ORIGINAL DEPARTMENT STORE, King Street at Market: “Ghosts rush out every time I pass,” said a friend. He was growing sentimental about the Academy of Music building, razed in 1937. In 1830 in this “whale of a building,” for its time, was opened the world’s first department store. With great stocks from all parts of the world the Kerrisons built up an enormous business, their customers coming from as far as the Mississippi River! It was a massive building of massive construction. Its masonry was notable and it may be that its great heart cypress timbers were more notable. To the coming of the War for Southern Independence, Charleston being capital of a far-flung slave empire, business in the building prospered. Kerrison’s of this time is descendant of the original Kerrison’s; it is across and higher up King Street, one of the leading department stores of the South. After Appomattox Charleston was without a theater. The Charleston Theater had been destroyed in the fire of 1861. John Chadwick, a school master, acquired the building and converted the rear portion into a theater, the Academy of Music, wherein have appeared famous actors, actresses and singers, great bands and orchestras. Georges Barrere, solo flautist and conductor of the Little Symphony Orchestra and the Barrere Ensemble, after playing his flute on the stage, remarked: “Here is a veritable ‘Strad.’ of a theater!” Barrere was justly complimenting the remarkable acoustics of the theater. It is well to bear in mind that Charleston had a great department store before the first of the steam railroads began operation in America! A century ago in a mezzanine gallery on the top floor were displayed laces, embroideries and other fine goods from the world’s finest makers. As a theater the Academy of Music was owned for some years by John A. Owens, nationally known for his portrayal of Solon Shingle. It may be permissible here to say that Joseph Jefferson used to manage a theater in Charleston, that his mother was born in Charleston.

WASHINGTON SQUARE, Called also City Hall Park: In the northwest corner of this park is the first fireproof building built in America, for which salient reason Charleston knows it as The Fireproof Building. It was erected about 1826. Robert Mills was the architect. It is used for county offices and records. In the southwest corner is the City Hall which is discussed elsewhere. On Broad, Meeting and Chalmers Streets are handsome wrought-iron gates and wrought-iron railings of great grace. In the center of the park is a shaft of granite to the three companies of the Washington Light Infantry which served the Confederacy valiantly on the battlefields of Virginia in the 60’s, and in the defense of Charleston. Southward of this is a bust to the lilting Carolina poet, Henry Timrod, and eastward a monument to General Pierre G. T. Beauregard, for some time in the War for Southern Independence, commanding officer at Charleston. New Orleans paid tribute to this illustrious soldier long after Charleston had done so. Near the west gate is the statue of William Pitt.

WILLIAM PITT STATUE, in Washington Park: “The gentleman (Benjamin Franklin) tells us that America is obstinate, America is almost in open rebellion. Sir, I rejoice that America has resisted! Three millions of people so dead to all the feelings of liberty as voluntarily to submit to be slaves would have been fit instruments to make slaves of all the rest!” William Pitt was speaking in the House of Commons, London, denouncing the iniquitous stamp tax. Charlestown heard of the Pitt speech and Charlestown applauded. Charlestown ordered a statue of the great statesman in recognition of his noble position. The statue was received in Charlestown May 31, 1770, and was erected in the intersection of Broad and Meeting Streets, the most prominent position in the town at that time. During the Revolution a shell from a British gun on James Island struck off the right arm, explaining its absence into this day. Years afterward, interfering with traffic, it was removed to the yard of the Charleston Orphan House and in 1881, through the Carolina Art Association, placed where now it is in Washington Park.

LORD CAMPBELL’S HOUSE, 34 Meeting Street: Last of the Royal Governors, Lord William Campbell, precipitately left Charlestown September 16, 1775, taking refuge aboard H.M.S. Tamar. Lord Campbell by night went through his garden to a boat in Vanderhorst Creek (Water Street nowadays). He had come to Charlestown June 18, 1775, and was “received civilly, but without enthusiasm.” Fleeing, he carried with him the Great Seal of the Province. South Carolina was on the way to independence. The house was built about 1760 and was owned by Mrs. Blake, first cousin to Sarah Izard who married Lord Campbell. She belonged to one of the richest and most influential families in the Province. After the Revolution, about 1795, Colonel Lewis Morris, a Revolutionary officer, acquired the property. Colonel Francis Kinloch Huger, who had part in the frustrated plot to liberate the Marquis de Lafayette from the Austrian prison of Olmutz, was wounded on the steps of this house; a section of the bull’s-eye in the roof fell and fractured his skull. In the earthquake of 1886, a young Englishman was killed on the steps; a piece of the parapet fell on him. The house has been in the Huger family for years. The handsome piazzas on the south side were built for the late William E. Huger, whose son, Daniel Elliott Huger, is the present owner.

WILLIAM BULL’S HOUSE, 35 Meeting Street: Across Meeting Street from the Charlestown home of Lord William Campbell was the home of the first Lieutenant Governor of the Royal Province of South Carolina, William Bull, who is said to have erected it; he died in 1755. It was his son, William Bull, then also Lieutenant Governor who was occupying it at the outbreak of the Revolution. The office of Lieutenant Governor was devised to safeguard against an interregnum between the naming of Governors by the King of England.

