Coastal Heritage VOLUME 30, NUMBER 1 WINTER 2017

Trailblazers of the

ReconstructionW interEra 2017 • 1 3 TRAILBLAZERS OF THE RECONSTRUCTION ERA With a new National Park Service site planned for Beaufort County, the people who led the way during Reconstruction gain new acclaim.

5 Coastal Science Serving South Carolina SOUTH CAROLINA’S SEVEN CONSTITUTIONS Coastal Heritage is a quarterly publication New state guiding principles set the tone for Reconstruction. of the S.C. Sea Grant Consortium, a science- based state agency supporting research, education, and outreach to conserve coastal 14 resources and enhance economic opportunity NEWS AND NOTES for the people of South Carolina. Comments regarding this or future issues of • USC President Pastides elected board chair Coastal Heritage are welcomed at • Two students chosen for Knauss fellowship [email protected]. Subscriptions • Community shellfish restoration and research featured at conference are free upon request by contacting: • Beach Sweep/River Sweep nets 24 tons of debris S.C. Sea Grant Consortium 287 Meeting Street 16 Charleston, S.C. 29401 phone: (843) 953-2078 EBBS AND FLOWS [email protected] • North Carolina’s Coastal Conference Executive Director • SEERS/Benthic Ecology Meeting M. Richard DeVoe • Gullah/Geechee Coastal Cultures Conference Director of Communications Susan Ferris Hill Editor Joey Holleman Art Director Pam Hesse Pam Hesse Graphic Design  Board of Directors The Consortium’s Board of Directors is composed of the chief executive officers of its member institutions:

Dr. Harris Pastides, Chair President, University of South Carolina Dr. James P. Clements President, Clemson University Dr. David A. DeCenzo President, Coastal Carolina University Glenn F. McConnell President, College of Charleston Dr. David J. Cole President, Medical University of South Carolina Col. Alvin A. Taylor ON THE COVER: Director, Robert Smalls, the most prominent African-American figure in South Carolina S.C. Department of Natural Resources during Reconstruction, is celebrated with a sculpture outside Tabernacle Baptist Church James E. Clark in Beaufort, S.C. President, S.C. State University PHOTO/GRACE BEAHM Lt. General John W. Rosa COPYRIGHT © 2017 by the South Carolina Sea Grant Consortium. All rights reserved. President, The Citadel

2 • Coastal Heritage HISTORY ABOUNDS. A marker was erected in 1994 at the Georgetown home of Joseph Rainey. A revival of interest in Rainey and other important figures of Reconstruc­ tion­ is expected with the recent announcement of a National Park Service Reconstruction National Monument in Beaufort County, S.C. PHOTO/GRACE BEAHM

Trailblazers of the Reconstruction Era by Joey Holleman

obert Smalls pulled off a feat so was a suburban real-estate developer in problem to face in the sudden freeing Rdaring it landed him an audience coastal South Carolina decades before of thousands of irresponsible, unedu- with President Abraham Lincoln as true suburbs arose in the region. cated, unmoral, and, in many cases, well as a trip to New York to bolster Francis Cardozo was the first brutish Africans. The people of South support for the Union effort during the African American to hold statewide Carolina felt that they were a danger Civil War. office in the United States. Joseph and that harsh laws were necessary to Frances Rollin Whipper sued Rainey was the first African American hold them in bounds.” a Charleston public transportation to serve in the United States House of That is from History of South company in 1867 for refusing to sell Representatives. Carolina, revised in 1916 by Mary C. her a first-class ticket because she was These residents of Reconstruction- Simms Oliphant from the original black, and won the case. era South Carolina in the second half book written by her grandfather, Laura Towne started a school for of the 19th century lived amazing lives, William Gilmore Simms. The words former slaves on Saint Helena Island with plot twists worthy of best-selling reflected the ruling class viewpoint in in 1862, just a few months after such novels or blockbuster motion pictures. the early 20th century. an institution would have been illegal, Yet this is how South Carolina history The New Simms History of South and it’s still a center of the community. textbooks referred to their era and Carolina, Oliphant’s 1940 update, Reverend Richard Cain rein­vig- accomplishments for the first half of toned down the rhetoric only slightly. or­ated an African-American church the 20th century: The chapter on the period after that remains a Charleston icon, and he “The State had a tremendous the Civil War was titled “Recon­

