In the main section of the Hairston family cemetery at the Beaver Creek plantation rest the graves of twenty-one Hairston family members who passed away while the family owned the property. But there are two graves in that same section that do not belong to the Hairstons, at least not by blood. Those two stones belong to Surry and Esther, an enslaved couple whose story quietly lives on in the history of Beaver Creek.
Surry and Esther lived on the Beaver Creek plantation during the mid nineteenth century. As is true with most enslaved people, very few records exist of their daily lives. However, through a handful of family writings, we are able to piece together small but meaningful glimpses into who they were.
One example comes from Ann Hairston, who owned Beaver Creek with her husband, Marshall. She once sent Surry into town for cheese. Rather than returning with something ordinary, Surry came back with the finest cheese he could find. Ann noted that it cost more than she would have paid, but she also wrote that Surry was the best servant they had.
Surry’s responsibilities went far beyond errands. He served as Marshall Hairston’s personal assistant and traveled with him each fall to Mississippi, where Marshall managed another Hairston property called Billy’s Creek. They would spend the winter there preparing for the coming year before returning home in the spring. In Marshall’s letters back to Virginia, he often closed with a postscript that said, “Tell Esther that Surry sends his love and is doing well.” Those words reveal a devotion that distance and circumstance could not diminish.
The Civil War changed everything. Billy’s Creek was burned near the war’s end, most likely by Union troops. Marshall later wrote that he and Surry remained until they could hear the Yankee guns. Back in Virginia, the war came even closer to Beaver Creek when Stoneman’s cavalry clashed less than a mile away. At the time, Confederate General Jubal Early, Marshall’s cousin, was recovering from pneumonia at the plantation. It was Surry who warned Early that Union soldiers were near and urged him to flee. Early later recalled that Surry even misled Union troops, claiming that Early had just ridden out of town in the opposite direction. Early escaped capture, was given three hundred dollars in gold by his cousins, and departed for Mexico.
When the war ended in 1865, emancipation came to all who had been enslaved. By Christmas, most of the freed people at Beaver Creek had left to begin new lives in Henry County and beyond. But two remained, Surry and Esther. Marshall and Ann arranged for them to be formally married and gave them a home on the property, where they continued to live and work alongside the family.
We do not know exactly when Surry and Esther died. What we do know is how deeply they were respected. They were buried not in a separate ground, but inside the Hairston family cemetery itself, only a few plots from Marshall, Ann, and the children Esther had likely helped raise. Their gravestone is simple, inscribed only with “Surry and Esther,” and decorated with a carved symbol of two hands joined together.
Surry and Esther, together in life, and together in death.
Jarred Marlowe is a local resident and historian. He is a member of the Col. George Waller Chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution, the Blue & Gray Education Society, and the committee chair for the Martinsville-Henry County 250 Committee. He may be reached at marloweja15@gmail.com.
