Oakland Plantation was established in 1735 with a royal grant to William Sanders, who built a house and tavern, or “publick house,” there. That house was either extensively remodeled into or replaced by the present house featuring a central hall, built about 1816 by William Sanders IV and further enlarged by his son William Sanders V shortly before the Civil War. On April 18, 1865, in the last days of the Civil War, the house was the headquarters of Confederate Maj. Gen. P.M.B. Young and was struck by an artillery shell in a brief skirmish. The next day it was the headquarters of Federal Brig. Gen. Edward E. Potter and a field hospital. Renamed “Dixie Hall” in the 1950s, it remained in the hands of the Sanders family until 1981.