Winter 2017 • 3 residents flexed political muscle reflect- ing their numbers. The beginning of the end of Reconstruction was the 1876 election, when the Democrats, then the party of the white establish- ment, used voter intimidation to regain control of state politics. A new state constitution in 1895 further disenfranchised black voters, and the Reconstruction era ended by the turn of the century. Reverend Abraham Murray, cur- rent pastor at the historic Brick Baptist Church on Saint Helena Island, knew little about the region’s rich Recon­ struction history when he came to the church 16 years ago. “I was never taught anything good about the period called Reconstruction,” Murray says. In December 2016, hundreds of history enthusiasts packed Brick Baptist Church at a public meeting to discuss establishing a National Park Service (NPS) site in Beaufort County to commemorate Reconstruction. The meeting was the final official event in a 15-year effort. Barack Obama, in one of his last acts as president in January 2017, designated a Reconstruction National Monument covering four specific locations in Beaufort County— Brick Baptist Church, Darrah Hall at the adjacent Penn Center, the Emanci­ pation Oak at Camp Saxton in Port Royal, and a former firehouse in Beau­fort. From interpretive sites at the firehouse and Penn Center, home to MAP/U.S. DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR/NATIONAL PARK SERVICE the first school for freed slaves in 1862, visitors will be able to learn about the struction­—The State’s Darkest Day.” ignored individually and pilloried fascinating people, places, and events “The horrors of war were nothing collectively. By the 1970 version of of the era. compared to those of this period when the Oliphant textbook, now titled The “We live in the world that Recon­ Congress was ‘reconstructing’ the History of South Carolina, figures such struction made, so it’s very important State,” it reads, referring to those as Cain, Cardozo, Rainey, and Smalls that we grapple with and understand elected to the state Legislature during did merit mentions. The overriding this period in our history,” says Ehren Reconstruction as carpetbaggers, message, however, remained that Foley, a historian with the S.C. State scalawags, and negroes. “For eight nothing positive happened during Historic Preservation Office. “And we years, they plundered and robbed the Reconstruction. The next section in haven’t really had that reckoning yet, State. … The Congress of the United the textbook was renamed “The End and maybe this is our opportunity States kept troops in South Carolina of a Tragic Era.” to do so.” to keep these thieves in power.” Reconstruction was the historical In the past 50 years, a wave of Rather than being celebrated for period born of the emancipation of scholarly books and papers has broadly achievements against great odds, the slaves and the economic and political examined the Reconstruction period, Reconstruction-era leaders of the upheaval of the Civil War. It was but little of the scholarship on the newly free black population were marked by a brief period when black subject has filtered down to general

