They were identical in every way except one.
Amara had a small scar above her left eyebrow while Adana did not.
This tiny difference was the only way people at Riverside Plantation could tell the twin sisters apart.
But on the morning of March 3rd, 1843 in St.
James Parish, Louisiana.
That distinction would become critically important because on that morning, Colonel Thomas Bowmont took his first sip from a bottle of rum that one of the twins had carefully poisoned 3 days earlier.
What followed was not a quick death, but a slow, agonizing decline that would take 6 months and claim not one life, but seven, unraveling the entire social order of the plantation in ways the twins never anticipated.
Amara and Adana were born in 1822 on Riverside Plantation to a woman named Kem who had been captured from what is now Nigeria and brought to Louisiana in 1820 just 12 years after the official end of the international slave trade.
Kem carried with her extensive knowledge of African medicinal plants and their properties knowledge that had been passed down through generations of healers in her village.
In Louisiana, she discovered that many plants with similar properties grew in the bayou and forests surrounding the plantation.
Kem taught her twin daughters everything she knew.
By the time they were teenagers, Amara and Adana could identify over 100 different plants and their uses.
They knew which herbs could cure fevers, which could ease pain, which could induce sleep, and crucially, which could kill.
This knowledge was power, dangerous power for enslaved people to possess.
So Kem taught them to hide it, to appear simple and unthreatening while quietly maintaining their expertise.
Knowledge is the one thing they cannot take from you.
Kem told her daughters.
They can own your body, sell your labor, but your mind remains your own.
Guard it carefully.
The twins worked in the big house as maids, chosen for this position because of their appearance.
Colonel Bowmont liked having attractive young women serving in his home, and the identical twins were considered a curiosity, a conversation piece for his guests.
The twins understood their precarious position and moved through the house like ghosts, silent, efficient, invisible.
Colonel Thomas Bowmont was a widowerower in his 50s, his wife having died in childbirth 10 years earlier along with the infant.
He had no children and no close family, which left him lonely, bitter, and increasingly dependent on alcohol.
Every evening he would sit on his gallery overlooking the Mississippi River, and drink rum, sometimes a bottle or more per night.
He kept an extensive stock in his study, bottles imported from the Caribbean, that he considered his private treasure.
The colonel was not the crulest master in Louisiana.
There were far worse, but he was unpredictable.
Alcohol made him volatile.
Some nights he was melancholy and harmless.
Other nights he was violent and dangerous.
The enslaved people at Riverside learned to read his moods and avoid him when the darkness was upon him.
In February 1843, something happened that would seal the colonel’s fate.
Kem, now 43 years old and still working in the kitchen, despite declining health, caught a severe fever.
Amara and Adana begged the colonel to allow them to care for their mother, to use their herbal knowledge to treat her.
The colonel refused, claiming that enslaved people didn’t need special treatment and that Kem would either recover on her own or she wouldn’t.
Your mother is my property, he told the twins coldly.
I’ll decide what care she receives, and I’ve decided she receives none.
If she’s too weak to work, she’s not worth the investment.
Kem died 3 days later, untreated, suffering, while her daughters were forbidden from even sitting with her during her final hours.
The twins were granted 2 hours to bury their mother in the slave cemetery behind the quarters, then were immediately ordered back to work in the big house.
That night, as Amara and Adana lay together in their small cabin, something fundamental changed between them.
They had always been close, bonded by the unique connection of twins.
But grief and rage forged that bond into something harder, sharper, more dangerous.
He killed her,” Adana whispered in the darkness as surely as if he’d struck her down himself.
“Yes,” Amara replied.
“And he will pay.” “If we’re caught,” Adana began.
“We won’t be caught,” Amara interrupted.
“Because we’re going to be very, very careful, and we’re going to use what Mama taught us.” Over the next week, the twins formulated their plan with meticulous precision.
They would use oleander, a common ornamental plant that grew abundantly around the plantation’s big house.
Every part of the oleander plant contains cardiac glycosides, compounds that disrupt the heart’s rhythm.
In small doses, it causes nausea and weakness.
