Posted by: Nic Butler | 16 December 2008

Fall Interns Complete Transcription Projects

This fall the Charleston Archive received some outstanding assistance in creating two new research tools. Between mid-August and mid-December 2008, interns Megan Williams and Kalen McNabb, both students in the Historic Preservation and Community Planning program at the College of Charleston, spent a combined total of nearly 300 hours transcribing building-related data from two little-known historic sources.

Megan Williams

Megan Williams

First, they combed through the proceedings of Charleston’s City Council from 1838 through 1862 (which survive only in contemporary newspapers) and transcribed nearly 1,500 references to the activities of the city’s Committee on Wooden Buildings, which was created after the fire of 27 April 1838 that burned a major part of Charleston. The city wanted to outlaw the construction of all wooden buildings after that “dreadful conflagration,” but, under pressure from the public, decided instead to permit the erection of wooden structures under very specific regulations. Homeowners were obliged to get their wooden projects approved by the Committee on Wooden Building, and thus the extant council proceedings contain a wealth of names, addresses, and building descriptions that could prove very useful for people in the historic preservation community today.

Kalen McNabb

Kalen McNabb

Second, Megan and Kalen transcribed 302 of the earliest known building permits issued by the city of Charleston, which date from January 1882 through April 1883. These permits, which were issued in accordance with an ordinance ratified in late 1881, contain the names, addresses, and brief descriptions of residential building projects. Most of the permits seem to have been issued for work located in poorer, less developed areas of the city at that time, and include such work as moving older buildings, repairing and expanding existing structures, and building new on empty lots. Many of these buildings may still stand today, and further research using these permits will hopefully shed more light on the development of Charleston’s urban landscape of the early 1880s.

The Charleston Archive owes a big thanks to Megan and Kalen. Their prolific accomplishments will soon be available to the public in both an electronic and a paper format. Over the next several weeks I will finish proofreading the transcriptions and writing introductory essays for each of the two projects, and the finished products will be available as self-published books in early 2009. Stay tuned for futher details!

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Posted in Charleston, Preservation, genealogy, history, interns/volunteers, neighborhood history, programs

Posted by: Nic Butler | 20 November 2008

Fort Johnson’s 300th Anniversary

The name “Fort Johnson” is familiar to nearly every resident of the Charleston area, especially those on James Island who live on or near the scenic Fort Johnson Road. Hundreds of people work and study every day at the NOAA’s Hollings Marine Laboratory and Center for Coastal Environmental Health and Biomolecular Research, the College of Charleston’s Grice Marine Laboratory, MUSC’s Marine Biomedecine and Environmental Sciences Center, and SCDNR’s Marine Resources Research Institute, all of which are located on the grounds of Fort Johnson. But how many people know anything about the history of the old fort itself, which was dismantled more than a century ago? Sadly, few remember that construction on Fort Johnson started at Windmill Point on James Island three hundred years ago—in the year 1708.

Fort Johnson was designed and built in 1708 by Huguenot refugees to protect the English colony of South Carolina from attack by Spanish and French forces. It suffered damage from numerous storms and was entirely rebuilt in 1759. In September 1775 the fort was captured by South Carolina patriots at the beginning American Revolution. In the 1790s Fort Johnson was again rebuilt and again destroyed by storms during the War of 1812. The site was fortified during the Civil War and occupied by Confederate forces until 1865. After the war, the remnants of the fort were allowed to decay as the site became used for other purposes, including a quarantine station for immigrants.

To mark the 300th anniversary of the construction of Fort Johnson, the Charleston Archive and the Mayor’s Walled City Task Force will be presenting a free program at the main branch of the Charleston County Public Library to raise public awareness of this site’s rich history. On Thursday, December 11th 2008, Dr. Nic Butler, manager of the Charleston Archive and historian for the Task Force, will provide an illustrated overview of the fort’s history, and archaeologist Carl Steen, of the Diachronic Research Foundation, will discuss his recent investigations at this important site. Please join us!

fort_johnson_flyerThursday, 11 December 2008
6:30 p.m.
Charleston County Public Library Auditorium
68 Calhoun Street

For further information, please contact Dr. Butler at (843) 805-6968 or butlern@ccpl.org.

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Posted in Charleston, colonial history, history, programs, public history

Posted by: Nic Butler | 15 October 2008

Charleston Voters of 1877

Election season seems the perfect time to showcase a piece of local voting history, and the Charleston Archive is proud to announce the completion of a transcription of the names and address of the men who voted in the city’s municipal election of 1877. These voters, numbering more than seven thousand black, white, Chinese, and Hispanic males, registered in early November 1877 to elect Charleston’s mayor and aldermen (City Council members) in early December of that year. The record of their names and addresses was preserved in the surviving documents of the city’s Commissioners of Elections, 1877–1879, which are now housed at the Charleston Archive at the Charleston County Public Library.

