Rose Hall Great House
The Rose Hall Great House is a former property that belongs to the Jamaican city of Montego Bay , but is about 15 kilometers away. The building was built in 1770 and is considered the most famous structure in Jamaica.
description
Rose Hall is considered to be the most famous structure in Jamaica. The building was built on a stone base in the Jamaican-Georgian style . The upper of the three floors is plastered on the front facade. Before the main floor there are spacious terraces from which two large stairways out. The main gate is framed like a triumphal arch .
Inside there is a large French-style ballroom, which is lined with silk wallpaper. The large staircase is made of handcrafted and carved tropical woods.
The property is located on a hill with a panoramic view of the Montengo Bay.
history
Rose Hall was completed in 1770 at a cost of £ 30,000. It was the so-called Great House of the English plantation owner John Palmer. The property included around 650 hectares of pasture land and sugar cane fields. Later, the great-nephew John Rose Palmer took over the property and the adjacent plantation called Palmyra . In total, more than 2000 enslaved Africans worked on the approximately 2,640 hectares of the Palmyra plantations. From 1845 the property was uninhabited and fell into disrepair.
In 1977 the Rose Hall Great House was acquired by former Miss USA Michele Rollins and her husband, entrepreneur John W. Rollins . The property was restored at great expense. Since then a museum has been located there, which deals with the history of slavery in Rose Hall and with mostly European antiques. There is also a bar and a restaurant on the ground floor.
Legends
According to an old legend, the ghost of a white witch named Annie Palmer haunts the house. The story goes that she was born in England and had an Irish father and English mother. The family spent most of their lives in Haiti. After both parents died of yellow fever, she was raised by a nanny who practiced witchcraft and voodoo . She moved to Jamaica and met John Palmer, the owner of the Rose Hall plantations. Annie Palmer murdered him to get his property. She later married two other wealthy men, whom she also murdered. She is also said to have taken male slaves who worked on the plantations as pleasure slaves and then killed them. She was later said to have been murdered by a slave named Takoo .
An investigation by the author and critic Benjamin Radford in 2007 found that the story is historically undetectable. The story is likely based on a 1929 novel by Jamaican author Herbert G. de Lisser called "The White Witch of Rosehall" . The character Annie Palmer cannot be historically proven. The name could be derived from Rosa Palmer, who ruled Rose Hall in her day and had four husbands. However, she is said to have lived a virtuous life. Nevertheless, the story continues to be told during tours of the building.
Pop Culture
TV, literature
- The third part of Diana Gabaldon's novel Fire and Stone series is about Rose Hall and the Annie Palmer legend, among others.
- An episode of the American TV series Ghost Adventures takes place in and around Rose Hall.
- The 19th season finale of America's Next Top Model had the Rose Hall Estate as a set .
- The American TV program Scariest Places on Earth dedicates an episode to the Rose Hall legend.
music
- Musician Johnny Cash wrote a song about the legend of Rose Hall. It's called The Ballad of Annie Palmer .
- The band Coven released the song "The White Witch of Rose Hall" on their first album Witchcraft Destroys Minds & Reaps Souls from 1969 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e description on InselJamaika.de
- ↑ a b frommers.com - Great House Review
- ↑ a b c Things to do in Jamaica - Rose Hall Great House
- ↑ a b c d The Legend of Annie Palmer - JamaicaTravelAndCulture.com
- ^ Benjamin Radford: The White Witch of Rose Hall. In: Fortean Times . September 2008, ISSN 0308-5899
- ↑ Thomas Polly: The Rough Guide to Jamaica. Penguin, 2010, ISBN 978-1-4053-8205-2 .
Coordinates: 18 ° 30'59 " N , 77 ° 49'9" W.