U.S. Civil War (1861-1865)

The regiment spent most of the war participating in various expeditions, skirmishing, or serving on garrison duty along the coasts of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida.

With the arrival of Europeans, natives created the first commercial fisheries, trading seafood for firearms and clothing.

Florence was chosen because of its proximity to three converging railroad lines. Neither the town nor the camp was ready for the sudden rush of Union prisoners.

Located on Charleston harbor, Fort Johnson was constructed on the northeast point of James Island in 1708.

With walls five feet thick and fifty feet high, Fort Sumter was designed to mount 135 heavy cannons and garrison 650 officers and men. The fort was about ninety percent complete when South Carolina seceded on December 20, 1860, and due to the war was never finished.

Free blacks never exceeded two percent of the state’s antebellum black population, which was consistent with its lower-South neighbors but starkly contrasted with states in the upper South.

Created by an act of Congress in March 1865, the bureau grew out of efforts by northern Republicans and reformers to bring the free labor society and culture of the antebellum North to the post-emancipation South.

General George Washington Goethals was made chief engineer of the Panama Canal in 1907, and he selected Gaillard to oversee dredging and excavation.

Gary served as a bill clerk in the state legislature for nine years before being elected by Abbeville County to the S.C. House of Representatives in 1890. He remained there until 1900 and served as Speaker of the House from 1896 to 1900.

Gary capitalized on the reputation he earned in war. Active in Democratic Party politics, in 1876 he was the most uncompromising and outspoken leader of the “Straight-out” faction of the South Carolina Democratic Party, stressing white supremacy and solidarity while vigorously opposing any cooperation with Republicans or black Carolinians.

Geddings was an active participant in the intellectual life of antebellum Charleston. He was a friend of the author William Gilmore Simms, who dedicated one of his books to Geddings, and was an early subscriber to the works of John James Audubon, whom he also knew.

During his fifty-four-year career at the College of Charleston, Gibbes taught mathematics, chemistry, physics, and astronomy, and endeared himself to generations of students despite his exacting standards.

Keenly interested in natural history, Gibbes collected bird specimens, mollusk shells, and minerals. He was especially interested in vertebrate fossils, and it was in the field of paleontology that he made lasting contributions.

Most of Gillisonville proper, including the courthouse, was burned by Union troops in January 1865. According to tradition, the Baptist church was undamaged because troops sheltered themselves and their horses there.

For Gilman, Charleston was her first permanent home and, even though she retained much affection for the North, she soon came to see herself as a southerner. As hostilities between the two regions increased, Gilman felt compelled to try to reconcile these differences in her writing.

A powerful preacher who was at home with the Gullah dialect, Girardeau attracted large numbers of African Americans to the congregation. To accommodate the growing crowds, a new church building, Zion Presbyterian, was built on the corner of Calhoun and Meeting Streets primarily with money from the Adger and Smyth families of Charleston.

At the battles of Chickamauga and Chattanooga, and throughout the Atlanta Campaign, Gist proved a reliable and respected commander.

Gist's biographer Daniel Bell describes him as “influential” in bringing about disunion, but it is doubtful that his personal leadership was truly essential. By 1860 the movement possessed more momentum than could be attributable to any one man.

His first trial resulted in a conviction, but in a second trial he was acquitted. He was elected lieutenant governor of the state in 1872 and reelected in 1874, in which capacity he served as president ex officio of the S.C. Senate. Gleaves also served in the South Carolina state militia as a major and judge advocate in the First Brigade, colonel and aide to the governor, and colonel and judge advocate in the Second Division.

Inspired by the rise of Ben Tillman’s hate-mongering but successful campaign for governor in 1890, Ambrose, Narciso, and their younger brother William, founded the State newspaper in Columbia as an ardent and outspoken anti-Tillman daily.