4 • Coastal Heritage public knowledge. One solution could It’s not because his life was lacking be celebrating the amazing characters in dramatics. University of South SOUTH CAROLINA’S SEVEN of Reconstruction, whose stories make Carolina history professor Andrew CONSTITUTIONS history come alive for students of all Billingsley’s 2007 book “Yearning to ages. The following are snapshots Breathe Free: Robert Smalls of South South Carolina has had seven constitu- of six fascinating people who called Carolina and His Families” reads like tions, including four in the second half of th South Carolina home during that era. hard-to-believe fiction. the 19 century that marked tremendous “He was a brave, intelligent leader changes of course and set the tone for the ROBERT SMALLS (1839-1915) in the decade of biracial political Reconstruction era in South Carolina. democracy in South Carolina, which Constitution of 1776: Robert Smalls has earned has not been equaled even to the Adopted before the Declaration of more attention than most of South present time,” wrote Billingsley in the Independence. Set up a new system Carolina’s Reconstruction leaders. A summary of his book. “The struggle of government, including a General school in Beaufort, a U.S. Army ship, he led in the 1895 Constitutional Assembly, with state president and vice and a section of a U.S. Navy training Convention is at least on a par with president selected by legislators. facility have been named in his honor. the struggle for voting rights in the The new National Museum of African civil rights era of the 1960s.” Constitution of 1778: American History and Cul­ture in Considering where he came Created state Senate. Governor and Washington, D.C., features a statue from, Smalls’ accomplishments were lieutenant governor replaced president of Robert Smalls that greets visitors astounding. He was born into slavery, and vice president. entering the area entitled “Defending the son of a house servant of wealthy Constitution of 1790: Freedom, Defining Freedom: Era of Beaufort resident Henry McKee. At First document created by an elected Segregation 1876-1968.” age 12, Smalls was taken to Charleston convention, with minor changes in Many believe he deserves more to board with a McKee relative. He government structure. acclaim. went to work as a waiter and a lamp- “I think Robert Smalls was the lighter, with his pay going to McKee. Constitution of 1861: most consequential South Carolinian His powerful physique later led to a job With the Ordinance of Secession who ever lived,” says U.S. Representa- loading cargo on the city docks, gradu- passed late in 1860, state leaders tive James Clyburn, who taught high ating to jobs as a rigger and a boat tweaked the 1790 document to allow school history before entering the pilot. Those skills were critical to the for withdrawal from the Union. political arena. daring event that shaped the rest of Constitution of 1865: Yet Smalls wasn’t mentioned in Smalls’ life. Forced to come up with a new constitu- many South Carolina history text- Soon after the Civil War broke tion to re-enter the United States. books for much of the 20th century. out, Smalls was pressed into service on Abolished requirement to own property the Confederate steamer Planter. Like to be eligible for public office. Didn’t many in his situation, he longed for include voting rights for blacks. freedom. On the night of May 13, 1862, he saw his chance. Confederate Constitution of 1868: officers in charge ofPlanter left the Forced again by the federal government black crew on the boat and went to rewrite the document. Created by a ashore for the night. After quietly convention of delegates from through- sending for the crew’s family members out the state, including many blacks. to come aboard, Smalls pulled Planter Gave all men the right to vote. Called away from the dock flying the South for public education for all. Carolina and Confederate flags. Standing tall in the pilothouse, imper- Constitution of 1895: sonating the ship’s white captain, Product of a constitutional convention Smalls guided Planter past multiple called for by Democratic Party leaders. checkpoints, including Fort Sumter. Voting eligibility regulations disenfran- Approaching the Union fleet ringing chised many blacks. Legislative changes the outer harbor, Smalls raised the in 1950 and 1969 loosened those white flag of truce and surrendered restrictions. Robert Smalls: harbor pilot, politician, to the Union Navy. Source: S.C. Archives and History and education advocate. His daring feat was celebrated in Foundation PHOTO/LIBRARY OF CONGRESS the North, with Union leaders sending

Winter 2017 • 5 schools. (Smalls had no formal educa- tion before hiring tutors to teach him to read and write as an adult.) In Washington, he advocated for his race and projects in his home state, including a naval base in his district at Port Royal. As white elites regained power in South Carolina late in the 1870s, they tried to purge the remaining blacks from political offices, often with charges of malfeasance. In 1877, Congressman Smalls was charged with accepting a $5,000 bribe to influence the awarding of a government print contract when he was a state legislator in 1873. He was appealing his convic- tion when President Rutherford B. Hayes granted him a pardon as part of a political deal that began the down- fall of Reconstruction. After the 1876 election, voter intimidation and new voting regula- tions made it more difficult for African Americans to gain political office. Yet Smalls remained a force in Beaufort County for the rest of his life. He served portions of three more terms in Congress and in 1895 returned to Columbia to serve on the panel writ- ing a new state constitution. While that document further tightened white leaders’ grip on power, Smalls refused to back down. “My race needs no special defense, MAKING CONNECTIONS. Robert Smalls’ legacy is strong in Beaufort, where he for the whole history of them in this lived until his death in 1915. A sculptured bust of Smalls’ powerful countenance stands country proves them to be the equal a few feet from his grave at Tabernacle Baptist Church at 907 Craven Street. His home at 511 Prince Street has been beautifully restored. It’s a private residence and not of any people, anywhere,” he said in open to the public, but anyone can peer through the magnolia trees and imagine Smalls addressing the Constitutional ­strolling from the front door to his job a few blocks away as Collector of Customs. Convention. “All they need is an equal PHOTO/GRACE BEAHM chance in the battle of life.”

