Glen Aubin, commonly known as the Rounds Plantation, is located about twelve miles south of Natchez and is accessed from Hutchins Landing Road about three miles from its intersection with U.S. Highway 61 South. Glen Aubin is a story and a half, frame, Greek Revival plantation residence that rests upon large brick foundation piers. The gabled roof is pierced by two interior brick chimneys which are topped by arched brick hoods, one hood for each flue. The front slope of the roof features two gabled and pilastered dormer windows that light the upper half story of the house. The finished rooms of the upper half story were not an original feature of the house but were added not long after the house was built. The northerly facade is fronted by a gallery with round, stuccoed-brick, Doric columns which are echoed on the ends of the facade by wide, wooden pilasters. The three- bay facade is finished in stucco, scored in imitation of stone. Occupying the center bay is the main entrance to the house which, like the flanking secondary entrances is raised two steps above gallery floor, level and featues a symmetrically molded surround with corner and plinth blocks. The main entrance is filled with a single-leaf, molded, two-panel door set within transom and sidelights. The secondary entrances are filled with single-leaf doors, each with one molded panel set beneath a twelve-light, glazed upper panel. The interior plan is a double-pile plan, three rooms wide, with no central passage. Originally, before the roof line was altered to accommodate the two upper story bedrooms, the rear range of rooms consisted of a hallway with two smaller rooms sharing a central chimney on the eastern side and one room on the western side. About a decade after the house was built, the chimney was removed and the wall configuration altered to allow for construction of a stairway entered from the newly created, center rear room. This partially enclosed stairway is entered on the southern wall in a short straight flight where it makes a quarter turn with winders to continue in an unbroken flight along the eastern wall to terminate in the eastern second-story bedroom. The three front rooms of the first story are well trimmed with, symmetrically molded surrounds, molded six-panel doors, molded bases with two fascias, and wooden pilastered mantel pieces. The easternmost room is further elaborated by a full, plaster entablature, and the westernmost room features a fireplace closet. The rear rooms vary only in having molded architrave surrounds. The upper story bedrooms are more plainly trimmed with beaded baseboards, unmolded six-panel doors, architrave surrounds, and a simpler pilastered mantel piece in the western room. The eastern room is unheated and the eastern chimney rises through the room. Across the rear of the house is a gallery supported by unusual, rectangular-sectioned, tapered, stuccoed-brick columns. At the southern corner of the rear gallery is an original cistern. Extending beyond the original gallery is a later gallery extension supported by crude posts. Although Glen Aubin is only in fair condition, the house is structurally sound and possesses outstanding architectural integrity. Almost all original hardware, including carpenter locks, curtain tie-back brackets, fireplace jamb hooks, and Victorian picture hangers, have survived in place. Original paint colors and decorative oak graining are also found throughout the house. No original outbuildings have survived. Statement of Significance (in one paragraph): Glen Aubin is one of Mississippis unique residential essays in the vernacular Greek Revival Style. With its stucccded-brick columns, raised doorways, and exterior doors with glazed upper panels, the house would more typically weave into the architectural character of neighboring Louisiana. The house was constructed,as the residence of Adams County planter John Odlin Hutchins and his wife Aubin, from whom it derives its name, upon land acquired by Hutchinss grandfather, Anthony Hutchins, as an English land grant in the early 1780s. Coming to Natchez in 1772, Anthony Hutchins was the areas largest landholder and planter in the latter part of the eighteenth century (D. Clayton James, Antebellum Natchez [Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1968], p. 19). Stylistically, Glen Aubin appears to date from around 1835 to 1845 with the only major changes to the house having occurred ca. 1850, when the roof was raised to accommodate second-storybedrooms. The house is probably unique for Adams County in its use of stuccoed- brick columns on a story-and-a-half frame plantation house. The use of exterior doors with original, glazed upper panels is also very unusual, although a few other examples have been located on other Adams County buildings. Glen Aubin also has black history significance as the residence of the Rounds family from 1874 until 1984 (Adams County Deed Book XX:174 and 16-N:422 and 427). Charlie and Charity Rounds were either former slaves or free blacks who managed to secure the property on which John 0. Hutchins formerly resided (Deed Book XX:174)« The purchase was arranged by Wilmer Shields, plantation manager at neighboring Laurel Hill owned by William Newton Mercer. The name Charity appears in a list of slaves owned by Mercer (Final Record Book 1:165), and it is possible that Charity Rounds was a Laurel Hill slave who, with her husband, was assisted by Shields in acquiring a neighboring plantation. Like China Grove, Bourbon, and Oakland, Glen Aubin was one of several plantations in southwest Adams County that were purchased by former slaves or their children in the years immediately following the Civil War. The Rounds family is responsible for the outstanding architectural integrity of the house, which includes the survival of all original hardware, oak graining, and interior and exterior paint colors. The house and some of the land is currently for sale. The picture on the left is from 1983/1984 and the pic on the right is a fairly current one. This plantation home is not far from Laurel Hill.  
Posted on: Sat, 15 Mar 2014 02:26:19 +0000
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