Portrait of a Plantation - A Documentary of the Avenel House (2003)
From Dixiepedia: The PC-Free Encyclopedia
The official documentary of historic Avenel House, Portrait of a Plantation - A Documentary of the Avenel House (2003 Confederate Pictures), was first released in 2004, and was purchased by the Bedford Central Library in Bedford, Virginia. This main branch is the headquarters of the Bedford Central Library System, which also has satellite branches in Big Island, Bedford, Forest, Montvale, Moneta, and Stewartsville. The Forest branch is near the Summer home of Thomas Jefferson's Poplar Forest retreat. The video is available through inter-library loan, as well (DVD 812 POR). The Burwells of Avenel and the Jeffersons of Poplar Forest were friends with each other over the years. The library owns a number of Confederate Picture's releases, including a short fictional film about a future reenactment in the year 2015, entitledThe Welcome Guest of Avenel, as well as The Making of the Avenel Project (2004), Incident at Johnson Farm (2004), Patrick Henry at West Manor (2005), and Up From Slavery - Booker T.'s Birthplace (2005) (offered by the National Park Service as the official documentary of Booker T. Washington National Monument near Moneta, and under the Confederate Pictures imprint called Freedom Films).
In fact, the Bedford Central Library is actually on the original Avenel property, (as it fronts onto North Bridge Street) and which area once comprised the front entrance to the home. It is said that the row of massive cedars lining the library parking lot are in fact original to the carriage driveway which led up to the home during the lifetime of the Burwells, who built Avenel house in 1836. The property was once a full 200 acre working plantation, and once had one hundred 'servants' on the place. The old property lines took in College Avenue to the East, all the way back behind the National Elks Home, to the West, and all the way over to Main Street, to the South. The rail lines of the Norfolk and Southern Railway (between Roanoke and Lynchburg, Virginia) also cross over the property belonging to the Burwell family, and it is said that William M. Burwell, builder of Avenel House, brought the rail lines in from Big Lick (now Roanoke City) through to Lynchburg, prior to the Civil War. The Civil War was also fought on their property (The June 1864 Battle of Liberty, and Hunter's Union Defeat and Retreat from Liberty, where in 8,000 Confederates of General Jubal Anderson Early's Army chased off 22,000 of General 'Black Dave' Hunters' Yankees). After the war, the Village of Liberty (whose genesis can be traced to Avenel House) became the Town of Bedford, and later, The City of Bedford, Virginia. These battles today are fought on the original streets of Liberty during the Hunter's Retreat from Liberty Civil War reenactments, and the last three years of this street fighting is available on the Confederate Pictures Release The War between the Streets (2005-6-7 Confederate Pictures Release).
This rail line into Lynchburg was the Union objective in the raid, and with the Union's subsequent defeat, the Southern Confederacy was saved for at least another year...
The property today is part of a massive Civil War Trails marker system, and the City of Bedford is also home to the D-Day Memorial, several miles from historic Avenel House.
Click on any photo to enlarge...
All three of the following films are available from the Bedford Central Library System in Bedford, Virginia. To reserve through inter-library loan, visit the sites below:
http://catalog.bplsonline.org (SEARCH WORDS: Portrait of a Plantation). DVD 812 POR
http://catalog.bplsonline.org (SEARCH WORDS: The Welcome Guest of Avenel). DVD 812 WEL Vol.2
http://catalog.bplsonline.org (SEARCH WORDS: The making of the Avenel Project). DVD8 12 MAK
This version of PORTRAIT that is in the library is the two disc DVD set which concludes on the first fifteen minutes of the WELCOME GUEST DVD. THE WELCOME GUEST OF AVENEL is a short comedy about a reenactment in the year 2015 at Avenel House in the which the ghost of Robert E. Lee attends, in place of the White Lady Ghost, and unbenownst to the reenactors at the time... until later.