Smalls on trips to Washington and was just getting started. The respect he FRANCES ROLLIN WHIPPER New York. He was granted a monetary earned among the black population for (1845-1901) reward and put in charge of Planter, his daring act translated into political which became an active Union ship in leadership. He served in the state Eighty-eight years before Rosa South Carolina waters. By the end of House of Representatives and Senate Parks refused to move to the back of the war, Smalls earned enough to and was elected five times to the U.S. the bus in a defining moment of the purchase his former owner’s home, House of Representatives. He was an 20th century Civil Rights movement, which like many plantation owners’ active member of the Constitutional Frances Rollin took a similar prin- property was seized to cover unpaid Convention of 1868, which wrote cipled stand in Charleston. taxes during the war. South Carolina’s new governing In the summer of 1867, Rollin Smalls would have deserved fame guidelines. tried to buy a ticket on the steamer had he lived a quiet life as a ship pilot In the state legislature, he advo­- Pilot Boy, which made routine trips or businessman from that point, but he cated funding for integrated public from Charleston to Beaufort. Captain

6 • Coastal Heritage longed to take advantage of her new As she pressed her civil rights case rights. Unlike many, she refused to in 1867, Rollin sought counsel from back down when challenged. She took Major Martin R. Delany, a high-rank- the case to court. In August of 1867, ing black military officer with the McNelty was found guilty of violating Freedmen’s Bureau. They became the military order and fined $250. friends, and Delany asked Rollin to As historian Willard B. write his biography. The end product­— Gatewood, Jr. noted in the January Life and Public Services of Martin R. 1991 issue of South Carolina Historical Delany—was published under the Magazine, McNelty had refused pseudonym Frank A. Rollin to avoid ­passage to the wrong woman. Rollin prejudice against women authors. was born in 1845 in Charleston, the Some reference books specify it as the daughter of free black parents of first full-length biography written by French and Haitian backgrounds. an African American. Her father operated a successful lum- In 1868, Rollin accepted a job in ber business, and the family was the office of William Whipper, one among the city’s black aristocracy. She of the state’s first African-American Frances Rollin Whipper: civil rights was educated in Catholic schools in attorneys and a member of the S.C. advocate, writer, and single mom. Charleston before being shipped to House of Repre­sentatives from PHOTO/N.Y. PUBLIC LIBRARY/LEIGH WHIPPER PHOTOGRAPH COLLECTION Philadelphia as war talk heated up to Beaufort County. Whipper, son of a attend the Institute for Colored Youth, Philadelphia businessman, was recently W. T. McNelty refused to sell the black a Quaker school. After the war, she widowed. Within two weeks of hiring woman a first-class ticket, ignoring a returned to Charleston to teach in Rollin, Whipper asked her to marry recent military order banning discrim­­ schools operated by the Freedmen’s him. Against her family’s objections, ination on public conveyances. Like Bureau and the American Missionary she agreed to the union, and they were many black South Carolinians, Rollin Association. married a month later.