In larger doses, it causes irregular heartbeat, confusion, and eventually cardiac arrest.
Crucially, its symptoms can mimic heart disease, making it difficult to identify as poison, especially in an era before sophisticated toxicology.
But the twins made a calculated decision.
They would not give the colonel a lethal dose all at once.
Instead, they would administer small amounts over time, creating a slow poisoning that would appear to be natural illness.
This served multiple purposes.
It would be harder to trace to a specific source.
It would give the colonel time to suffer as their mother had suffered, and it would allow the twins to control the process, potentially stopping if the risk became too great.
The challenge was delivery.
The colonel’s rum was kept in his private study, and while the twins had access to the room for cleaning, they couldn’t be seen tampering with the bottles.
They needed a method that was subtle, undetectable, and repeatable.
Amara proposed the solution.
Every 3 days they dusted and cleaned the colonel’s study, including polishing the bottles in his rum collection.
They could prepare an oleander extract mixed with a small amount of rum, then use a thin cloth soaked in this mixture to wipe the mouth of his favorite bottles.
When the colonel poured his drinks, a small amount of the poison would mix with the rum.
He would never taste it, never suspect it, and each drink would add to the cumulative toxin in his system.
On February 28th, 1843, exactly one week after Kemy’s death, the twins prepared their first batch of poison.
They collected oleander leaves and flowers in the early morning, claiming they were gathering plants for decorative arrangements, a task they’d performed many times before.
In their cabin, working by candle light, they crushed the plant material and extracted its toxic oils using a method their mother had taught them, mixing it with a small amount of stolen rum to create a potent solution.
The next day, March 1st, during their routine cleaning of the study, Hadana stood watch at the door while Amara carefully wiped the mouths of three rum bottles with a cloth soaked in their oleander mixture.
The entire process took less than 30 seconds.
No one saw, no one suspected.
That evening, Colonel Bowmont poured himself his customary glass of rum and drank it while watching the sunset from his gallery.
He noticed nothing unusual.
The twins continued their routine.
Every 3 days during cleaning, they reapplied the poison to the bottle mouths.
They kept careful mental track of which bottles they’d treated, varying them slightly to avoid any pattern.
They maintained their usual demeanor, quiet, efficient, invisible.
By mid-March, Colonel Bowmont began experiencing symptoms.
He complained of nausea and headaches.
His appetite decreased.
He attributed it to a stomach ailment and drank more rum to settle his nerves, unknowingly ingesting more poison with each glass.
By early April, the symptoms worsened.
The colonel developed irregular heartbeat and confusion.
His hands trembled.
He had episodes of disorientation where he couldn’t remember conversations or events.
His overseer, Samuel Richardson, suggested calling a doctor from New Orleans.
Dr.
Henri Lauron arrived on April 8th, 1843, and examined the colonel thoroughly.
He diagnosed heart disease, possibly brought on by years of heavy drinking.
He prescribed rest, a bland diet, and ironically, moderation in alcohol consumption.
He noted that the colonel’s heart showed signs of serious dysfunction and warned that his condition could be fatal if not managed carefully.
Colonel Bowmont largely ignored this advice.
He reduced his rum consumption slightly but refused to stop entirely.
He became irritable and paranoid.
Convinced that he was being worked to death by the stress of managing the plantation, he took his frustrations out on the enslaved people, becoming more violent and unpredictable than ever.
The twins watched all of this with cold satisfaction.
Their mother’s death was being avenged slowly, methodically.
They felt no guilt, only a sense of justice being served.
But in late April, something unexpected happened.
The colonel’s nephew, Robert Bowmont, arrived from Baton Rouge for an extended visit.
Robert was 28 years old, recently returned from studying law in Boston, and notably more progressive in his views than his uncle.
He was appalled by conditions on the plantation, and began arguing with the colonel about treatment of the enslaved people.
These arguments usually occurred in the evening on the gallery where the colonel would drink his rum and Robert would try to reason with him and sometimes when the colonel was too drunk or ill to finish a glass, Robert would drink the remainder rather than let it go to waste.
By early May, Robert began experiencing symptoms similar to his uncles.
