Carolina Sky

The American and South Carolina flags fly against a beautiful skyscape on a chilly December day at the Rock Hill airport.

Tour time!

This is an awesome series! This book is a part of the Touring the Backroads series by Blair Publishing. There are several different titles available for both Carolinas, Georgia, Virginia, and Tennessee. Each book is divided into several tours based by area, and can be easily driven. the only downside is that the road names in the books can often differ from what actual signs say. For instance, the book may list road numbers, while local signs only have names. This can be remedied by a little advance research on an internet map site, but on the road it can be a challenge. The descriptions of the locations are usually good, with plenty of detail. The books are also quite nice in that they usually cover both major and minor sites, rather than just one or the other. This particular example has a specific disadvantage of only covering Revolutionary War sites, while other books cover other topics. Great for a topic specific study, but if you are just driving through and want to see many different things, you may have issues. Each book is written by a local expert, often someone with several other books to their name. Overall, these are the best books I have found for finding historic places easily. I highly reccomend them for anyone living in an area covered by one of them. The one above can be found on Amazon here and most of the others can be found here.

Touring South Carolina's Revolutionary War Sites

Daniel Barefoot

Touring the Backroads Series

338 pages

1999 John F. Blair Publishing

Hero of the Hornet's Nest

Ok, so this is Elijah Clarke State Park, north of Washington, Georgia, and on the GA/SC border. Seen above and below are a reconstruction of Clarke's first home in GA. During the summer months, it is open and has artifacts from his life inside.

Elijah Clarke was born in North Carolina in 1733 and moved to Georgia in 1774, when he joined the Revolutionary effort. He served in several battles throughout Georgia and South Carolina including Aligator Creek, Kettle Creek, Musgrove's Mill, Blackstocks, and two sieges of Augusta. After the war he served in the State Assembly from 1781 to 1790. In 1793 he joined the French Army and participated in efforts against the Spanish in Florida. In 1794, he established the Trans-Oconee Republic in the area of modern day Northern Georgia. This was viewed by the Government as a violtaion of treaties with the Natives, and after failed diplomatic attempts to end the Republic, a group of soldiers and local militia surrounded the settlement and Clarke surrendered.

Erected to the memory of Gen. Elijah Clarke 1736-1799

Revolutionary Soldier and Patriot

And his Wife Hannah Arrington 1737-1827

By the Elijah Clarke Chapter, Athens, Georgia

And the Hannah Clarke Chapter, Quitman, Georgia

Daughters of the American Revolution, 1924

Clarke was originally buried at his home, which is now under Clark's Hill/Strom Thurmond Lake (the name depends on which side of the state line you're on.)
John Dooly was another Patriot leader, most noted for his actions and Kettle Creek. His home was located here, where he was killed by Loyalists, and he is buried somewhere nearby.

Yes this area is still plagued by low water levels, as these pictures of Clark's Hill/Strom Thurmond Lake show. Ya see, this is a fishing pier, and is supposed to be IN the water...

Chasing the Redcoats

Ok, so this is a book I picked up at Ninety-Six as a substitute for another tour book I no longer had. This book certainly covers more battlefields than other tour books, though aside from the graves of Francis Marion and William Washington, it does not cover other war related sites. Each site location is accompanied by a short description of the battle that took place, though the descriptions are not nearly comprehensive. Perhaps the best idea would be to familiarize yourself with the battles before, then use this guide to travel. Its best property is probably its small size, just a small paperback compared to some of the larger tour books. It is also a cheap buy at just $12. All things considered, I highly reccomend it for any history chaser living or traveling in the Palmetto State. The book can be bought on Amazon here.

South Carolina's Revolutionary War Battlefields: A tour guide

R.L. Barbour

2002 Pelican Publishing

119 pages

Palmetto State

Ok, so I stole this photo from the wife. It is the entrance to South Carolina from Georgia on 95. This setup makes it quite obvious that the residents of the Palmetto State have very strong pride in thei state's history and traditions.

