The Bellamy Mansion, built between 1859 and 1861, is a mixture of Neoclassical architectural styles, including Greek Revival and Italianate, and is located at 503 Market Street in the heart of downtown Wilmington, North Carolina. It is one of North Carolina’s finest examples of historic antebellum architecture. It is a contributing building in the Wilmington Historic District.
Background In 1860, Wilmington was the largest city in North Carolina by population and was number one in the world for the naval stores industry. It was considered a cosmopolitan port city where men like Dr. John D. Bellamy could advance themselves politically, economically and culturally. Designed with Greek Revival and Italianate styling, this twenty-two room house was constructed with the labor of both enslaved skilled carpenters and freed black artisans. In 1860 this was a construction site. The architect James F. Post, a native of New Jersey, and his assistant, draftsman Rufus W. Bunnell of Connecticut, oversaw the construction of the mansion. Originally built as a private residence for the family of Dr. John D. Bellamy, a prominent plantation owner, physician, and businessman, the mansion has endured a remarkable series of events throughout its existence. Mrs. Bellamy’s formal gardens were not planted until closer to 1870, and when the mansion was first built there were no large shade trees like today. By the time Dr. Bellamy and Eliza Bellamy moved into the house in early 1861, they had been married twenty years and moved in with eight children who ranged in age from a young adult all the way to a toddler. In fact, Eliza was pregnant with her tenth child. Ten Bellamys moved into the big house while nine enslaved workers moved into the outbuildings. The home was taken over by federal troops during the American Civil War, survived a disastrous fire in 1972, was home to two generations of Bellamy family members, and now following extensive restoration and preservation over several decades, the Bellamy Mansion is a fully functioning museum of history and design arts.
It is now a stewardship property of Preservation North Carolina, a private nonprofit organization dedicated to the protection of historic sites in North Carolina.Bisher, Catherine W. The Bellamy Mansion Wilmington North Carolina: An Antebellum Architectural Treasure and Its People 2004 PNC Inc.
The Bellamy family As a young man, John Dillard Bellamy, Sr. inherited a large piece of his father’s plantation in Horry County, South Carolina along with several enslaved workers. He moved to Wilmington, North Carolina, to begin studying medicine with Dr. William James Harriss. He left for two years in 1837 to study at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and he returned to Wilmington in 1839 to marry Eliza, Harriss' eldest daughter and take over Dr. Harriss’ medical practice following Eliza’s father’s untimely death in July. After their wedding, Bellamy took over Dr. William James Harriss' medical practice in July 1839. The Bellamys lived in the Dock Street home of Eliza’s newly widowed mother, Mary Priscilla Jennings Harriss. Upon his death, Dr. Harriss left behind his wife, along with seven children and fourteen enslaved workers who were also living at the household. John and Eliza welcomed four of their own children into the Dock Street home before they moved across the street in 1846 to the former residence of the sixteenth governor, Benjamin Smith. It was here, from 1852 to 1859, that the next five of the Bellamy’s ten children were born.
By 1860, as the Bellamy family prepared to move into their new home on Market Street, their family included eight children, ages ranging from one to nineteen. Along with the ten members of the Bellamy family, nine enslaved workers also lived at the household. In 1861, Robert Rankin was the last born of the children and the only one to be born in the mansion on Market Street.
Dr. Bellamy’s prosperity continued to grow through the second half of the nineteenth century and by 1850 he was listed as a "merchant" on the census. His medical practice was successful; however, the majority of his wealth came from his operation of a turpentine distillery in Brunswick County, his position as a director of the Bank of the Cape Fear, and his investment, as director and stockholder, in the Wilmington and Weldon Railroad. Grovely Plantation was "an almost ten thousand acre" produce plantation on Town Creek in Brunswick County, now a present-day Brunswick Forest development, on which Dr. Bellamy raised livestock and crops such as "wheat, oats, corn, and peanuts." In 1860, he had 82 enslaved workers living in 17 "slave cabins" at Grovely, while the family lived in a "comfortable and pleasant" home that was "no stately mansion." Grist Plantation was a turpentine plantation in Columbus County, near Chadbourn, North Carolina. Dr. Bellamy kept 24 enslaved men between the ages of 18 and 40 living in 9 slave cabins. The work was extremely difficult for the enslaved workers but very profitable for Dr. Bellamy. According to John D. Bellamy, Jr. his father told him concerning the home at 5th and Market the "amount of its cost was only one year's profit that he made at Grist." Dr. Bellamy was an extremely wealthy man as indicated by his land and slave holdings. In 1860, he owned 114 enslaved workers in North Carolina spread across three counties. Only 117 other men in the entire state owned between 100 and 199 enslaved workers out of a slave owning population of almost 35,000, meaning John D. Bellamy was in the upper echelon and of the planter class.
