he wanted to give his wife's slaves their freedom as soon as he was able." In 1859, Grant freed William Jones, the only person he is known to have enslaved. During the Civil War, some enslaved people at White Haven simply walked off, as they did on many plantations in both Union and Confederate states. Missouri's constitutional convention abolished slavery in the state in January 1865, freeing any enslaved people still living at White Haven. "I Ulysses S. Grant... do hereby manumit, emancipate and set free from Slavery my Negro man William, sometimes called William Jones... forever." Post-Grant history The Grants turned White Haven over to William Henry Vanderbilt in 1881, to satisfy a loan Vanderbilt gave Grant after one of the latter's financial partners absconded with embezzled investment funds. A portion of the plantation was later purchased by Adolphus Busch, where he developed his Grant's Farm property, and the acreage around the main house was rescued from development of a Grant-themed amusement park in 1913 by Albert Wenzlick, a St. Louis real estate developer. The house was maintained by Wenzlick and his son until the latter's death in 1979. The property was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979, and was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1986. In 1989, White Haven became a part of the National Park Service, and is currently one of more than 400 sites managed by that agency. The current superintendent is M. Tucker Blythe. See also General Grant National Memorial (Grant's Tomb), New York City, New York Grant Cottage State Historic Site, on Mount McGregor, Wilton, New York Ulysses S. Grant Home, Galena, Illinois Grant Boyhood Home, Georgetown, Ohio Grant Birthplace, Point Pleasant, Ohio Grant's Farm History of slavery in Missouri List of National Historic Landmarks in Missouri National Register of Historic Places listings in St. Louis County, Missouri References Other sources Casey, Emma Dent. "When Grant Went A-Courtin'." Unpublished manuscript, Ulysses S. Grant NHS collection. Grant, Julia Dent. The Personal Memoirs of Julia Dent Grant (Mrs. Ulysses S. Grant). Southern Illinois University Press, 1988. Greene, Lorenzo, et al. Missouri's Black Heritage. University of Missouri Press, 1993. Hurt, R. Douglas. Agriculture and Slavery in Missouri's Little Dixie. University of Missouri Press, 1992. Vlach, John Michael. Back of the Big House. University of North Carolina Press, 1993. Wade, Richard C. Slavery in the Cities: The South 1820–1860. Oxford University Press, 1964.