MILES BREWTON HOUSE, 27 King Street: History, romance, legend and tradition crowd upon this famous mansion, built by Miles Brewton about 1765. Brewton and his family perished at sea and the property descended to his sister, the famous Mrs. Rebecca Motte (whose name is perpetuated in the Rebecca Motte Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution). This gallant and patriotic lady was living in the house when the British took possession of Charleston. Sir Henry Clinton commandeered it as his headquarters, and Lord Rawdon did the same thing. Lord Cornwallis was quartered in the house. Again, when the Union forces occupied Charleston in the War for Southern Independence, the general commanding set up his headquarters here. Later the house was the residence of the Pringle family, hence it is commonly known nowadays as the Pringle House. The visitor should observe the picturesque old coach house adjoining and to the north. The old garden is behind high brick walls, so typical of the old Charlestown. Her home in possession of the invading British, Rebecca Brewton Motte, widow of Jacob Motte, retired with his family to her plantation house in Orangeburg County on the Congaree River. The British, seizing the residence, built a parapet around it. Francis Marion and Henry Lee laid siege to it. Apprised that British reinforcements were approaching, the officers considered the burning of the fine property, but hesitated. Mrs. Motte, however, overcame their scruples. Bringing out an African bow and arrows for it, she deliberately sent flaming arrows to the roof which caught afire, causing the British garrison to surrender with alacrity. After independence Mrs. Motte undertook rice planting on scale and built up a considerable property. Her two eldest daughters, in succession, were wives of the great Thomas Pinckney.

WILLIAM GIBBES HOUSE, 64 South Battery Street: William Gibbes came to Charlestown direct from England and was active in behalf of the colonies until the actual break with the Crown, when he fled to Bermuda, thence going back to England. The handsome house was built before 1776; the exact date is obscured. Gibbes was with others interested in reclaiming marshy areas in that section. Five years after his death the records show that Mrs. Sarah Smithe purchased the property, the consideration being twenty-five hundred pounds. An elegant ballroom occupies the width of the upper story. Within brick walls on three sides was, and is, a beautiful garden. For years the property belonged to the Drayton family and some years after the War for Southern Independence it was occupied by James Petigru Lesesne, son of the Chancellor Henry Deas Lesesne and a great-grandson of the Huguenot pastor, Jean Louis Gibert who came from the Channel Islands leading a French colony into upper South Carolina. It passed into the ownership of Colonel J. B. E. Sloan and in late years is the property of Mrs. Washington A. Roebling, widow of the builder of the Brooklyn Bridge over the East River, New York.

WILLIAM BLACKLOCK HOUSE, 18 Bull Street: This fine mansion, built about 1800, is considered one of the best examples of its type of architecture. It is a two-story brick dwelling, with a double set of steps leading to an entrance platform. The carriage gates are gracefully ornate. There is the peculiarity that the gates are of wood, rather than of the wrought-iron pieces that would be expected.

THE WASHINGTON HOUSE, 87 Church Street: President George Washington, visiting Charleston in May, 1791, was “domiciled” in the residence of Thomas Heyward, Jr., one of the four South Carolina Signers of the Declaration of Independence. Edward Rutledge, also a Signer of the Declaration, was of the company that greeted the soldier-statesman across the Cooper River and escorted him to town. A complete equipment was organized by the City of Charleston for the President’s comfort. The house has undergone changes. For some years a baker did business on the ground floor. The property is now owned and maintained by the Society for the Preservation of Old Dwellings. Down the street and on the opposite side at No. 78, President Washington addressed citizens from the balcony, which is a graceful reminder of the French influence in Charleston.

MYTHICAL OLD SLAVE MARKET, 6 Chalmers Street: Chalmers in this year is fairly famous for two things: It is Charleston’s surviving “cobble-stone” street, the stones coming in ballast from European shores in the old sailing days, and on it is a building that tourists are told was the old Slave Market. The myth has been exploded repeatedly, but it persists, and since there are no black slaves it probably doesn’t matter. Authorities are positive in saying that nowhere in Charleston was there a constituted slave market for the public auctioning of blacks from Africa. Several houses in this vicinity were used in olden times to quarter slaves who were to be sold on the block. Authorities also agree, propagandists to the contrary notwithstanding, that the black slaves in the South were in better care than were the peasantry in any other part of the world.

CHARLESTON LIBRARY, 164 King Street: Organized in 1748 by seventeen young gentlemen of Charlestown, third oldest in this country, the Charleston Library Society, a private enterprise governed by a Board of Trustees, moved into a new fireproof building in recent years. In 1835 the society bought the building of the old South Carolina Bank, at the northwest corner of Broad and Church Streets, using this until the transfer to King Street. The society has more than 60,000 volumes. It owns the only surviving file of the South Carolina State Gazette and one of three files of The Courier (1803). Valuable books were lost in the fire of 1778. In the War for Southern Independence most of the volumes were taken to Columbia for safekeeping; those left in the society’s building were destroyed. In 1874 the old Apprentices’ Society was merged with the Charleston Library Society. In 1900, dissolving, the South Carolina Jockey Club transferred its property to the library; the club and the society were about of an age. Generous bequests have greatly assisted the society.