WORDS ENDURE. Frances Rollin Whipper returned to South Carolina late in life and died in 1901 in Beaufort. Her gravesite, likely in the Wesley United Methodist Church cemetery, is unidentified, and no home in South Carolina is celebrated as the Frances Rollin Whipper house. Thus the best way to make a modern-day connection with her is to read passages from the Martin Delany biography she wrote. It’s available in its entirety online at http://digilib.nypl.org/dynaweb/digs/wwm9720. The Special Collections section of the College of Charleston Addlestone Library has a first edition of the book. PHOTOS/GRACE BEAHM

Winter 2017 • 7 Rollin Whipper didn’t follow the scholars in her diary. Attendance rose cultural norm of retreating to the to 110 by October. Eventually, the background as the wife of a public growth forced a move a few miles away official. Through the next decade, she to the larger Brick Baptist Church, balanced raising the three of her five and then in 1865 to a new school children who survived infancy with built next door with the aid of donors working in her husband’s law office, from Pennsylvania. It was called briefly editing the Beaufort Tribune Penn School. newspaper, and pushing for women’s “Our school is a delight,” Towne suffrage alongside her four sisters. The wrote in an 1877 letter. “It rained one marriage by all accounts was a rocky day last week, but through the pelting one, as William Whipper’s gambling showers came nearly every blessed and drinking habits were well known. child. Some of them walk six miles Late in his career, Whipper moved the and back, besides doing their task of family to Washington, D.C. When her cotton-picking. Their steady eagerness husband returned to South Carolina in to learn is just something amazing.” 1884, Rollin Whipper stayed behind Trained in medicine, Towne also with their children in Washington. Laura Matilda Towne: abolitionist, was the only physician in the com­ An early example of the working physician, and educator. munity for years. She would spend single mother, Rollin Whipper took a PHOTO/LIBRARY OF CONGRESS/THE ROBIN mornings traveling house-to-house to job in Frederick Douglass’ Record of G. STANFORD COLLECTION treat sick islanders, and then return to Deeds Office in Washington, accept- the school and teach in the after- ing writing assignments on the side and ventured by ship to Beaufort noons. She delivered babies, and to help make ends meet. Her three County and filled the void. taught them a few years later. children all attended college. One Classes began September 22, Ellen Murray, Towne’s friend from daughter became a nurse and teacher, 1862 at The Oaks plantation with 41 Canada, and Charlotte Forten, a free another earned a degree in medicine students—Towne referred to them as black Northerner, were the primary and started a home for unwed mothers in Washington, and a son enjoyed a long career as a stage and screen actor. Shortly before Rollin Whipper’s death, she was contacted by Daniel Murray for details to include in a biog- raphy on her in the Encyclopedia of the Colored Race. Her response revealed her humility. “I thank you sincerely that you deem me worthy to be inscribed among those who have con- tributed to the progress and uplifting of the race,” she wrote. “I have always classed myself among those who never reached the mark they had in sight.”

LAURA MATILDA TOWNE (1825-1901)

Early in the Civil War, Union troops took control of Beaufort and the nearby sea islands, and plantation owners fled to the interior. Abolition­ CHURCH SCHOOL. Laura Towne’s home at Frogmore Plantation on Saint Helena ists in northern states felt the formerly Island is privately owned. Most of the structures on the Penn Center campus post- enslaved people left behind deserved date Towne, but the Brick Baptist Church (above) remains. Visitors can peer through the windows and imagine multiple classes of students meeting in its open sanctuary. an education. Enthusiastic to help, “We have the noise of three large schools in one room, and it is trying to the voice and Laura Towne left the comfort of a strength, and not conducive to good order,” Towne wrote in her diary. white, upper-class life in Philadelphia PHOTO/GRACE BEAHM