Nausea, headaches, confusion.
The twins realized with horror what was happening.
They were accidentally poisoning an innocent man, or at least a less guilty one.
They faced a terrible dilemma.
If they stopped poisoning the rum, the colonel might recover and the opportunity for justice would be lost.
If they continued, Robert might die along with him.
Amara and Adana argued about this in whispered conversations in their cabin late at night.
Adana wanted to stop immediately, unwilling to harm Robert, who had shown them nothing but courtesy.
Amara argued that Robert’s unintended poisoning was unfortunate but acceptable collateral damage in their mission of justice for their mother.
He chose to be here.
Amara insisted he chose to benefit from this system to inherit this plantation eventually.
He’s not innocent.
He’s not the one who killed Mama.
Adana countered.
We are becoming what we hate.
We’re becoming murderers.
They compromised.
They would reduce the poison concentration and apply it less frequently, hoping to slow Robert’s symptoms while continuing the colonel’s decline.
But this compromise would prove inadequate.
By midMay, both the Colonel and Robert were seriously ill.
Doctor Lauron was called back and expressed grave concern.
He couldn’t understand why both men were exhibiting similar symptoms.
He began to suspect something in the environment.
perhaps bad water or contaminated food or myasma from the swamps.
The doctor ordered the entire household to switch to boiled water and questioned the cook extensively about food preparation.
He examined the enslaved people for signs of illness but found none.
This puzzled him further.
If there was an environmental cause, why were only the two white men affected? Amara and Adana lived in constant fear during this period.
Each doctor’s visit raised the possibility that their poisoning would be discovered.
They stopped applying the oleander mixture entirely, hoping that both men might stabilize and the investigation would end.
But the damage was done.
Oleander poisoning is cumulative and both men had been exposed for months.
Even without additional poison, the toxins already in their systems continued to affect their hearts.
On May 23rd, 1843, Robert Bowmont died.
He was 28 years old.
His death certificate listed the cause as heart failure.
His body was sent back to his family in Baton Rouge for burial.
His death devastated the colonel, who had genuinely cared for his nephew and had hoped Robert might inherit the plantation.
The twins received this news with profound guilt and conflict.
Adana wept privately, feeling responsible for killing a man who had shown them kindness.
Amara remained stoic, insisting they had to see their mission through, but even she felt the weight of Robert’s unintended death.
Colonel Bowmont’s condition continued deteriorating.
By June, he was mostly bedridden, his heart failing, his mind often confused.
He ranted about conspiracies and enemies, convinced someone was trying to kill him, but unable to identify who or how.
In his paranoid state, he accused various enslaved people of poisoning his food, resulting in several brutal whippings of innocent individuals.
The twins watched these punishments with anguish.
Their act of vengeance was causing suffering to others who had nothing to do with their mother’s death.
The moral weight of their actions grew heavier each day.
On July 1st, 1843, the colonel’s head overseer, Samuel Richardson, made a discovery.
While going through the colonel’s study, searching for important plantation records, he noticed that several rum bottles had a slight oily residue around their mouths.
Curious, he smelled it and detected a faint, bitter scent beneath the rum smell.
He couldn’t identify it, but something seemed wrong.
Richardson brought this to Dr.
Lauron’s attention during the doctor’s next visit.
Dr.
Lauron examined the bottles carefully and detected the same bitter scent.
His medical training, while limited by the era’s standards, included some knowledge of poisons.
He recognized the scent as possibly plant-based, perhaps something in the nightshade or dog bane family.
These bottles may have been tampered with, doctor Lauron told Richardson.
I believe the colonel and his nephew may have been poisoned.
Richardson immediately assembled all the house servants, including Amara and Adana, for questioning.
Each was asked about their access to the study, their knowledge of plants, any grievances they might have against the colonel.
The twins maintained their composure perfectly.
They answered questions simply and directly.
Yes, they cleaned the study regularly.
No, they had no knowledge of poisons.
No, they bore no ill will toward the master.
They were the picture of submissive, ignorant house servants.
But Richardson remained suspicious, particularly of the twins.
