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Following in the tradition of the original enslaved plasterers, William M. Hill, a second-generation master plasterer from Clinton, NC, and his team of artisans repaired extensive plaster damage resulting from the 1972 fire at the Bellamy Mansion. During 1992 and 1993 — 20 years after the blaze set by arsonists — they restored the ornamental plasterwork and fabricated the missing parts by hand.  Bellamy plasterers Johnny Allen and Durand McCollum (back row); Ray Wynn, William Hill and Chester Wynn (front row). Hill's journey to become a master of his craft was a fascinating one, as uncovered by historian David Cecelski in a 2006 interview with Hill, then age 77, published in The Raleigh News & Observer. According to Cecelski, Hill was “a soft-spoken, spiritual man” who described the work of the Bellamy’s enslaved artisans as “unsurpassed.” Following are excerpts from the article, in William M. Hill’s words: My daddy was in building, and I’m guessing it was just in my blood. He didn’t finish the second grade, but he became a master plasterer. People beat a path to his door because he was good. He knew how to work. The appearance of his work was good. It was solid, it was sturdy. I learned everything from him. I stayed just as close to him as his underwear. I started with my daddy when I was 11 years old. My brother and I were there, there wasn’t anybody to keep us, so daddy carried us to the job. Plastering is as old as Time. It was done in biblical days. It was a means of covering up wood studs and wood ceiling joists, and it was done by hand, and still is. It hasn’t changed much. It takes four years to get from apprentice laborer to plasterer. But you never get above labor. You never get above that common job: making up that mortar, pushing a wheelbarrow, building a scaffold. You learn how to mix the mortar. Your plaster material is a rock, a mineral that comes out of the earth, and you mix it with sand and water. You learn how to put it on the wall or a ceiling with a trowel. It’s something that you learn the feel of with your hands. When I was 19 years old, he (Hill’s dad) turned the business over to me, lock, stock and barrel.  William Hill works to restore the intricate plasterwork damaged by fire in the Bellamy Mansion's front parlor. He successfully preserved the "unsurpassed" work of the original enslaved artisans. In my younger years, I liked newer buildings: hit them and go. But I realized, in my older years, it is a challenge to go in something like the Bellamy Mansion, a building that is 150 years old. You have to get into the minds of those plasterers and they’re dead. If you don’t, you can’t redo what they’ve done. Now, to John Doe it might not mean a thing. But for me to go in there and take this stuff that is damaged by fire and time and restore it identical, that’s a challenge. He described his perfectionism to museum staff as standing in the center of the room, staring at the plaster, climbing up and down a ladder to retouch with a putty knife, for hours, inch by laborious inch, to get it right. A wood and metal template fabricated by the team, and used to get the curvature of crown molding, was one sign of Mr. Hill's aim to do this work in a similar manner to the original plasterers. William Hill (pictured below in 2008) worked on hospitals, city halls, courthouses, jails, schools, banks, theaters, and churches. His work can be found in buildings on the campuses of both UNC-Chapel Hill and NC State, and his plasterer's tool is forever immortalized in the Bellamy Museum northwest library. He died in 2022, aged 92. 
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On March 13, 1972, disaster struck the Bellamy mansion. Arsonists poured gasoline on the floors and set fire to the house. Damage was most severe in the northwest room on the first floor and in the central passage. Plaster had fallen and broken in many rooms, wood was charred and some destroyed, and fixtures and mirrors were damaged. The antebellum house, built mostly by enslaved workers in 1861, and that had previously needed only ordinary repairs and repainting, now required major restoration. Still intact on the outside, the mansion stood fire-damaged and empty at the heart of the city of Wilmington.
Although no culprits or motives were ever determined, the best theory behind the 1972 fire at the Bellamy Mansion is that it was political in nature. Throughout the south, public schools were being desegregated, bringing Black and White children together in the classrooms. New Hanover County, of which Wilmington is a part, had begun integrating its high schools in 1968. Black students were bused to the White schools and not given the same opportunities as the White students. It was a tumultuous time in Wilmington, scarred by protests, fires and widespread violence. In early February 1971, Black students staged a school boycott to protest systematic mistreatment by the city’s education authorities, teachers, police, and White adult thugs who harassed them on school grounds. Amid the chaos that ensued, a White-owned mom-and-pop store called Mike’s Grocery was burned. In March 1972, nine Black men (five of them high school students) and one White woman — the Wilmington Ten — were charged and convicted of that fire based on perjured testimony.  Heyward C. Bellamy served as Superintendent of Schools from 1968 to 1981; Black students demonstrating in front of city hall in February 1971 to demand protection from the Rights of White People vigilantes and the police. Photo: NHCPL. How does the fire set by arsonists at the Bellamy Mansion factor into this narrative? Many observers at the time linked the arson to conflicts over the school district’s integration. Heyward C. Bellamy, a distant cousin of the family, was the Superintendent of Schools overseeing that effort, which was unpopular among both Whites and Blacks. He became a lightning rod for community tensions. Once, he was shouted down by angry Black students. On another evening, hundreds of sympathizers with the group Rights of White People demonstrated on Bellamy's lawn and let the air out of his car's tires. His name alone may have been the catalyst for the Bellamy fire.
