By Chuck Hustmyre
(Continued)
Chloe's Plan
Sometime following her banishment to the kitchen, Chloe, who had taken to wearing a scarf wound around her head to cover her missing ear, came up with a scheme to get back into the judge's good graces and back into his house, perhaps even back into his bed. Chloe baked a cake for the judge's two children and mixed into the confection the residue of boiled oleander leaves.
Chloe's plan was to make the children sick and then offer to nurse them back to health. In return for her services, the judge would be compelled to reappoint her as the children's nanny.
The only problem was, Chloe mixed in too much oleander.
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| The Myrtles Plantation house |
Both of the judge's children and his wife died after eating the cake.
According to the legend, when the other slaves learned what Chloe had done, they dragged her to a tree behind the house and hanged her. After she was dead, they weighted her body down with stones and threw her into the river.
Judge Woodruff sold the house and moved to New Orleans. Before he left, he planted crape myrtles throughout the property, which is how the plantation later derived its name.
The killing of the judge's family and the hanging of his children's former nanny are but four of at least 10 murders that have been committed on the plantation's property since construction was completed in 1796.
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