8 • Coastal Heritage teachers in the school’s early years. Cain and six like-minded entre- However, Forten referred to Towne preneurs took a railroad excursion in as “the most indispensable person on search of the ideal spot for a new black the place, and the people are devoted community. They opted for a railroad to her.” water stop about 20 miles northwest of Towne felt equally enamored of Charleston. The group paid $1,000 for the people. Returning from one of her 620 acres in 1867, and then subdivided rare trips to Philadelphia, she wrote in it into four-acre lots set up on a grid of a letter: “It is good to be back where dirt roads. Thus was born Lincolnville, you are really needed.” one of South Carolina’s first suburban After the war, many abolitionists real-estate developments. Cain went lost interest in the plight of the former on to many grand accomplishments, slaves. Towne stayed. Through Recon- but the notion behind Lincolnville— struction and much longer she fought self-sufficiency and social advancement to keep Penn School afloat with pleas for African Americans—held up as a to Northern philanthropists for funds. constant in his life. It was a threadbare life, but the school Born in 1825 to a free black father never closed. Towne finally turned Richard Harvey Cain: clergyman, and a Cherokee mother in Virginia, over operation of the school to the ­entrepreneur, and Congressman. Cain grew up in Ohio and entered the leaders of Virginia’s Hampton Institute PHOTO/LIBRARY OF CONGRESS/CONGRES- ministry at the age of 19. In 1865, the shortly before her death in 1901. SIONAL BICENTENNIAL OBSERVANCE GROUP AME Church assigned him the task “Her purpose never failed,” Rupert of resurrecting Charleston’s Emanuel Sargent Holland wrote in Letters and have always been directed by others in AME congregation, which had been Diary of Laura M. Towne: Written from all the affairs of life: They have fur- shut down by authorities after the the Sea Islands of South Carolina, 1862- nished the thoughts while we have 1822 slave revolt led by Denmark 1884. “And though to friends in the been passive instruments, acting as we Vesey. Emanuel quickly grew and North­—think of her isolation, her were acted upon, mere automatons.” became a force in the community, many privations, her constant struggle to keep her school alive—the sacrifice seemed prodigious, to her it meant happiness, as the work chosen for her hand.”

RICHARD HARVEY CAIN (1825-1887)

Among the remaining vestiges of Reconstruction in South Carolina are enclaves such as Honey Hill or Sol Legare on James Island, where freed- men built homes near the plantations on which they had been enslaved. Reverend Richard Cain, a Northern clergyman sent to Charleston after the war by the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church, felt the freedmen deserved more. They deserved communities created sepa- rately from the plantations, places just for them, where they could create their own municipal governments and SUBURBAN LEGACY. Marble memorials to Richard Cain can be found in Emanuel regulations. and Morris Brown AME churches in Charleston. His legacy might be most strong, ­however, in Lincolnville, where East Cain Street ends a block away from Ebenezer “We know how to serve others… AME Church, built on land he donated. While Lincolnville now has a diverse but have not learned how to serve ­population, African Americans maintain a majority of elected positions. ourselves,” Cain said in 1865. “We PHOTO/GRACE BEAHM

Winter 2017 • 9 and additional AME churches sprung Cardozo returned to Charleston in up in Charleston, Georgetown, July 1865 to take over operation of the Lincolnville, Marion, Summerville, American Missionary Association’s and Sumter. Saxton School, which had been estab- Cain preached not only in church lished a year earlier by his brother but also from the pages of his news­ Thomas. Such was the thirst for edu- paper—South Carolina Leader, later cation among the newly freed that the renamed Missionary Record—and school, which started with 400 stu- from political pulpits in Columbia dents, grew to 1,050 students from and Washington. He helped write the October through December of 1865. state’s 1868 constitution and served Suddenly, his ministry had found its one term in the S.C. Senate and two purpose. “If I can influence and shape terms in the U.S. House. Before the the future of this great number [of Lincolnville land purchase, Cain children], if I can cause them to love advocated for the federal government and serve Christ, I could not aspire taking $1 million out of the Freedmen’s to nobler work,” Cardozo wrote to a Bureau budget to purchase former friend in 1865. plantations and divide the land for Francis Lewis Cardozo: educator, Saxton School moved to new sale to landless poor blacks. ­clergyman, and politician. locations several times as it grew until Democrats challenged Cain’s PHOTO/LIBRARY OF CONGRESS a donation from Northern benefactor Congressional victory in the heated Charles Avery allowed school backers 1876 election. While he survived that highly educated negro in America.” to buy two lots on Bull Street. In 1867, challenge, Cain’s increasingly radical How he used that education—a Avery School sprouted on those lots ideas cost him the Republican nomina- ­mixture of preaching, teaching, and as a grand brick building with arches, tion in 1878 and ended his political political leadership—made him truly cupolas, and piazzas. career. Cain went on to serve super­ special. As Reconstruction began to visory roles in the AME Church in Texas (where he also co-founded Paul Quinn College) and Washington, D.C., before his death in 1887.

