Lee, Stephen Dill

Even before the state seceded, South Carolina had already begun making preparations for a war that most of her citizens believed either would never actually occur or would be of short duration. Militia companies, some of them with lineages dating back to the Revolutionary War, were joined by new units raised in cities, towns, and communities all over the state to accommodate the flood of enthusiastic volunteers.

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.

His election to the governor’s chair in 1877 effectively ended Reconstruction in the state, and in the eyes of white South Carolinians, Hampton was more than a victorious political candidate. He was their savior.