plantation in 1848 and  only brief emergency trips there afterwards.

In the summer of 1847, Douglas moved his family from Springfield, Illinois, to fast-growing Chicago and that is where he acquired a vast amount of land, some of which eventually became Camp Douglas, a training camp for Union soldiers initially and later a notorious prison camp for Confederate soldiers.

His wife, Martha died in 1853.

A Free State Senator With a Southern Plantation?  --Old Secesh