Finding "My" Charleston…Digging down on the block I live on…to see what I can find.

Category: Local history research

  • The Revolutionary War—1782 and the Letters of Eliza Wilkinson

    I also found this book when I first started researching Charleston and put it on my shelf. It took me four years but once I seriously went looking for a few women to write about, I read it through and fell in love with Eliza. She was not strictly in my neighborhood…but in the next…

  • Remembrances of Charleston Women in the Civil War

    I think I mentioned earlier that I found a treasure of a book on-line called “Our Women in the War.” It is a compilation of women’s stories from across the South. The stories were requested, gathered and published by the Charleston News and Courier in 1885 with the subtitle: The Lives They Lived: The Deaths…

  • Caroline Howard Gilman 1794—1888

    Creator of the Charleston Unitarian Church Graveyard among other things Charleston’s old Unitarian graveyard is a popular tourist site for two reasons: One, the grounds are left more or less to nature with minimal control by volunteers. And two, it is haunted. I will add links if you are interested in more…a great story about…

  • In the Beginning…Affra Harleston Comings 1670-1698

    In the Beginning…Affra Harleston Comings 1670-1698

    I have decided to go back to the beginning with a slightly different focus; early women in my neighborhood. While my block was quiet or at times should have been…my neighborhood was not. In fact, luckily for me, there is a woman who is locally well known for being a first settler on the first…

  • A Few Women around my Neighborhood…

    A Few Women around my Neighborhood…

    Like with the history of the slaves in Charleston, much work has been done also on women. My little bit of history writing eventually settled on telling the stories of the local women. As I’ve said before, most early history books of the early days of most American cities and towns are written to a…

  • Phase Five…The Church under my parking lot and the Red-Light District.

    I have documented what little history that I could find in this blog of the church graveyard that was moved just before they paved the new city parking lot in my backyard and the church and congregation that went with it. I was very lucky to have the News & Courier articles to follow, especially…

  • Phase Three…1849-1861… of the Church under My Parking Lot…Prosperity

    Reverend Dana continues in the News and Courier Charleston SC July 14, 1873, article… The career of the church had been singularly peaceful. No schism had existed. The half-century under review may be divided into four parts. The first of twelve and a half years; the second twelve and a half years, ending July 1848;…

  • Phase Two–1835-1848–The Church Under My Parking Lot…and Fire

    Continuing with the Charleston SC 1873 News and Courier article of an interview and sermon by Rev. Dana from Third Presbyterian Church…under my parking lot… “The half-century under review may be divided into four parts. The first of twelve and a half years; (the last post, Phase One) the second twelve and a half years,…

  • Phase One–1823-1835–of the Church under my Parking Lot…and Abolition

    When and who…. The News and Courier 1873 article for Monday July 14, 1873, I began quoting in the introduction to this series on the church under my parking lot contains a sermon given by the pastor, Reverend W.C. Dana, where he documents the church’s history in four 12-½ year phases…and the reporter tells us…

  • The Who, When, and Why there was a Church and Graveyard under my Parking Lot

    I wrote two posts on this blog back in July on the graveyard under the parking lot of Canterbury House at the corner of Market and Archdale in old town Charleston, SC where I now live. I wrote several posts after that…trying to stay within my stated framework…digging down on the history of this one…