CHARLESTON MUSEUM, 123 Rutledge Avenue: This, the oldest Museum in the country, is housed in the former Thomson Auditorium, built in 1899 for conventions, with money bequeathed by John Thomson. The Charlestown Museum was organized in 1773 and incorporated in 1915. Very fine collections of natural history and of the history of human culture are owned. Lately the Museum had the great good fortune to come into possession of the priceless collection of birds preserved by the distinguished South Carolina ornithologist, Arthur Trezevant Wayne. A skeleton of a large whale which found its way into Charleston harbor and was harpooned is one of the Museum’s unique specimens, unique in that the cetacean was caught in this harbor.

THE BATTERY, White Point Gardens: It is no use to call the Battery by its proper name; even in Charleston, White Point Gardens is not recognized as the Battery. Nonetheless the name of this famous and beautiful park and promenade is White Point Gardens. Its sea walls are laved on the south by the Ashley River and on the east by the Cooper River; their confluence is at and off the southeast corner of the Battery. This pleasure ground has been favorably compared with the world’s most famous plazas and promenades. It is a source of never-ending delight to visitors. East, or High Battery begins at the old Granville Bastion, now Omar Temple of the Mystic Shrine. It is a great promenade, with a commanding view of the harbor seaward, with Fort Sumter in the middle-ground. South Battery, proper, is between the East Battery and the extension of King Street to the water. Somewhat more than eight acres constitute South Battery, which, to the westward, becomes the Murray Boulevard, lined, as East and South Battery are, with fine residences. In its origin East Battery had a wall of palmetto logs with a plank walk on top. It was swept away in the great gale of 1804. William Crafts, Jr., originated the first stone wall, with rock ballast from incoming ships as “riprap” to strengthen the wall. The work was completed before 1820. In the War of 1812 guns were emplaced along East Battery, thus, it is held, accounting for its name, The Battery. Fort Broughton and Fort Mechanic have long since disappeared. Fort Street became South Bay Street and later South Battery for its whole length from East Battery through the Boulevard area to the junction with Tradd Street a mile away. It was in 1830 that the first steps toward creating a beautiful pleasure ground were taken. By 1852 White Point Gardens was an accomplished fact. Fine oak and palmetto trees enhance the attractiveness of the Battery. Years ago a bathhouse was removed. The monument to the defenders of Fort Moultrie, commonly called the Sergeant Jasper monument because of the figure of a soldier rescuing the flag, was unveiled June 28 (Carolina Day), 1876, the hundredth anniversary of the repulse of Sir Peter Parker’s British fleet. The monument to William Gilmore Simms, editor, author and historian, was erected in June, 1879. At the foot of Meeting Street is a memorial fountain to the men of the first submarine, Confederates. Facing Fort Sumter is a monument to the defenders of Fort Sumter. On the Battery are relics of all the wars Charleston has seen, the Spanish War being represented by the capstan of the battleship Maine, destroyed in Havana harbor in 1898. To visit Charleston and not to see the Battery is unthinkable. From time to time concerts are given in the band stand. The late Andrew B. Murray contributed generously to the improvement of the Battery and of the driveway named in his honor.

THE COLONIAL COMMON, and Ashley River Embankment: In Charleston beautiful Colonial Lake is The Pond. It came into being in the 1880’s with the reclaiming of the area. The official designation is The Colonial Common and Ashley River Embankment. About this salt-water pond are garden areas, and west of it is the new Moultrie Playground which greatly improves the appearance of the neighborhood. Some of Charleston’s most desirable residences face the pond. Off its northwest corner is the Baker Sanatorium, one of the South’s largest and most completely equipped private hospitals, founded by Archibald E. Baker, surgeon. Less than fifty years ago there was a causeway at the head of Broad Street; nowadays the whole area is populated. Colonial Lake is bounded by Broad Street, Rutledge Avenue, Beaufain Street, and Ashley Avenue, paramount traffic arteries. Its water is from the Ashley River, regulated by a flood-gate.

MEDICAL COLLEGE, 16 Lucas Street: While the Medical College of the State of South Carolina dates from 1823, it did not move to the present site until 1913. For years before that it was in Queen Street. The college maintains schools of medicine, pharmacy and nursing. The News and Courier is quoted: “The early faculty included men of national and international reputation, who gave the college a prestige which placed it at once amongst the foremost institutions of the kind, and among its graduates were not a few whose fame added further luster to their alma mater.... The sessions of the college were carried on without intermission until the outbreak of the War Between the States when lectures had to be discontinued. In 1865 the college was reopened, and in spite of adverse conditions has been in successful operation ever since.” In the session of the Legislature in 1913 the college passed under State control.

