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31 Parlange is situated on the banks of False River near New Roads in Pointe Coupée Parish. According to tradition, it was built about 1750–1754 for Vincent de Ternant, Marquis de Dansville-sur-Meuse (ca. 1710–1757), a French immigrant with a land grant from the French crown and a contract with Prussian interests to produce indigo. Parlange is often cited as one of the earliest examples of a French raised cottage and of French Colonial construction techniques in the state, though it is difficult to ascertain how much of the original structure remains in the wake of renovation, addition, and remodeling campaigns that began about 1820. A steep roof with a pair of dormer windows on the front and back, an encircling main floor gallery with slender cypress colonnettes, and tapering brick Tuscan columns below are distinguishing features. The upper story is constructed of cypress timbers in- filled with bousillage (a mixture of mud and Spanish moss) placed on barreaux (a cypress lattice support also known in Louisiana as cats) and covered with stucco. The ground floor is composed of bricks molded and fired on site. Circumstantial evidence suggests that Charles Paquet (fl. 1787–1791), a free man of color, may have been the builder. The main house underwent extensive alteration about 1835–1840, with the addition of exterior stairs. A son, also known as the Marquis de Ternant (1757–1818), appears to have inherited the house. The plantation then descended to Claude Vincent de Ternant II (1786–1842), followed by his second wife Virginie (née Trahan; 1818–1889). The de Ternants became among the first to grow sugarcane successfully in Louisiana, eventually abandoning indigo. After Marquis Claude’s death in 1842, Virginie married Charles Parlange (ca. 1810–ca. 1864), a former colonel in the French army. According to local tradition, during the Civil War the main house was spared destruction by federal troops after Madame Parlange treated Union general Nathaniel P. Banks and his men to a feast on tables spread beneath the oaks. Her son Charles (1851–1907) became associate justice of the Supreme Court of Louisiana and later federal judge of the Eastern District of Louisiana. Charles’s former law partner, E. D. White, became chief justice. Virginie’s granddaughter from her first marriage, Virginie Amélie Avegno Gautreau (1859– 1915), posed for John Singer Sargent’s famous painting Madame X (1884). Virginie’s grandson, Walter Charles Parlange (ca. 1895–1968), and his wife Paule (née Brièrre; ca. 1889–1981) returned to the house in 1918. Members of the Parlange family continue to live in the house and operate Parlange as a cattle and sugarcane plantation. In his photographs, Tebbs seems to be appealing both to artistic and documentarian interests. PARLANGE PLANTATION ca. 1754/1820/1835–1840 Parlange Plantation (front door), gelatin silver print, Louisiana State Museum, 1956.087.160 Parlange Plantation (front view from a distance), vintage gelatin silver print, Louisiana State Museum, 1956.087.209 32 Voisin Plantation (side elevation), vintage gelatin silver print, Louisiana State Museum, 1956.087.297b ...

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