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Ashley River Historic District (Boundary Increase)

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Ashley River Historic District (Boundary Increase) NPS Form 10-900 OMB No. 1024-0018 (Expires 5/31/2012) United States Department of the Interior National Park Service National Register of Historic Places Registration Form This form is for use in nominating or requesting determinations for individual properties and districts. See instructions in National Register Bulletin, How to Complete the National Register of Historic Places Registration Form. If any item does not apply to the property being documented, enter "N/A" for "not applicable." For functions, architectural classification, materials, and areas of significance, enter only categories and subcategories from the instructions. Place additional certification comments, entries, and narrative items on continuation sheets if needed (NPS Form 10-900a). 1. Name of Property historic name Ashley River Historic District (additional documentation and boundary increase/decrease) other names/site number n/a 2. Location street & number NW of Charleston between the NE bank of the Ashley River and the not for publication Ashley-Stono Canal, and east of Delmar Hwy (Hwy 165) city or town Charleston x vicinity state Charleston and South Carolina code SC county Dorchester code 019 &035 3. State/Federal Agency Certification As the designated authority under the National Historic Preservation Act, as amended, I hereby certify that this X nomination request for determination of eligibility meets the documentation standards for registering properties in the National Register of Historic Places and meets the procedural and professional requirements set forth in 36 CFR Part 60. In my opinion, the property _ meets _ does not meet the National Register Criteria. I recommend that this property be considered significant at the following level(s) of significance: X national statewide local ____________________________________ Signature of certifying official Date _____________________________________ Title State or Federal agency/bureau or Tribal Government In my opinion, the property meets does not meet the National Register criteria. ____________________________________ Signature of commenting official Date ___________________ _________ Title State or Federal agency/bureau or Tribal Government 1 Ashley River Historic District (additional Charleston and documentation and boundary Dorchester Counties, SC increase/decrease) Name of Property County and State 4. National Park Service Certification I, hereby, certify that this property is: entered in the National Register determined eligible for the National Register determined not eligible for the National Register removed from the National Register other (explain:) ________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________ Signature of the Keeper Date of Action 5. Classification Ownership of Property Category of Property Number of Resources within Property (Check as many boxes as apply) (Check only one box) (Do not include previously listed resources in the count.) Contributing Noncontributing x private building(s) 17 64 buildings public - Local x district 0 0 district x public - State site 67 0 site public - Federal structure 51 2 structure object 1 0 object 136 68 Total Name of related multiple property listing Number of contributing resources previously (Enter "N/A" if property is not part of a multiple property listing) listed in the National Register n/a 44 6. Function or Use Historic Functions Current Functions (Enter categories from instructions) (Enter categories from instructions) Agriculture Agriculture/subsistence Domestic Domestic Industry/processing/extraction Industry/processing/extraction Defense Landscape Landscape Transportation Transportation Industry/processing/extraction 2 Ashley River Historic District (additional Charleston and documentation and boundary Dorchester Counties, SC increase/decrease) Name of Property County and State Section 7: Description Architectural Classification Materials (Enter categories from instructions) (Enter categories from instructions) See individual descriptions within the inventory foundation: Brick walls: Brick; Wood; Stucco roof: Metal; Stone; Asphalt other: Narrative Description (Describe the historic and current physical appearance of the property. Explain contributing and noncontributing resources if necessary. Begin with a summary paragraph that briefly describes the general characteristics of the property, such as its location, setting, size, and significant features.) Summary Paragraph The Ashley River Historic District is located approximately 16 miles from downtown Charleston, encompasses land controlled by five municipalities, and is almost equally divided between Charleston and Dorchester counties. The district extends from the north bank of the Ashley River (and in some areas beyond) across the dry land, swamps, and marshes of the Rantowles Creek and Stono Swamp watershed. The boundary is complex and will be described thoroughly in a later section and delineated on maps. The 23,828.26-acre tract of land is a distinctive historic rural landscape that retains a high degree of integrity. Generally speaking, the terrain of the district is flat with isolated areas of high ground as well as low fresh water swamps and salt water marshes. The salt water marshes are located along the Ashley River, with the fresh water swamps being found further inland. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Narrative Description The proposed Ashley River Historic District (Boundary Increase) is such a significant revision that it is essentially a new district nomination incorporating the 1994 nomination into one that makes a case for expanding the boundaries, acreage, and types of resources within a much larger district. This new nomination features a more detailed and comprehensive inventory and description, and a fuller and more sophisticated discussion of the appropriate National Register Criteria, Areas of Significance, and Period of Significance, not only for the resources included in the original district, but also for those now being added in a boundary increase which more than triples the size of the district from 7,000 acres to 23,828.26 acres. 3 Ashley River Historic District (additional Charleston and documentation and boundary Dorchester Counties, SC increase/decrease) Name of Property County and State Its most notable expansion adds several thousand acres of historic and archaeological resources associated with the rice culture that dominated the landscape, economy, and society of the South Carolina Lowcountry from the early-eighteenth century to the mid- nineteenth century and associated with phosphate mining that helped the region recover from the agricultural and economic upheaval of the Civil War and Reconstruction era. Other resources largely absent from the original district include hunting plantations and preserves, and those associated with the timber industry, both dating from the late- nineteenth century through the mid-twentieth century. These types of properties provide valuable historic and archaeological context that gives this expanded Ashley River Historic District more lasting value as a research document and planning tool. The Ashley River Historic District is within an area of remarkably low-lying flat terrain of South Carolina commonly known as the Lowcountry. It is drained by the Ashley River to the north and the Stono River (via Rantowles Creek) to the south. These rivers are significantly affected by the tidal push and pull of the Atlantic Ocean. Terraces indicative of the sea levels of ancient oceans step gradually toward the Atlantic and are remnants of a geologic process that concurrently deposited concentrations of fossil sediments, and in particular phosphoritic marl, throughout the Lowcountry. The courses of the rivers and creeks in the district have remained remarkably constant, and identical topographic features in the form of bends, points, elbows, curves and islands can be easily matched from current maps and aerial photographs, to historical plats and surveys. Historically, the Ashley River and Rantowles Creek substantially facilitated the creation of this cultural landscape which was transformed and managed by European settlers and their enslaved Native American and African labor force. The waterways of the Lowcountry – specifically the Wando, Cooper, Ashley, Stono, and Edisto rivers, and their tributary creeks – were exploited as the primary transportation network in the Lowcountry. Within the district these waterways greatly facilitated exploration and settlement, the movement of goods, and the cultivation of staple crops. The banks of the Ashley River were selected as the location for the founders’ initial settlement at Albemarle Point in 1670, a location a few miles beyond the eastern boundary of the nominated district. Radiating from Albemarle Point, and particularly toward the headwaters of the Ashley, where a 12,000-acre land grant known as Lord Ashley’s Barony was reserved for the first Earl of Shaftsbury, Anthony Ashley Cooper, the colonists established a network of settlements and roads that secured an economic foundation for the new colony based chiefly on the supply of raw materials and foodstuffs to the sugar plantations in the English West Indies.1 Ease of access by water to Charleston (relocated from Albemarle Point to its present location by 1680) heightened the demand for riverfront tracts of land along the Ashley River, and resulted in a land-use pattern
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