FRANCIS LEWIS CARDOZO (1836-1903)

Francis Cardozo, free child of a white customs worker and a multiracial mother, by the norms of the early 19th century was considered black. How­ ever, he was granted privileges many blacks in Charleston lacked. He attended schools set up for the black aristocracy, and he was apprenticed to a carpenter during his teen years. Hungry for education, Cardozo used earnings from his carpentry work in 1858 to pay for a trip to Scotland, where he enrolled at Glasgow Uni­ versity. He moved on to seminary training at renowned colleges in Edinburgh and London. He later STILL SCHOLARLY. Francis Cardozo left South Carolina in 1878 to take a position earned a law degree from the Univer­ with the U.S. Treasury in Washington, D.C. Though he spent only a few years in sity of South Carolina, which briefly Charleston, his legacy can be found in the grand brick building at 125 Bull Street, now known as the Avery Research Center for African American History and Culture. In was integrated during Recon­struction. addition to research rooms and exhibit spaces, Avery features a recreated 19 th century Abolitionist Henry Ward Beecher social studies classroom complete with wooden desks in neat rows. once referred to Cardozo as “the most PHOTO/GRACE BEAHM

10 • Coastal Heritage remake the state, Cardozo turned over wealth and spirit,” wrote University of where Rainey made connections that operation of the school to others and South Carolina law professor Lewis allowed him to escape to a new life. pursued another passion—politics. He Burke in a South Carolina Law Review He and his wife quickly established was among the top black firebrands article in 2002. “But worse, the successful businesses in the bustling when leaders gathered in 1868 to Redeem­ers made their case to the Bermudan port of St. George, she as rewrite South Carolina’s constitution. state, the nation, and to history for a seamstress, he as a barber. “We have been cheated out of our many years that the Republicans and When the war ended, however, he rights for two centuries, and…I want to the African Ameri­cans were corrupt returned home and took on a role of fix them in the Constitution in such a and inferior.” political leadership among the newly way that no lawyer, however cunning freed black population. He helped or astute, can possibly misinter­pret the JOSEPH HAYNE RAINEY write the state’s 1868 constitution and meaning,” he said at the Constitutional (1832-1887) was elected to the S.C. Senate in 1870. Convention. “If we do not do so, we When a corruption scandal forced S.C. deserve to be, and will be, cheated again.” Born into slavery in Georgetown Representative Benjamin Whittemore Those words proved prophetic County in 1832, Joseph Rainey par- from the U.S. House, Rainey won a a decade later. But the work of that layed barbering, a Bermudan exile, special election to fill his seat. Sworn convention allowed blacks to vote in and bombastic oratory into his special in on December 12, 1870, Rainey large numbers for the first time during place in history as the first black was the first of his race seated in the the 1868 election. Most statewide man seated in the U.S. House of House. He was joined a few months offices still were won by Northern Representatives. later by black congressmen selected in whites who had descended on South When Rainey was young, his the 1870 general election, including Carolina after the war—the carpet- industrious father earned enough fellow South Carolinians Robert De baggers of later history books—or by money as a barber to buy his family’s Large and Robert Elliott. Southern whites who had sided with freedom. At age 14, Rainey followed If he had come along 150 years the Union—the scalawags. Cardozo his father’s lead and began cutting later, Rainey would have been a media was the exception. Elected as a hair at the Mills House Hotel in sensation. With chiseled facial features Republican to the office of Secretary Charleston. and bushy pork chop sideburns, he of State, he was the first black to win Rainey was conscripted into the spiced his eloquent speeches with statewide office in the country. He Confederate military at the beginning theatric flair. News reports praised his earned re-election in 1870, then won of the war. He was assigned to a ship rare melding of courtesy and aggres- the more important office of State tasked with slipping through the sion. He fought for enforcement of new Treasurer in 1872 and 1874. Union blockade of the Charleston civil rights regulations, not only on the Cardozo never stopped advocating harbor. The blockade-running ships floor of Congress but in the real world. for public education. At the Constitu­ often picked up provisions in Bermuda, He once entered a whites-only hotel in tional Convention in 1868, he pushed Suffolk, Va., and refused to leave until for integrated schools. He later boasted he was forcibly removed. in a letter to the American Missionary Among his most impassioned Association that in his first months as speeches came in reaction to the treasurer he helped allocate $300,000 Hamburg riots, when white men to public schools, more than his prede- incited by South Carolina Democratic cessor had in five years. “I take the party leaders confronted black militia deepest interest in the schools, espe- members parading near Edgefield in cially for my own race that need them July 1876. Part of a pattern of violence so badly,” he wrote. aimed at suppressing black votes, the As whites regained political con- showdown resulted in the deaths of trol in 1876, Cardozo’s former position one white man and six black men. No of power made him a prime target. In white men were prosecuted in the case. 1877, he was convicted of fraud during “In the name of my race and my his time in office. Offered a pardon, he people,” Rainey said, “in the name of refused and went to prison in 1878 humanity, in the name of God, I ask while appealing his conviction. After you whether we are to be American seven months behind bars, he accepted citizens with all the rights and immu- a new pardon offer and left the state Joseph Hayne Rainey: barber, orator, nities of citizens or whether we are to for Washington, D.C. and statesman. be vassals and slaves again? I ask you to “His conviction broke him in PHOTO/LIBRARY OF CONGRESS tell us whether these things are to go