He had noticed how educated they seemed, how they carried themselves with unusual dignity.
He didn’t trust them.
He ordered them confined to their cabin under guard while he investigated further.
Over the next week, Richardson and Dr.
Lauron conducted a thorough investigation.
They examined all the food stores, interviewed everyone who had access to the colonel’s private spaces, and consulted medical texts about poisons.
Doctor Lauron became increasingly convinced that Oleander was the poison based on the symptoms and the bitter scent, but he couldn’t definitively prove it or identify the source.
Meanwhile, Colonel Bowmont’s condition reached its final stage.
On July 9th, 1843, he suffered a massive cardiac arrest and died.
He was 54 years old.
His death was officially recorded as heart disease.
Though Dr.
Lauron noted in his private records his suspicion of poisoning.
With the colonel dead, Richardson faced a decision.
He had strong suspicions about the twins, but no concrete proof.
Under Louisiana law, enslaved people could be tried for murder, and if convicted, they would be executed.
But convictions required evidence, and Richardson had only circumstantial suspicions.
Additionally, with the colonel’s death, the plantation entered legal limbo.
Robert’s family in Baton Rouge was contesting the will, claiming they deserve to inherit since Robert had died while staying at the plantation.
The entire property, including all enslaved people, was frozen as assets until the legal matters were resolved.
During this period of legal uncertainty, something unexpected happened.
A lawyer named Marcus Whitmore arrived from New Orleans representing an abolitionist organization that had been monitoring conditions at Riverside Plantation.
Robert Bowmont before his death had written to this organization expressing concerns about his uncle’s treatment of enslaved people and indicating he planned to free some of them if he inherited.
Whitmore used Robert’s letters and the legal confusion surrounding the estate to argue that several enslaved people should be freed immediately, including Amara and Adana.
He claimed, somewhat creatively interpreting the law, that since Robert had died with intent to free certain individuals, and since the colonel’s will was disputed, these individuals should be considered in a state of conditional freedom pending resolution.
This legal maneuver was unprecedented and unlikely to succeed, but it created enough confusion that Richardson, distracted by managing the plantation during the ownership dispute, couldn’t pursue his suspicions about the twins.
By the time the legal situation clarified months later, Whitmore had managed to secure the twins transfer to a Quaker family in Pennsylvania who officially employed them as paid servants, effectively removing them from Louisiana jurisdiction.
Amara and Adana left Riverside Plantation in November 1843, 8 months after they had begun poisoning the Colonel’s rum.
They traveled north with Witmore, leaving behind the only home they had ever known.
Carrying with them the weight of three deaths, the Colonels which they had intended, Roberts, which they had not, and their mothers, which had started it all.
In Philadelphia, the twins lived with the Quaker family and worked as paid domestic servants.
a dramatic change from enslavement.
They were together.
They were relatively safe and they were free.
But freedom brought its own torments, particularly guilt over Robert’s death.
Adana struggled profoundly with this guilt.
She became withdrawn and depressed, barely eating, sleeping fitfully, haunted by visions of Robert’s face.
In the spring of 1844, Adana fell ill with pneumonia, and weakened by her emotional state, died within a week.
She was 22 years old.
Amara was devastated by her twin’s death.
She had survived slavery, executed a complex revenge, escaped to freedom only to lose the person most important to her.
In her grief, she recognized that Adana had died from the weight of what they had done, that the guilt had consumed her as surely as poison.
Amara lived until 1889, reaching the age of 67.
She never married, never had children, and worked her entire life as a domestic servant in Philadelphia.
She was known as a quiet, skilled herbalist who made medicines for the city’s black community.
Few people knew her history.
In 1887, 2 years before her death, Amara was interviewed by a journalist named Sarah Grim, daughter of the famous abolitionist sisters, who was documenting formerly enslaved people’s experiences.
In this interview, conducted privately and not published until 1920, Amara told the complete story of what she and her sister had done at Riverside Plantation.
“I poisoned my master,” she said flatly.
“My twin sister and I, we poisoned him slowly using oleander to avenge our mother’s death.