Leavin, on a.... prop plane

Ok, so this is my first "mobile blogging"! Try to follow along here. The wife has been up in South Carolina for a while now, but when I came in, she came down to "visit" for a day. Then when we went on standown she asked her dad (did I mention he's a pilot?) to come down and fly me up there. No, not his house, to her mom's house near Charlotte. We're going to her dad's house near Columbia in a couple days. Then we will drive home to Georgia. Confused yet? I'm not sure yet that I'm not. Anyway, here is her dad's plane at the St Marys airport.

Starting lineup at the airport

Friendly reminder from your local submarine base. I love how the small sign says pilots are "requested" to not fly over the base.

Here's the base, looking out toward the piers.

Here's the rest of the base with all the admin buildings.

Crooked River, the jut of land above is where the state park is.

Woodbine, GA. Here is the Camden county courthouse complex

looks like some clearing operation going on

The Altamaha River above and below. The mouth of this river is where Oglethorpe created the town of Darien as a barrier for Savannah.

Nice farm yo.

Here's where we stoppped for gas

Gassin' up the plane

Nuke power plant at the Savannah river site. Oh by the way, that's the Savannah river too.

Another site at the Sav River site. Looks like a former plant site that has been decommed and is being disposed of.

Some kind of mining operation. I'm used to seeing these out west digging for gold or copper. Not sure what they're looking for here.

Lake Murray, west of Columbia SC.

Dreher Island State Park on Lake Murray

Monticello Reservoir, just north of Lake Murray. You can see the dam and power plant here that form the lake.

Charlotte, North Carolina

Catawba Power plant at Lake Wylie

Here we are, Rock Hill Municipal airport

Jacket at the Rock Hill airport of Robert Bryant

HOLDER OF WORLDS NON-STOP LIGHT PLANE RECORD
MIAMI, FLA. TO CAMDEN, NJ.
JULY 13, 1938 1051 MILES
IN 13 HRS. & 20 MINUTES

Siege? Fail.

Ok, so our last stop was on the way back to the Wife's Dad's house, at the Ninety-Six National Historic Site. This was a very important settlement in the Colonial days, and was the site of two Revolutionary War battles. The painting above, in the visitor center, depicts the later battle.
We begin in the visitor center, where artifacts from the entire war are on display
History is.... sexy?

The park trail does not follow the historical timeline, so for ease of understanding, the photos are not in order, but arranged so the story is easier to follow.

This is the historic Charleston Road. Down this road was a trading post built by Robert Gouedy in 1751. He became the area's first permanent settler, and an influential man in the future Ninety-Six village. In 1759, a stockade was built around one of his barns, also believed to be somewhere down the Charleston road, which came to be known as Fort Ninety-Six. This fort held up well against two attacks by Cherokees on February 3 and March 3, 1760.

This is the site of the Village of Ninety-Six. It is believed that the town got its name from being ninety-six miles from the Cherokee settlement of Keowee, but this distance turned out to be wrong. Following the attacks in 1760, the Cherokee signed a treaty in 1761 that limited their travel and influence past the town of Keowee. Following the treaty, many settlers came to the area, now free from fear of Indian attacks. But with the outbreak of the Revolution, fears were again raised and a stockade was built around the village. The tall grass in the photo above shows where the stockade was located. Sentiments in the Carolina Backcountry were far more divided than along the coast, and for that matter, than in most of the rest of the country. Some settlers remained loyal to the Crown for protection against future Indian threats, while others felt the British had not done anything to help them, and thus sided with independence. These divided loyalties clashed in the first major land battle of the Revolution in the South.

In November of 1775, Patriot forces in Charleston sent gunpowder and other supplies west to the Cherokees, supposedly for hunting. In addition, a Patriot leader local to Ninety-Six, Major Andrew Williamson, arrested the local Loyalist leader Robert Cunningham and sent him to Charleston. These actions caused the Loyalists to unite a force of about 1,900 under Cunningham's brother, Patrick. Williamson responded by building a stockade fort with 600 Patriots. The reconstruction of this fort is seen in the photo above. On November 19, fighting began, and was heavy, but sporadic for three days until the two forces agreed to let their superiors settle their differences. This was short lived however, because Patriot Colonel Richard Richardson arrived, arrested several Loyalist leaders, and sent them to Charleston. While the first major battle was over, the area continued to be plagued by skirmishes for the next several years.