THE ROPER HOSPITAL, 15 Lucas Street: On the site of the old City Hospital is the Roper Hospital; riverward is its auxiliary pavilion, the Riverside Infirmary, a high-class private hospital. The Roper is a general hospital operated by the Medical Society of South Carolina, the City of Charleston and the County of Charleston contributing to the care of “free” patients. The institution includes a special building for contagious diseases. The hospital owes its origin to the benevolence of Colonel Thomas Roper. In 1849 the Medical Society proceeded to arrange the building of a hospital, “prompted by the deficient and faulty hospital accommodations of the city at that time.” The City Council appropriated $20,000 and a lot was acquired at Queen and Mazyck Streets. Public spirited citizens swelled the building fund. The building was completed in 1852. Before it was completely furnished and equipped, it had to be opened because of the yellow fever epidemic that raged in 1852. In effect, the old Roper Hospital was leased to the City of Charleston, the arrangement between the Board of Trustees and the City Council beginning in 1856 and terminating in 1865. With the evacuation of Charleston by the Confederates, the Union invaders took it over; its trustees were impotent. Next to the Roper, the city improvised and operated its own hospital, and the Roper trustees closed their institution in 1871. The city hospital was virtually destroyed in the earthquake of 1886. The City Council had it transferred to Lucas Street. On this site the present Roper building was erected. It has been greatly enlarged in the last twenty years. Nurses’ homes are on the property, the student nurses being enrolled at the Medical College.

ASHLEY HALL, 172 Rutledge Avenue: Originally one of the historic mansions of Charleston, Ashley Hall, a preparatory school for young ladies, draws its students from many states. In the language of Miss Mary Vardrine McBee, founder and principal: “It is but a little while since Ashley Hall was a venturous experiment. Begun in the conviction that South Carolina and her sister States were ready to welcome a school for girls of high intellectual standing, while cherishing still those amenities of feminine culture which give Southern life its distinctive charm, Ashley Hall was welcomed in its very inception. It had hardly been opened before the necessity of enlargement, alike of building and staff, became apparent.” The grounds about this fine mansion are among the most beautiful in the South. Annually a Shakespearean play is performed in the garden, the students portraying the rôles.

PRINCESS LOUISE, Site of the Landing Stage: Princess Louise, daughter of Queen Victoria, was in Charleston January 19-24, 1883, first member of the English Royal family to come to the capital of the former Royal Province. She was accompanied by her husband, the Marquis of Lorne, then Governor General of Canada, later the Duke of Argyle. In residence at the Charleston Hotel she received “pleasantly a number of our citizens, both ladies and gentlemen.” For her convenience a landing stage was provided at the foot of King Street, on the Battery (the Fort Sumter Hotel is on this site). As the Princess was about to embark on H.M.S. Dido, the Battery was “densely crowded with people, including a number of ladies.” The German Artillery fired a salute and the Dido answered. “The pure splendor of the Japonicas,” said The News and Courier, “reminded the Princess of the old home at Osborne, where so much of her young life was spent.”

H. A. MIDDLETON’S HOUSE, 68 South Battery Street: Henry Augustus Middleton, of the illustrious Middleton family, died in Charleston in March, 1887, in his ninety-fifth year. He was at the time of his death, The News and Courier said, “the oldest living representative of a family which for more than two centuries has been closely and prominently identified with the history of South Carolina.... He was a school boy when Marengo was being fought and was a young man whose education was finished when the great Napoleon closed his career at Waterloo.” The same newspaper further said that Mr. Middleton “was a conspicuous representative of a society and class which are fast passing into tradition.” He was owner and operator of many great plantations, and before the War for Southern Independence among the leading owners of slaves. He married Harriott, daughter of Cleland Kinloch, of Wee Haw, in Georgetown County. The fine old property is now owned by Dr. W. J. Pettus. Through Mr. Middleton’s life and for twenty-five years thereafter the sea wall on the west side of the yard was washed by the Ashley River at high tide. The marsh expanse to the west is in the Boulevard area.

ST. FRANCIS XAVIER INFIRMARY, 264 Calhoun Street: The principal building of the St. Francis Xavier Infirmary was built in the bishopric of the Right Reverend William Thomas Russell, of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Charleston, but the wing on Ashley Avenue is much older. Sisters of Mercy have supervision over the Xavier in all its departments, including the school for nurses. The hospital enjoys high rating by the national hospital authorities. The building is commodious, convenient and fireproof.

LIBERTY TREE SITE, 22 North Alexander Street: The Liberty Tree in old Mazyckboro under which Christopher Gadsden, William Johnson and others impatient with English treatment of the colonies met and debated has gone, but a tablet marks the site. The inscription reads: “Near this spot once stood the Liberty Tree where Colonial independence was first advocated by Christopher Gadsden, A.D. 1766, and where ten years later the Declaration of Independence was first heard and applauded by South Carolinians.” This tablet was erected by the Sons of the Revolution in 1905. It was under the tree in a pasture that patriots nurtured high treason against the English Crown.