Paid and enslaved workers
Ten Bellamys moved into the big house while nine enslaved workers moved into the outbuildings. Guy Nixon, the butler and carriage driver for the Bellamys, would run errands, answer the door, and serve meals. Tony Bellamy, the caretaker, most likely conducted maintenance and grounds keeping on the property. The fact he took Dr. Bellamy’s last name after emancipation most likely means he lived primarily at Grovely and only came to town when needed. If the needed repairs and work required him to stay in Wilmington overnight or longer, he would have most likely slept in the same area as Guy. Sarah Miller Sampson (1815-1896) belonged to Dr. William Harriss, Dr. John D. Bellamy’s father-in-law, and was given to Eliza and John D. Bellamy in 1839, the year of their marriage and of Dr. Harriss’s untimely death just a few weeks after the ceremony. Rosella and six other females were also working in the home, including Joan, a wet nurse and nanny for the Bellamy children; Caroline, Joan’s daughter (who was 7 in 1860) and was described as Mrs. Bellamy’s "little maid" who followed Eliza "from foot to foot"; Mary Ann, a 14-year old in 1860 who was likely learning tasks from Sarah, Joan, and Rosella. A 4-year-old girl, a 3-year-old girl and a 1-year-old girl were also listed on the census.
The enslaved craftsmen, such as brick masons, carpenters, and plasterers, were hired by Dr. Bellamy in what was known as the "hiring out" system whereby enslaved workers would congregate at the Market House near New Year’s Day and wealthy men would engage them in temporal contracts, usually in construction. Rufus Bunnell noted on January 2, 1860, that "Hundreds of (N)egro slaves huddled about the Market House … sitting or standing in the keen weather" to renew their contracts.
Even those who had constructed the Bellamy Mansion would join in the war effort on both sides of the Mason–Dixon line. The architect, James F. Post had joined the Confederate artillery, and even helped to build various structures at Fort Fisher and Fort Anderson. As he had since returned to the north after his duties were completed, draftsman Rufus W. Bunnell had joined the Connecticut regiment of the Union Army.
William B. Gould, a mulatto, was owned by the Nixon family and was a plasterer who was hired out by Dr. Bellamy. The enslaved plasterer managed to escape from Wilmington with several other enslaved workers on the night of September 21, 1862. Eight enslaved workers rowed a small boat down the Cape Fear River to a Union blockade ship, where Gould and some of the others joined the Union navy. Despite it being illegal to teach slaves to read and/or write in North Carolina by 1830, Gould had kept an extensive diary during the war, which is thought to be one of only a few diaries written by a former slave serving in the Civil War in existence today. Gould later continued plastering in Massachusetts, where he married and had eight children. In the 1990s his great-grandson, William B. Gould IV, edited Gould’s diary into a book titled, Diary of a Contraband: The Civil War Passage of a Black Sailor.
After the family settled back into their home and Dr. Bellamy restarted production at Grovely, he was, of course, using paid labor. Of the enslaved workers who had resided here before the Civil War only one remained as a paid servant. Mary Ann Nixon was still working for the Bellamys in 1870 and still living in the slave quarters with one other "domestic servant." Sarah seemingly retired and by 1866 was living on Red Cross St. with her husband, Aaron Sampson. Sarah and Aaron were married when Sarah was just 15 years old, but they did not live together until she was about 50 years old. She was listed on the 1870 census as "keeping house." Aaron was an enslaved carpenter who continued as a carpenter in Wilmington after emancipation.
History
As the war continued, the Bellamys remained in residence at their new Market Street home. However, the deadly outbreak of a yellow fever epidemic had begun to spread throughout Wilmington and the family was forced to take refuge at Grovely Plantation. On January 15, 1865, Dr. Bellamy and his family learned that Fort Fisher had fallen to the federal troops under General Alfred H. Terry. This was a devastating blow to the Confederacy, as Wilmington was the last major port supplying the southern states.
While the family was still at Grovely Plantation, Federal troops arrived in Wilmington on February 22, having pushed many of the Confederate troops inland. Union officers took shelter in the nicer homes in town whose owners had been forced to abandon them. The Bellamy House was quickly occupied and chosen to be headquarters for the military staff. On March 1, 1865, General Joseph Roswell Hawley was placed in charge of the Wilmington District and assigned the Bellamy House. Soon after, the General’s wife Harriet Foote Hawley, an experienced war nurse, arrived in Wilmington in April 1865 to help tend to the wounded.
After the official end of the war in April 1865, the Federal Government seized southern property, including land, buildings, and homes of Dr. Bellamy. The Bellamys came to reclaim their house, but Dr. Bellamy was not allowed into Wilmington, courtesy of General Hawley — Dr. Bellamy's reputation preceded him. Gen. Joseph Hawley wrote about Dr. Bellamy to another Union officer upon receipt of Dr. Bellamy’s oath of allegiance to the federal government stating, "As a specimen of the temper of certain people I inclose a copy of an application from J.D. Bellamy, which explains itself. Bellamy was a rabid secessionist here and tyrannized over all suspected of Unionism. He ran away, but only to get under the feet of General Sherman’s forces. From a neighboring county he sends in this appeal. I have answered verbally that having for four years been making his bed, he now must lie on it for awhile. I have no time to take him within the lines."