Hofwyl-Broadfield Plantation
In the early 1800s William Brailsford of Charleston carved a rice plantation from the salt marshes along the Altamaha River, and five generations of the Dent family lived in the antebellum house until Ophelia Dent, the last heir, willed it to Georgia in 1973. Of all the children raised there, only little James Dent Jr. never grew up — he died of croup at four and a half in 1887, and he is the one who lingers.
Staff and visitors describe a small boy on the porch steps or standing quietly at the foot of a bed, and one site manager says he has spoken with the child, as if the youngest Dent still seeks the recognition his short life never gave him.
📍 5556 U.S. Highway 17 N, Brunswick, GA 31525, Brunswick, GA · Get directions