WILLIAM WASHINGTON HOUSE, 8 South Battery Street: Here lived Colonel William Washington, a Virginian, who achieved distinction in the Revolution, mainly in South Carolina. The fine old house was built by Thomas Savage about 1769 and was purchased by Colonel Washington after independence had been recognized. His fiancée, member of a proud South Carolina family, presented him with a flag when she learned he had none. It was a piece taken from a handsome drapery of red silk and became known as the Eutaw flag, for the Battle of Eutaw Springs. In 1827 Mrs. Washington, his widow, gave this battle-stained banner to the Washington Light Infantry which now owns it. Latterly the property has been owned by Julian Mitchell, outstanding lawyer, president of the South Carolina National Bank.

HAMPTON PARK, Head of Cleveland Street: Notwithstanding its comparative youth Hampton Park, named for General Wade Hampton, is a distinguished pleasure ground, its gardens developed to a high state of loveliness. Some time after the South Carolina, Inter-State and West Indian Exposition (1901-02) the city took over the property and developed it into a modern park. Its sunken garden, with ducks and geese and swans playing in the water, is appealing, and about it on all sides are flower beds, profusely beautiful in their seasons. Large canebreaks are growing near the sunken garden. An attractive driveway goes about the property, but vehicles are not permitted within the garden area. A section of the tract, bordering the Ashley River, was ceded to The Citadel, the Military College of South Carolina, after the World War. A stroll through Hampton Park’s flowers in spring and summer is thoroughly worth while. Features include a zoo and an aviary.

COUNTY COURT HOUSE, Broad and Meeting Streets: In years when Charleston was Charles Town, when Indians were roaming these coastal woods, the State House stood at the northwest corner of Broad and Meeting Streets. It was burned in 1788, after Columbia, on the Congaree, had become the capital of the State. Not long after the fire the county built its court house here. The building was renovated and enlarged several years ago, the court room being in the annex. Records running back to the Proprietary era are in the offices of the Clerk of Court. A legend persists that the Court House is the old State House, but it is a mistaken legend, for it was burned in 1788. From its entrance Governor John Rutledge first read the Declaration of Independence.

UNITED STATES POST OFFICE, Broad and Meeting Streets: Since 1896 the United States post office has been in the granite building at the southwest corner of Broad and Meeting Streets, on the site of the old (police) Guard House which suffered heavy damage in the earthquake of 1886. Southward of the building is an attractive park which is not open to the public. The United States court and its officials and attachés have quarters in the building. Previously the post office was in the old Exchange, at the foot of Broad Street. On the four corners of Broad and Meeting Streets are: Southwest, post office; southeast, St. Michael’s Episcopal Church, on the site of the first English church; northeast, City Hall, the building erected for the United States Bank; on the site of an early market place; northwest, County Court House, on the site of the old State House. (Consult the Index.)

UNITED STATES CUSTOMS HOUSE, East Bay Street, at Market: Work on this, one of the handsomest government buildings, was begun in 1850 and was proceeding when the War for Southern Independence interrupted. After Appomattox it was completed, but it is much smaller than the original plans prescribed, explaining the fine esplanade effect in front. It is a Roman-Corinthian building of white marble, and its steps, both front and back, have elicited warm admiration from appreciative visitors. Piles, grillage and concrete were used in the foundations. The building houses the customs service, the army engineer offices, the weather bureau, the public health surgeon, the immigration service, the internal revenue offices and the bureau of steamboat inspection. In the basement from time to time are stored quantities of “contraband” confiscated by the Coast Guard and other federal prohibition agents. Prior to 1850 the old Fitzsimmons wharf was on the site of the Customs House quay.

SOUTH CAROLINA HALL, 72 Meeting Street: This is the property of the South Carolina Society, built in 1804 as a free school and meeting place, but the society dates to 1736 when it was formed by French Protestants for charitable purposes. In the beginning it was known as the Two-Bit Club. Through years it has done noble work in assisting the families of deceased members and in educating their children. The porch over Meeting Street is notably attractive; it was added when the building was improved and enlarged. Members have made liberal donations to this society, as mural tablets in the hall attest. The St. Andrew’s Society, organized by Scots in 1729, is quartered in this building, accounting for the presence of tables and chairs used in the Secession convention in St. Andrew’s Hall, Broad Street, burned in the fire of 1861.

THE SWORD GATES, 32 Legare Street: Years and years ago, a famous school for girls was on this property under the principalship of Madame Talvande, survivor of the Domingo massacres. It is one of the most desirable residential properties in Charleston. It was built in 1776. Through the Sword Gates (1815-20), uncommonly fine examples of ornate and graceful iron work, one peeps into a beckoning garden, protected by high brick walls. The ballroom in the house is known as one of the most elegant in Charleston. There are really two houses, the older, of brick, on the north; the wooden building has broad piazzas on two sides, overlooking the large garden to the south and west. For years, after the Confederate War, Colonel Charles H. Simonton, United States Circuit Judge, distinguished Confederate officer, and his family lived here. Now it is the property of a granddaughter of President Abraham Lincoln, who owns also the old Magwood Gardens in St. Andrew’s Parish on the Ashley River Road. Kinspeople of Mrs. Abraham Lincoln have long been resident in the Barnwell section of this State.

