Memoirs written by Richard Sprigg Steuart suggest that Dodon was originally patented to one James Stewart in 1669, a Scottish immigrant from Perth.

Dodon formed a small part of the overall plantation economy of the Southern States, which forced enslaved people to produce cotton, tobacco, and other cash crops for export to England.

He thereafter divided his estates, giving Dodon to his wife Ann (née Digges), with instructions on which of his children, loyal to the new American nation, would inherit.

As one family member later recalled: Dr Steuart was constantly away from home, avoiding the raiding parties from the Northern soldiers who sought to capture him, because of the help he gave the South by secretly sending supplies of quinine, and other necessities...to the Southern hospitals.

Wakened...in the dead of night, [his wife Maria] dressed quietly and...admitted the Northern soldiers, and then stealing past the sentries, walked half a mile to the quarters, and sent a trusty messenger to warn his master not to return.

Stuart) fought at a number of major battles including Spotsylvania, Gettysburg, Cross Keys, and Winchester, before surrendering with General Lee at Appomattox Court House.

The estate did not prosper after the war's end, in large part because the white owners could no longer enslave Black people for their labor.

[14] Dodon is home to the ninth generation of Steuarts today, who continue to farm, and to breed and train horses, as well as grow grapes and make wine.

[citation needed] A family graveyard, marked by a small obelisk listing the names of Steuart kin resting there, sits in a grove of trees on one of the high spots of the property.