Site of the Ninety-Six jail, which the Loyalists used as a stronghold during the battle.



Grave of James Birmingham, killed in the Battle of Ninety-Six and the first South Carolinian killed in the cause of freedom.


The next major battle didn't come until 1781. The British, having reached a stalemate with the Americans in the Northern colonies, had launched their Southern Campaign. Savannah, Georgia and Charleston, South Carolina were captured and the American army was shamed at Camden. But Patriot victories at King's Mountain and Cowpens, coupled with the high casualties of Guilford Courthouse and the constant partisan activities of Francis Marion, Thomas Sumter, and Andrew Pickens, had all but run the British out of the Carolinas. General Nathanael Greene, following Guilford Courthouse, had begun a campaign of retaking British outposts begining with Fort Watson and Camden, where the Americans had been so badly defeated just a year before.
On May 21, 1781 Greene arrived at the British outpost of Ninety-Six with a force of about 1,000 men. Pictured above is the Island Ford road, which the Patriots arrived on.


The Patriots discovered that the British had created an elaborate defensive layout. The town still had its pallisade fence to protect it, and the stockade fort from the 1775 battle had been rebuilt on the same spot, which also contained the town's water supply. But the most formidable creation was the new Star Fort, a large earthen fort on the other side of the town. The three areas were connected by trenches to carry supplies and information. These trenches are today marked by the small white posts seen in the photo above leading to the rebuilt stockade fort.
Greene realized that the Star Fort was the heart of the defenses, but also knew it was too strong for a direct assault. This point was driven home on the night of May 22, when Americans building an assault position seventy yards from the fort were driven off by the British. To solve the problem, he turned to Polish engineer Colonel Thaddeus Kosciuszko, to direct a series of approach trenches. While not a siege in its normal sense, its method of execution was the same. The first trench was built over 200 yards from the fort, well out of firing range. The intense heat, mosquitoes, and nearly rock hard southern clay made the digging nearly impossible. Nevertheless, the first trench was completed on June 1.


From the first trench, a line of approach trenches were created in a zig-zag pattern to prevent the British from firing directly down the trench. The concept allowed soldiers in the first trench to shoot over their comrades heads to defend them while they dug. About seventy yards from the fort, the second trench was dug, being completed on June 3. From here, more approach trenches were dug, until the third and final trench was built on June 10, at forty yards, musket rage, from the fort.
An example of a canon the Americans used to protect their trenches
During the night of June 13, the Americans built a thirty foot rifle tower out of logs near the third trench. This was built to allow rifleman to take out British soldiers who had been shooting into the trenches from the fort and killing American soldiers. The tower was so effective that the British commander, Lt. Col. John Cruger used sandbags to raise the walls of the fort six feet, and attempted to burn down the tower with heated canon shot. The attempt failed due to the freshness of the wood.
Also near the third trench, the Americans began to dig a mine shaft with the idea of placing gunpowder under the wall of the fort and exploding it. the mine was never completed, but the idea would resurface eighty-three years later at the bloody siege of St Petersburg in the Civil War.


Greene now learned that 2,000 British reenforcements were enroute to the town, and decided that an attack was needed before he became trapped. At noon on June 18, the attack began. Col "Lighthorse Harry" Lee captured the stockade fort, and Greene's men surged from the third, and closest, trench. Canon attempted to breach the earthen wall, while men with axes cut through the pallisade surounding the fort and men with hooks sliced open the sandbags atop the fort. Cruger ordered his men to stop the attack and sent them into the ditch surrounding the fort. After very bloody hand to hand fighting, the Americans were driven off. Greene collected his forces and left, next appearing at Eutaw Springs. In July the British and Loyalists left Ninety-Six for Charleston, burning what they could and attempting to destroy the Star Fort.
This house was built nearby in 1787, and moved here in 1968.
The house interior is now made to look like an 18th century inn.