BETH ELOHIM SYNAGOGUE, 74 Hasell Street: Charleston has had a Jewish congregation since 1750. The tabernacle of Beth Elohim was dedicated in March, 1843, and was among the first synagogues in which an organ was installed. To this congregation is attributed the Jewish Reform movement in the United States, which had its beginning in 1824. The Beth Elohim congregation had a tabernacle on this site just after the Revolution; it was destroyed in the fire of 1838. The incorporation of the congregation dates to 1781. The present tabernacle is a fine example of the Athenian style in architecture. Certain changes in the interior were made about 1880.

YOUNG MEN’S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION, 26 George Street: While this handsome and commodious building was completed in 1912, the association in Charleston was organized in 1854 and is one of the oldest. Its beginning was less than ten years after the Young Men’s Christian Association was founded in London, England, June 6, 1844; the Charleston date was February, 1854. The Charleston association moved into its own building at 208 King Street in 1889 and there remained until it occupied the present building at 26 George Street. Clarence Olney Getty has been general secretary since 1917.

YOUNG WOMEN’S CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION, 76 Society Street: This Charleston branch of a great association had its beginning in 1903. Its first quarters were in an old residence at 21 George Street, the modern building coming with the growth of membership and the increase of community calls.

GRACE CHURCH, 100 Wentworth Street: Its congregation founded in 1840, its corner stone laid in July, 1847, Grace Episcopal Church was consecrated November 9, 1848. The Reverend Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, D.D., was its rector from 1850 to his death in 1898, nearly a half century. The Reverend William Way, D.D., has been rector more than a quarter of a century. Grace has one of the largest and most prosperous Episcopalian congregations in the South.

ST. PAUL’S CHURCH, 126 Coming Street: This is frequently called St. Paul’s, Radcliffeboro, as its site was outside the town when the edifice was consecrated in March, 1816; the congregation was founded in 1811. Its first rector was the Reverend Dr. Percy, an Englishman, who in 1772 took charge of the Bethesda school near Savannah, established by George Whitefield. St. Paul’s is a handsome building with Gothic tower and an impressive portico, with four Doric columns.

ST. PETER’S P.E. CHURCH, Rutledge and Sumter Streets: On this site of Christ Church is St. Peter’s, so named from the old church at No. 8 Logan Street. Through arrangement of the two vestries, the new St. Peter’s came into the old St. Peter’s properties. The Logan Street church was burned in the fire of 1861. Its graveyard is maintained. Possibly it was on this site that Hessian soldiers were drilled during the Revolution, as Charles Fraser says they went through their military exercises in Logan Street.

CONVENT OF OUR LADY OF MERCY, Legare and Queen Streets: This large brick building is of quite recent construction, but the Sisters of Mercy have been in Charleston more than a hundred years. Misses Mary Joseph and Honora O’Gorman, their niece, Mary Teresa Barry, fourteen years and six months old, and Miss Mary Burke arrived in Charleston November 23, 1829, coming on the invitation of Bishop John M. England. The Misses O’Gorman were natives of Cork, living in Baltimore, Maryland. December 10 they accepted the habit of religion, with Sister Mary Joseph as superioress of the new Community. In a small house on Friend (now Legare) Street the Sisters established the Academy of Our Lady of Mercy in December, 1830. Two years later the Bishop established a seminary and appointed Sister Mary Martha (Miss Honora O’Gorman) to its supervision. The Orphanage, Queen and Logan Streets, was established in 1840, under the care of the Sisters. The St. Francis Xavier Infirmary, Ashley Avenue and Calhoun Street, dates to 1882; it began in the McHugh residence, Magazine Street. In 1870 the Sisters acquired the old Nathaniel Russell house, 51 Meeting Street, relinquishing it on the completion of the new Convent. From the Charleston Community of Sisters of Mercy have gone other communities into both Carolinas and Georgia. Nor yellow fever nor war nor earthquake has swerved these consecrated women. They were angels of mercy in the yellow fever epidemics of 1835 and 1852. They nursed friend and foe alike in the War for Southern Independence. Notwithstanding the alarm and excitement in the time of the earthquake (1886) they ministered calmly, sweetly, efficiently to the sick and the injured.

BISHOP ENGLAND HIGH SCHOOL, 203 Calhoun Street: Long have the Catholics of Charleston had their parochial schools and the Academy of Our Lady of Mercy for girls. In 1914, in the pro-Cathedral, next to the Convent, Bishop Northrop established the Bishop England High School. Outgrowing these accommodations, it was transferred to the former home of the Cenacle Nuns in Calhoun Street, and on this site later the present large building was erected. Under the principalship of the Reverend Joseph L. O’Brien, the school has acquired a shining progress.