An alternate theory to the “fire of incendiary origin,” as described in the local newspaper, is that the Bellamy house may have been attacked as a symbol of the Old South. In early 1972, prior to the March fire, members of the Bellamy family formed a charitable corporation called Bellamy Mansion, Inc. to assure the preservation and restoration of the mansion and all its antebellum glory. For some Wilmingtonians, that may not have sat well. We simply don't know. Subsequent fires, for which the causes were unknown but were not ruled arson, destroyed the home of John D. Bellamy Jr. at 602 Market Street in August 1972, and the Robert Bellamy house in 1980 (the latter is now the parking lot for the Bellamy Museum).  John Bellamy Jr.'s house at 602 Market Street was owned by his granddaughter, Emma Bellamy Williamson Hendren, when it was engulfed by fire in August 1972. (Sources: Wilmington News article “Fire Hits Bellamy Mansion,” March 14, 1972; Catherine W. Bishir’s “The Bellamy Mansion”; Kenneth Robert Janken’s “The Wilmington Ten: Violence, Injustice, and the Rise of Black Politics in the 1970s”) When his father died in 1826, nine-year-old John D. Bellamy inherited 21 enslaved people. By 1860 he owned 114 in North Carolina, spread across three counties. He had 82 enslaved men, women, and children working at "Grovely," Bellamy’s produce plantation in Brunswick County. In Columbus County, there were 24 enslaved men between the ages of 17-40 who lived and worked at "Grist," Bellamy’s turpentine plantation. And in New Hanover County at the 503 Market Street townhome, nine domestic enslaved workers maintained the property and served the Bellamy family and their guests. The museum is fortunate to know their names and something of their lives.
The Bellamys moved into the home with their eight children, who ranged in age from a 19-year-old daughter, Belle, to 18-month-old Chesley. Primary care of the youngest Bellamy children was the responsibility of Joan, an enslaved wet nurse and nanny. Joan’s young daughter, Caroline, was described in a family memoir as matriarch Eliza Bellamy’s “little maid” who followed her “foot to foot.” She likely helped Mrs. Bellamy with her morning routine while Joan roused and tended to the Bellamy children. As coachman, Guy cared for the carriage as well as the horses. Each morning he prepared to drive Dr. Bellamy to his properties, or take Mrs. Bellamy and the children to visit friends or relatives. He ran errands in town and needed written permission from the Bellamys to legally purchase goods. Laws regulated where and when enslaved people could go, with whom they could do business, and with whom they could spend their leisure time. Wilmington’s slave owners nevertheless often disregarded the laws if it benefitted them.  Similar to the image of an enslaved worker shown at left, Rosella spent most of her 16-hour workdays as a laundress. She washed and dried linens and clothing for the Bellamys and their guests in the slave quarters’ laundry room. She was likely assisted by Mary Ann; together they ironed in a basement room in the mansion. The youngest enslaved girls likely helped carry laundry bundles and fold napkins.  The slaves used these exterior stairs to move between the mansion’s floors as their daily work required. The enslaved women and girls who were not preoccupied with the Bellamy children, meal preparations, or laundry spent their afternoons climbing the slave stairs as they cleaned, dusted, polished silver, and readied the mansion for guests. Guy served the evening meal, while Caroline used a “shoo fly” to ensure diners’ meals were insect free. They would then tend to the needs of the family and their guests after dinner in the parlors while Sarah tidied the kitchen and Mary Ann washed dishes. Joan put the Bellamy children to bed, and after all guests left for the night, the slaves retired to their bed chambers. Their workday ended around 10 o’clock, but they were on-call 24 hours a day. After a few hours’ slumber, the market house bell rang and another day began.
Source: Bellamy Mansion Museum Slave Quarters Exhibit.
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