He deserved what he got.
But we also killed his nephew accidentally, a man who didn’t deserve to die.
And my sister died from the guilt of it.
So I ask you, was our revenge worth three deaths? Was justice served, or did we just add more death to a system already drowning in it? Grim K asked if Amara regretted what she had done.
Amara was silent for a long moment, then replied, “I regret that we lived in a world where such choices seemed necessary.
I regret Robert’s death profoundly.
I regret that my sister couldn’t live with what we did, but do I regret killing the man who let our mother die when he could have saved her? No, I don’t.
That may make me a murderer in the eyes of law and perhaps God, but it makes me human in my own eyes.
Because humans seek justice even when the only justice available is the terrible kind.
The Riverside plantation still stands today, now a private residence in St.
James Parish.
The current owners, unaware of the property’s poisoning history, maintain the old big house and occasionally give historical tours focused on architectural details and plantation economy.
The slave quarters where Amara, Adana, and Kimmy lived were demolished in the 1920s.
In 2003, a historian named Doctor Jennifer Washington researched Amara’s story after discovering Grimkeyy’s unpublished interview in an archive.
Dr.
Washington cross-referenced Amara’s account with plantation records, death certificates, and Dr.
Lauron’s private medical journals, confirming most of the details.
Her book, The Poison in the Rama, Story of Slave Resistance in Antabbellum, Louisiana, was published in 2005 and brought Amara and Adana’s story to wider attention.
The book sparked considerable debate.
Some readers saw the twins as heroes who resisted their oppression using the only weapons available to them.
Others argued that poisoning, particularly poisoning that killed an innocent person, couldn’t be justified regardless of circumstances.
Still others focused on the tragedy of the situation.
That slavery created conditions where such desperate acts seemed like the only option for justice.
Dr.
Washington herself took a nuanced view.
We cannot judge Amara and Adana by comfortable modern standards.
They lived in a system that denied them all legal recourse, that treated them as property, that let their mother die unnecessarily.
Within that context, their actions were a form of resistance.
But they also illustrate the moral complexity of that resistance.
Violence, even justified violence, has consequences that ripple beyond the intended target.
Robert Bowmont died.
Adana died from guilt.
Amara lived with that weight for 45 years.
There are no clean victories in stories like this, only survival and the question of what price survival demands.
The cemetery where Kem was buried in 1843 still exists behind what used to be the slave quarters at Riverside Plantation.
It’s overgrown now, most markers long since decayed or disappeared.
But in 2006, following the publication of Dr.
Washington’s book.
Several of Kemy’s descendants traced through genealogical research visited the site and placed a permanent stone marker.
The inscription reads, “Kmi D.
1843, mother, healer, teacher.
She passed her knowledge to her daughters who used it to seek justice in an unjust world.
May her spirit and theirs rest in peace.” Amara is buried in a Quaker cemetery in Philadelphia.
Her grave marker is simple.
Amara 1822 1889 beloved sister skilled healer survivor.
There is no mention of what she did or what it cost her.
This is the story of the twin slaves who poisoned the colonel’s rum.
A story of grief transforming into vengeance, of calculated murder carried out over months, of unintended consequences and moral complexity.
It’s not a story with heroes and villains neatly separated, but rather one where desperate people made desperate choices in a system that offered them no good options.
Amara and Adana used their mother’s knowledge to kill the man they held responsible for her death.
In doing so, they also killed an innocent man and in a sense themselves.
The poison they administered wasn’t just to the colonel’s rum, but to their own souls.
a toxin that Adana couldn’t survive and that Amara carried until her death.
Their story asks uncomfortable questions about justice, revenge, and the moral costs of resistance in oppressive systems.
It offers no easy answers, only the historical reality that enslaved people sometimes fought back using whatever weapons they had, and that those weapons, however justified their use, might have been, always came with a price.
The oleander plants still grow around the old big house at Riverside Plantation.
Beautiful and deadly like the story itself.
A reminder that poison, whether in plants or in social systems, spreads in ways we cannot always control, affecting innocent and guilty alike, leaving scars that last for generations.