BIRTHPLACE OF MASONRY, Broad and Church Streets: Charleston has the oldest lodge of Ancient Free Masons in this country. Chartered by the Grand Lodge in England in 1735, Solomon’s Lodge, No. 1, was organized in October, 1736. Its communications were held above the old Shepheard’s Tavern, northeast corner of Broad and Church Streets, now the home of the Citizens and Southern Bank, successor to the Germania Savings Bank. The site is of interest also in that here was instituted the mother council of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Free Masonry in May, 1801, the significance of which is recognized by the Supreme Council of the Scottish Rite, its headquarters in Washington.

THE IZARD HOUSES, 110-114 Broad Street: Some time before 1757 the Izard House in Charlestown was built. It remained in the Izard family a hundred years and since then has been in the possession of the family of Judge Mitchell King. Next door to the west, Ralph Izard, in 1827, began the erection of a house for his daughter, who sold it in 1829 to her brother-in-law, Colonel Thomas Pinckney. It was later acquired for the Bishop of Charleston. The Most Reverend Emmet Walsh, sixth Bishop of Charleston, has residence here. It is but three doors from the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist.

JOHN RUTLEDGE’S HOUSE, 116 Broad Street: The war in which the Cherokee Indians were humbled had not been decided when this house was built in Charlestown. It became the home of John Rutledge, known as the Dictator, second Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. President of the independent Republic of South Carolina as the Revolution was breaking, he was clothed by the Assembly in 1780-82 with dictatorial powers; he was then Governor. The house, built in 1760, was the residence of Robert Goodwyn Rhett, former Mayor of Charleston, former president of the Chamber of Commerce of the United States, chairman of the board of the People’s State Bank of South Carolina. As guest of the Rhetts President William Howard Taft was entertained in this house.

CYPRESS GARDENS, On the Coastal Highway: Twenty-three miles north of Charleston, on the Coastal Highway (United States No. 52) Benjamin R. Kittredge has developed the Cypress Gardens. A cypress swamp, dark, mysterious, witching, has been shaped into an attraction of great power. To enjoy the Cypress Gardens to the full the visitor should use a boat. In their seasons the azaleas on this property are gorgeous, and in late spring the show of lotus is exquisite. Mr. Kittredge more than twenty years ago acquired the Dean Hall property, an old-time plantation on the Cooper River, from James Petigru Carson, grandson of the eminent lawyer and Unionist, James Louis Petigru.

CHARLESTON ORPHAN HOUSE, 160 Calhoun Street: When the City of Charleston was incorporated in 1783, it was provided that poor orphan children should be cared for by the town. At first boys and girls were boarded in private homes and educated at Charleston’s expense. In November, 1792, the corner stone of the orphanage on the present site was laid, and in October, 1794, it was occupied. At that time the roll of orphans numbered more than a hundred. In 1855, the building was greatly improved and enlarged. In the belfry is one of Charleston’s fire-alarm bells and above the belfry the figure of Charity. Clergymen of Charleston take turns in officiating in the orphans’ chapel, on the Vanderhorst Street side. Distinguished visitors to Charleston have inspected the Orphan House, among them Grover Cleveland when he was here, with Mrs. Cleveland, in 1888. The Charleston Orphan House is one of the oldest in the country. Generous gifts and legacies have greatly assisted the Board of Commissioners, the chairman of whom at this time is the Honorable John F. Ohlandt.

FIRST WHITE CHILD, Born at East Bay and Tradd: The site of the Tradd home is at the northwest corner of East Bay and Tradd Streets. Here was born the first white child of the colony, a boy, Robert Tradd. The Tradd family has perished in Charleston. It is perpetuated in the street so named.

JOHN EDWARDS’ HOUSE, 15 Meeting Street: John Edwards came from England and prospered as a merchant in Charlestown. In 1770 he built the fine mansion at what is now 15 Meeting Street. Edwards cast his lot with the patriots and contributed of his fortune to the cause of independence. “I would rather lose my all, than retain it subject to British authority,” he is reported to have said. During the British occupation in the Revolution, this house was quarters for Admiral Arbuthnot (Sir Henry Clinton was in the Miles Brewton house, 27 King Street). When in 1793 the French fled from San Domingo, the illustrious Compte de Grasse was entertained in this house. (Members of his family are interred in old St. Mary’s Churchyard, Charleston). The Edwards home is the property of the family of George W. Williams, banker.

GIBBES ART GALLERY, 131 Meeting Street: “For the erection or purchase of a suitable building to be used as a hall or halls for the exhibition of painting and for necessary rooms for students in the fine arts,” James S. Gibbes bequeathed about $125,000. The memorial building was erected on the site of the old Grand Opera House, opposite the site of the South Carolina Institute Hall in which the Ordinance of Secession was signed December 20, 1860. It is under supervision of the Mayor and the Carolina Art Association, chartered in December, 1858.

HIBERNIAN HALL, 105 Meeting Street: Says the bronze tablet at the gateway: “Founded March 17, 1801. Met in Corbett’s Tavern until construction of this hall. Dedicated 1841. Long a center of civic life in disasters as in prosperity. Its presidents alternate Catholic and Protestant. Hibernian Society.” Prominent among its founders was Judge Aedanus Burke, of whom many merry stories survive. Through many years the St. Cecilia Society gave its balls in this hall. At the St. Patrick’s Day banquets of the Hibernian Society men of lustrous national and international reputation have spoken.

