The Powis Gates

Jan 6th, 2022

Visited on Weekday Wait time No wait Reservation recommended No More
Dec 6th, 2022

May 8th, 2022

A standout historical monument on campus. Hard to miss!
Feb 16th, 2022

The history of thePowisGate is very interesting. It looks like afairytalebut has a dark story. ThePowisgate, Old Aberdeen, was built in 1834 with gains from the work of enslaved people on Jamaican plantations. Among them wasQuasheba. 7 children are also listed as havingQuashebaas a mother: Patsy, James, Junes,Edlin,Habbie, Samuel, and Bessie Jones.These names are taken from registries, between 1817 and 1832, of the enslaved on Castile Fort Pen Estatein the possession of Hugh Fraser Leslie. ThePowisLeslie family built this gate in 1833/34, partly with compensation money for the Abolition of slavery. The enslaved were not compensated. On 22ndMay 2021 an event was held at the gate to mark its links to slavery. A poem, The Violence of Identity was performed and two ceramic panels were hung back to back on the iron gate with rope. One had the poem embossed on it and one an imagined portrait ofQuashebaand the quote from a classical African playwright, Publius TerentiusAfer: Homo sum,humaninihil a mealienumputo, I am human, I consider nothing human alien to me.
Jan 19th, 2022