NATCHEZ — For some, the first day of Spring Pilgrimage is a chance to talk about antique furniture and Greek revival architecture.

But for Andrew Baker, it was a chance to tell some of the family stories.

Baker, the great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandson of the founders of Landsdowne, George and Charlotte Marshall, was at the front of the house Saturday, greeting visitors as they arrived on Pilgrimage.

Spring Pilgrimage is an annual four-week tour of Natchez’s antebellum homes, most of which are private homes and not open during the year.

Landsdowne is the last home in Natchez occupied by the descendents of the people who built it

While Baker would give the guests an introduction to the house and grounds, that wasn’t what he would focus on. Instead, he would tell the stories of the family that his grandmother told him every night before bed when he was young.

“I don’t really like to talk about when and where furniture was made, I think it’s kind of boring,” he said.

“But our family has an oral history, and (my grandmother) would always tell me a story about things that happened.”

Baker’s stories often included paradoxes, of landowners who had thousands of slaves but were Union sympathizers, of family members who fought for the South while others invested their money in Northern banks.

“When (they) did that, (my relative) said he knew that, no matter who won the war, the Union currency was going to be the one that was recognized and not the Confederacy,” Baker said. “He said he would rather have his fortune than his honor.”

Likewise, when the family freed its long-time butler — who had helped hide the silver from four Union soldiers determined to loot the house — the butler only asked if he could be buried in the family cemetery, even though they offered to give him land and money, Baker said.

“You look at history, and it’s not all black and white,” he said. “You look at slavery, and it was a very bad thing, but then also relationships were complex and there was a lot of gray there.”

And while some of the stories highlighted the complexity of relations between the planter and servile classes, some of those relationships were considered sordid at the time. One of Baker’s stories was of a female family member — one who married in — who had two children with a black footman.

“It was incredibly scandalous for the 1850s,” Baker said.

But not all of the stories Baker had to share were antebellum or serious. His favorite story about the property came much later, when one of the Marshall descendents drove a Cadillac off the bluff face over the bayou that runs across the property.

“She drove the Cadillac off the edge and landed it in the top of a tree,” he said. “She climbed down the tree and walked up to the house, her hair disheveled and stockings torn, and told them she had a small fender bender. The next morning, they walked out there and saw the car in the top of a tree.”

Those sorts of stories tend to alternate the generations attached to Landsdowne, he said.

“You have one generation, and they are kind of wild, and the next will be conservative and frugal,” he said. “The current generation, though, we kind of have both. My sister is very responsible, while I like to have a good time a little more.”

Pilgrimage continues today with the peach tour from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. and the orange tour from 1:30 to 5 p.m.

The peach tour includes Auburn, Magnolia Hall and the Governor Holmes House. The orange tour includes Pleasant Hill, Green Leaves and Elgin.