THE ENSTON HOME, 720 King Street: “To make old age comfortable,” William Enston, native of Canterbury, England, left his estate, after life tenures, for an institution for old and infirm persons. In 1882, in the life-time of the widow, arrangements for constructing the Enston Home were begun and in February, 1899, the memorial hall, a chapel and meeting place was formally dedicated. Cottages occupy about a half of the property. The Board of Trustees is watchful of the conditions warranting further growth. The Enston Home is an exemplary practical charity.

BETHEL METHODIST CHURCH, Calhoun and Pitt Streets: Elsewhere is reference made to the visits of John and Charles Wesley to Charleston in 1736 and 1737. John Wesley preached in St. Philip’s Episcopal Church in 1737. It was in 1785 that Bishop Asbury and his associates came to Charleston. Bethel, one of the strongholds of Methodism in South Carolina, dates to 1850. The church building was dedicated in 1853. It stands on the site where Wesley once preached and the pulpit from which he preached is still in use. The Sunday school building was erected in 1912. The earlier Bethel, known as Old Bethel, moved from the site, is used by a negro congregation at 222 Calhoun Street.

ST. LUKE’S CHURCH, 20 Elizabeth Street: For the convenience of Episcopalians in the northeastern section of Charleston, St. Luke’s Church was founded in December, 1857. The corner stone of the present building was laid in 1859 and the church, though partly completed, used in February, 1862. During the War for Southern Independence Union soldiers sacked the building and a negro female school was held in it. In the fall of 1865 it was repossessed by the vestry. In 1880 the congregation of St. Stephen’s chapel, Anson Street, united with St. Luke’s. For a time after 1900 the church was closed, but reopened by a section of the congregation of St. Paul’s.

YEAMANS HALL, Club on Goose Creek: On property taking its name from Sir John Yeamans, second Governor at Charles Town, is the Yeamans Hall Club, an exclusive organization, the members of which are mainly from the East. A number of the members have their own cottages on the property. Most of them are interested in hunting preserves in coastal South Carolina. The club property is not open to the public. It is on Goose Creek, some distance above its mouth. The late Walter Camp, in a letter said: “The combination of golf and other sports, with fishing, hunting and the close proximity of a large town for supplies renders the situation particularly attractive.” Golfers of wide experience have pronounced the links at Yeamans Hall among the very best. It is appropriate as Charleston boasted a golf club late in the eighteenth century, on the Harleston Green.

UNITED STATES NAVY YARD, on the Cooper River: The development of this naval base and station grew out of a recommendation by a special board in 1901. Of particular interest to the visitor is the old frigate Hartford, flagship of Commodore Farragut in the Battle of Mobile Bay—“Damn the torpedoes; go ahead.” For some years the cruiser Olympia, flagship of Commodore Dewey in the Battle of Manila Bay, was a receiving ship at the Charleston yard, but it was recommissioned in the World War. The destroyer Tillman, the gunboat Asheville and other naval craft have been built at this yard, which is equipped with a dry dock large enough to accommodate modern battleships, and with marine railways of considerable capacity. One of the navy’s most powerful radio-telegraph stations is at the yard. Charleston’s is the only navy yard on the Atlantic Coast south of Norfolk, of peculiar strategic value in relation to the Panama Canal. During the World War thousands of bluejackets were trained here, and the navy maintained a clothing factory with two thousand operatives.

CHAMBER OF COMMERCE, Broad and Church Streets: Having begun in 1773 the Charleston Chamber of Commerce is the oldest in the United States. With the removal of the Charleston Library to its building in King Street, the Chamber of Commerce acquired the building, formerly the home of the old South Carolina Bank.

THE COUNTRY CLUB, on James Island: On picturesque property on James Island, on one side washed by Wappoo Creek, the Charleston Country Club has a handsome and comfortable house and an excellent golf course. The club had its beginning in the Belvedere property on the Cooper River, northward of Magnolia Cemetery. Charleston, according to advertisements in the Charleston City Gazette in the late 1790’s, had the country’s first golf club. The Country Club is accessible by yacht as well as by motor, as it is on the inland waterway. A mile from this club are the municipal links, near the Stono River bridge, open to the public.

CHARLESTON’S BANKS: Oldest banking house in the South, dating to 1834, the main office of the South Carolina National Bank is at the northeast corner of Broad and State Streets. The old Bank of Charleston was the parent of the banking system with offices in Columbia, Greenville, Sumter and other South Carolina towns.

The Carolina Savings Bank’s main offices are at the southwest corner of Broad and East Bay Streets.

The Citizens and Southern Bank of South Carolina is in a new home at the northeast corner of Broad and Church Streets, site of the first Masonic lodge in this country.

The Miners and Merchants’ Bank is at 23 Broad Street.

Branch Offices of the banks are at convenient places in King Street, the principal retail area.