There is also available a one hour long stand-alone PORTRAIT OF A PLANTATION version which is not connected to the WELCOME GUEST DVD. THE MAKING OF THE AVENEL PROJECT explains how all of this came about...
NOTE: all three of these films were the first ones ever made by Confederate Pictures, when the company was still Full Eclipse Productions, and before our first computer, a late '06 iMac, came into being. At some point, they will all be remastered onto our brand new 3.06 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo 4 GB of Memory / 1 Terrabyte of storage iMac, affectionately known as the iBeast... but for now, they are as they were originally made; from a Digital Video camera onto an RDR-GX7 burner, by SONY, the first practical burner ever made.
A number of films have been made on the property since Confederate Pictures became the chronicler of the home. A total of six films, in all. Here are a series of stills taken from these films, dating back to 2003. A planned second edition of the documentary Portrait of a Plantation (2008) is scheduled to be released in 2008, with never-before-seen footages filmed in 2004, and 2005, as well as the original scenes from the film. The 2003 version of Portrait is one hour in length and the second edition (2008) extended version of Portrait will be at least two hours in length, and has been in the making for several years.
Chief among the reasons for this planned and updated re-release of the documentary is the discovery of a photograph which confirms the existence of the entity known as the White Lady Ghost, and there have also been a number of new accounts of people coming forward who have shared their ghostly experiences with Confederate Pictures on camera since the first release of "Portrait" back in 2003.
This, and the addition of the new footage (some photos from below will illustrate) will also add to the diversity of the film. Note: The film AVENEL THE MOTION PICTURE (2005 Confederate Pictures Release) was originally made to showcase the ghost photo, and to release it to the public, since the director's release of PORTRAIT would not be ready before now. After 2008, when the director's release of PORTRAIT OF A PLANTATION ( 2008 - The Director's Release) is available, the movie AVENEL THE MOTION PICTURE (2005) will be remastered in digital as simply the motion picture film, and will end with the Saturday, December 8, 1905 death of Letitia Burwell. . All references to the ghost photo, the ghost photo, itself, and the ghost testimony stories which were included in that film will be transferred to the director's release of PORTRAIT (2008). The motion picture has some elements of fiction in it, and PORTRAIT, the documentary, is 100% factual. Therefore, the photo rightly belongs solely in the documentary. The photo was taken on November 1, 2003, at 11:59:59 AM, and in broad daylight. The documentary was released later in December of 2003, and the photo was discovered on February 9, 2004 at precisely midnight. Therefore, the ghost photo could not be released on the original disc of PORTRAIT OF A PLANTATION (2003).
It should be noted here also that both the 'ghostless' versions of the two films, PORTRAIT (2003) and AVENEL THE MOTION PICTURE (2008), will always be available, because there are those who do not wish to see ghosts, of any sort and in any form, and yet who still wish to see the documentary and the motion picture. The film AVENEL THE MOTION PICTURE (2005), (the version which literally becomes the continuation of the recent documentary during the second hour), will be discontinued in 2008, in favor of the updated documentary. At some point, there will be a DIRECTOR'S RELEASE of AVENEL THE MOTION PICTURE, which WILL supersede the original version, entirely. AVENEL THE MOTION PICTURE, in any of its forms, will never again include the ghost photo. After 2008, one will have to obtain the documentary in order to obtain the Ghost photograph. There will, however, always be the two versions of PORTRAIT OF A PLANTATION, both the (2003) and (2008) versions, due to the ghost situation. (2003) will never include the ghost photo, and (2008) will always include it.