During a three-day period in early November 1877, 9,586 Charleston men registered to vote in the upcoming city election. One month later, on 11 December, 7,216 of the eligible voters went to their neighborhood polling place to cast their ballot. At the end of the day, Democratic candidate William W. Sale was proclaimed the new mayor, defeating Independent candidate D. F. Fleming.

The surviving records of these 1877 voters consist of twelve crumbling volumes, each of which represents a distinct election precinct in the city. At that time the city was divided into eight wards, each of which was further divided into precincts based on population density. Charleston had sixteen voting precincts in 1877, but the voter ledgers for four of these precincts are lost. Nevertheless, the surviving twelve volumes contain a wealth of information about the city’s demographics at that time. It was a precarious moment for voter rights in Charleston, following closely the end of the era of federal Reconstruction (which enfranchised black voters) and preceding the voter exclusion acts known as Jim Crow laws.

The 1877 ledgers contain the names and addresses of a total of 7,189 registered voters In addition, each of the precinct ledgers also includes numbers indicating the order in which these men registered and voted in the election. All voters were issued registration certificates in November, which they handed to the poll managers in December in order to cast their ballot. In order to prevent voter fraud, these certificates were either destroyed on the spot or filed for destruction at a later time, and the surviving precinct ledgers records this data as well.

Charleston Archive staff member Celeste Wiley spent many months transcribing the names, addresses, and other data from these 1877 records, and we are proud to make the fruit of her work available in two forms. First, the South Carolina Room at the CCPL’s main branch (68 Calhoun Street) has a paper copy of her work, which includes an introduction, illustrations, and appendices. A bound copy is now available in the S.C. Room under the title “The City of Charleston Voter Records of 1877: An Index of Names Transcribed from the Records of the Commissioners of Elections.” Second, we have made a PDF version of this transcription, which we are happy to distribute here.

To download the PDF file (2.1 mb), click this link: The City of Charleston Voter Records of 1877: An Index of Names Transcribed from the Records of the Commissioners of Elections.

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Posted in Charleston, archives, genealogy, history, public history

Posted by: Nic Butler | 13 October 2008

“Butcher Town” Program Postponed

This morning the Charleston County Public Library system learned of the passing of its director, Tom Raines, on Sunday, October 12th. Tom’s 26-year tenure as Deputy Director of the system included a number significant milestones, including the construction of five large regional branches and the construction of a long-awaited main branch downtown. Upon his appointment as Director of the CCPL system in January 2008, Tom embarked on a campaign to inspire and encourage the entire staff to re-evaluate the library’s creative role in the community. Sadly, he lived only long enough to see the first fruits of these positive efforts.

In recognition of Tom’s long and devoted service to the library, the entire CCPL system will be closed on Thursday, October 16th, so that all staff will have an opportunity to attend his funeral. The “Butcher Town” program, scheduled for that evening, will be postponed to Wednesday, November 12th. We apologize for any inconvenience this change may cause.

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Posted in Charleston, programs

Posted by: Nic Butler | 15 September 2008

Upcoming Program on “Butcher Town”

Charleston is an old city rich in colorful nicknames, but have you ever heard of a neighborhood called “Butcher Town“? Until the middle of the twentieth century, this phrase was often used to describe that part of the city where cattle and hogs were slaughtered for sale in the local markets. It was actually a sort of “movable feast,” if you will, the location of which changed several times over the course of more than two centuries. As you might imagine, the citizens who resided anywhere near—or downwind of—Butcher Town objected strenuously to the noise, stench, and waste emanating from the various slaughterhouses, and Charleston’s City Council struggled to find a balance between appeasing their complaints and sustaining this necessary business. After many generations of complaints about the unhealthy conditions and contamination created by the city’s urban cattle pens and slaughterhouses, however, the city finally shut down Butcher Town’s last incarnation—the City Abattoir—in 1949.

1888 advertisement for Charleston butcher Louis Seel

So where was “Butcher Town,” and how did its activities impact the health and environment of Charleston? For the answer to these and other sensational, even gruesome questions, please join me on Thursday, October 16th, at 7:00 P.M. for an illustrated program titled “Butcher Town: A Brief History of the Slaughter Houses of Early Charleston.”

To learn more details about this program, and to download a printable flyer for this program, please visit our Upcoming Events page.

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Posted in Charleston, environmental history, history, neighborhood history, programs, public history

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