Keller-Homeplace Plantation

Hahnville, Louisiana.

Digital photo by John Sheldon Perilloux 9/21/98
copyright © 1998-2001 John Sheldon Perilloux. All rights reserved

Home Place Plantation was built on a Spanish land grant of 10,000 acres in late 1790 for Pierre Gaillard (or possibly for his widow) by Charles Paquet, the same free man of color who built Destrehan, just across the river.

Home-Place is a near perfect example of a raised Creole plantation house.

In 1800 the widow Gaillard sold the home and property to Louis Edmond Fortier, and over the next twenty years of his ownership, he added considerable land to his holdings. Among the interests of Mr. Fortier, was the raising of thoroughbred horses.

Edmond Fortier died in 1849, and his wife sold the home, jointly, to their son, Drausin and three of their sons-in-law. Drausin died of yellow fever in 1856.

The property changed ownership several times over the next 37 years, until in 1893, it was purchased by Pierre Anatole Keller and his brother-in-law, Ulysses Haydel. They divided it, with Keller retaining the upriver portion, with the home. Haydel held ownership of the downriver portion, and renamed it Caneland. Until he could complete his home in 1895, he lived in a garconniere, which he had moved over from Home Place.

Keller and his son Theodore began renovating the old home, which was by now called Keller-Homeplace, in 1904, in the process making major alterations. In addition they planted an alee of pecan trees up the front drive.

Though the property is now vacant, it is still owned and maintained by the Keller family