Confederate Pictures is sympathetic to the people who do not wish to see any real ghosts in their videos, and did not ever, at any time, intend to photograph the actual entity, nor do anything to conjure nor summon the entity for the purposes of making any of these films. Confederate Pictures is a Christian-oriented endeavor, and does not condone the use of, nor has ever used, the so-called WHITE LADY poem, nor any information from SIr Walter Scott's novel, THE MONASTERY, for the purposes of conjuring up any activity at the home. The belief that some astral, spectral 'shade', or other, came over here from Scotland as a refugee in some of the 'original bricks' from Castle Avenel, which are said to be laid in the foundation of the home, is of no concern to us. Confederate Pictures does not condone the use of seances, nor any of the Black Arts, for the purposes of investigation, and Confederate Pictures does not belong to any of the 'ghost groups' who regularly meet at the home, including Ghostec, and others. On occasion, we have been invited to share our photograph with such groups, on location, but have never documented nor involved ourselves with paranormal research - beyond the act of showing those people who do involve themselves in such things - exactly what they are looking for, and what it looks like, in the event they actually find it. Our photograph was obtained as incidental to the making of the first official filmed documentary of the home; not sitting up until four o'clock in the morning in the Lee Bedroom, waiting for 'things' to 'happen'.
The ghost photo was simply a 'find' during the filming sequences, and Confederate Pictures wishes to offend no one in the process of recounting actual history, and yet still feels an obligation to the public to report what was discovered at the home at that time. Apparently, ghosts, as entities on film, are very real. The White Lady exists in real time. We cannot help that, nor control this phenomenon, in any way. We are only bringing the facts of our situation to light... For that reason, the Ghost Photo will not appear on this website, nor any of our other web pages... The entity exists, and is quite real. We have done our duty, and our level best, to let everyone know this. While we don't think it warrants any undue caution, when visiting the home, (which we do, in fact, quite often), we would suggest a proper decorum and propriety, in keeping with 19th century morals, values, and ethics. Anyone who has ever visited the home has, to our knowledge, had a wonderful time of it - even if that person experienced an encounter of some sort - so long as he or she acted as if the original owners were still alive, and afforded the home, and its ancestry, the proper respect.
The Burwell girls: Letitia, Kate, and Rosa... (Fannie is shown with the fan on the porch, along with one of their friends; Lucy Breckinridge of Oak Grove, Fannie's sister-in-law) - as seen during several of our film shoots... The girls were no strangers to manual house labor, as Letitia reports in her diary. They could sew, or do anything that was required, in order to keep the plantation running smoothly. Here they are shown making up the Lee bed in the Robert E. Lee bedroom. Letitia also speaks of a small garden she worked (believed to have been in front of the home, where the wrap-around porch now occupies). The Ballards built the wrap-around porch onto the home after 1905, and in Lettie's day, only two small federal porches on either of the main doors graced the home. The ghost photo shows the White Lady materialized 'on the porch', which thing she could not have done during Lettie's lifetime... As there was no White Lady of Avenel House, in the ghostly sense, during Lettie's reign as the living White Lady of Avenel House... and as Lettie had not been dead but a year when the first actual ghost sightings occurred, the assumption still remains that it is Miss Letitia (Lettie) Burwell who is the ghost of the house today...
The servants' needs took a lot of the family's time (" the 'wants' of the negroes... who needed new shoes, clothes, or blankets... the principle object of their (mother and grandmother's) lives seemed to be in providing these comforts..." - Letitia Burwell's diary).
The Modern Day Avenel House...
The White Lady Ghost of Avenel House
The White Lady Ghost has been seen many times over the years since the death of Letitia Burwell, at the age of 75, on December 8, 1905. The only other owners of the home, the Ballards, moved into Avenel after Letitia passed, and in 1906, the White Lady was first seen walking in the front yard of Avenel and disappearing into a large tree in the front yard. Peggy Ballard was a toddler at the time, and died at the age of 102 a few years ago... She and her mother both saw the ghost, and Peggy lived in the home all of her life, even as a wife (Peggy Ballard Maupin). Her account is also given in the documentary...
When Confederate Pictures filmed these White Lady scenes, Kristin Stroebel agreed to portray the White Lady. On October 25, 2003, she appeared as the ghost, and walked about the yard. These stills were taken from that shoot.
On November 1, 2003, at precisely noon, Confederate Pictures captured an image on film of the real White Lady Ghost of Avenel House. The image was not released in the original PORTRAIT OF A PLANTATION 2003 documentary because it was not discovered until February 9, 2004, at precisely midnight. By that time, the film had already been released to the public. At this time, the image is only available on the 2005 Confederate Pictures release, Avenel the Motion Picture.
The image is, by the way, completely materialized, and fully visible - as a period-dressed woman standing on the Southeast corner of the porch..
.The ghost is usually thought to be either Fan, or Mrs. Francis Burwell, Letitia's mother... but Kate and Fan were redheads, and the photo clearly shows a dark-haired woman. Also, Letitia, in her diary (which is housed in the Alderman Library at UVA), explains that the idea behind the white dress is her's. The 'flounced white muslin' dress the ghost in the photo is wearing is actually the one that Letitia describes in her diary... Also, there are several paintings of Letitia's Mother, the 'Old Miss' matriarch of the home, and she is not the woman in the ghost photo. The Old Miss is too large to be the woman in the ghost photo.
The White Dress came about because Avenel House was named for a Castle Avenel in Scotland, the ruins of which are haunted by a forlorn white female spectre. This account was taken from Sir Walter Scott's novel THE MONASTERY (available on the Project Gutenberg website in its entirety...). In Chapter 17 of that writing, The White Lady of Avenel is actually a young widow who haunts the ruins of Castle Avenel. Young Letitia was so taken by the idea of a white lady ghost named Mary Avenel that she wore a real blinding white muslin dress whenever she visited other homes, or entertained at Avenel House - throughout her life... She has apparently continued this tradition, to this day...
NOTE: The use of the 'young widow' (in Sir Walter Scott's novel, THE MONASTERY and as one of Lettie Burwell's favorite stories), was applied to Letitia's story in the 'morality play' called AVENEL THE MOTION PICTURE (2005) in reference to her 'love', the Southland, in the form of a Captain Joshua Thomas Beauregard, who, like. the romanticized Southland, can be seen as 'fictional'
.
It is believed that she showed up in the 'ghost photo' in order to put her stamp of approval on the project. It was for this reason that Confederate Pictures was created, and continues to defend her cause in film, and in its projects, and to seek the truth as to what actually happened during that time period...
To quote her from her diary:
My name is Letitia Burwell. I wish to leave a record of plantation life as it was... the truth may thus be preserved among a few, and merited praise may be awarded to noble men and virtuous women who have passed away...
Clearly, she has gotten our undivided attention in the matter.
This is the only time she has ever allowed herself, living or dead, to be photographed. The man who painted the portraits in the home was 'Cousin Harvey Mitchell', who, as Letitia writes, "forfeited the esteem of his Virginia friends by remaining with the Lincoln administration..." Thus, she would not sit for him...
There is a photograph of Rosa, the youngest daughter in the home, so it is known that the ghost photo is not of her, either...
Add to that, the descriptions given of Letitia, when she lived... of an extremely-small dark-haired woman in a white dress... It has to be Miss Lettie who is in the November 1, 2003 photograph... The real White Lady differs from Kristin Stroebel in that she is 12 or so inches shorter than Kristin is, and her dark hair is more full, not tied back, but perhaps in ringlets, or a short cascade - which is shoulder length. Her sleeves are full (flounced) and gathered at the wrists, and she has a very narrow waist... Her dress might support a hoop underneath, but as she is standing behind the railing, this is hard to determine... The documentary also documents the strange sightings that are claimed, including the ghost walking across Second Street back to the house and stopping a man in his car. When the man got out of his car to question her stepping out in front of him, she walked up behind the great red barn and disappeared into a tree. Here she is shown exactly where it happened... Crossing Second Street and then onto the modern Avenel property... (it used to all be Avenel property!)