Winter 2017 • 11 PAST PRESERVED. After Joseph Rainey lost his Congressional seat in the heated 1878 election, he held jobs in South Carolina and Washington, D.C., before his death in Georgetown, S.C., in 1887. His home at 909 Prince Street has been restored by the Camlin family as a private­ residence. Its “single house” architectural style is less showy than many neighboring structures, but the high- ceilinged parlor, with original mantel and pine floors, feels like a space where such an accomplished man would have lived. PHOTO/GRACE BEAHM

on, so that we may understand now African-American elected officials as with pasts that bring people into and henceforth what we are to expect.” ignorant ex-slaves,” one section of uncomfortable conversations. Maybe those standards states. “Although they they cause people to reflect on prob- HISTORY NEEDS HEROES TO were inexperienced in governance, lems, rather than triumphs.” MAKE IT COME TO LIFE as were many whites, most African The Reconstruction National Americans who served were literate Monument will be a huge step in that Modern historians lament that members of the middle class, many process. The National Park Service characters like Robert Smalls, Frances of whom had been free before the (NPS) created a thorough study of the Rollin Whipper, Laura Towne, Civil War.” period, which it considers lasting from Richard Cain, Francis Cardozo, and Social and economic upheaval at 1861 through 1898, and posted a web Joseph Rainey were ignored in school the end of the Civil War was painful page devoted to the new monument textbooks for generations. “For so for the white elite, and the later col- (www.nps.gov/reer/index.htm). long, there was this leap in what was lapse of Reconstruction crushed the “The presidential designation taught,” says USC history professor hopes of African Americans, says Kate of the Reconstruction Era National Bobby Donaldson. “There was the Masur, associate professor of history at Monument provides the National Park Civil War and emancipation, and then Northwestern University. But 150 Service with an opportunity to high- there’s a fog, and we ended up in the years later, emotions should have light the triumph, success, and promise 20th century.” calmed enough to allow examination of freedom to formerly enslaved These days, South Carolina state of a period that redefined the country. African Americans,” says Michael K-12 history standards do a better job “Anniversaries give us a great Allen, the NPS community partner- of reflecting Reconstruction. “White opportunity to talk about things,” ship specialist who coordinated the propaganda often characterized the Masur says. “It is important to engage effort to gain monument status.

12 • Coastal Heritage Several organizations have increased efforts to explore and recog- nize the era. The S.C. Department of Archives and History and the State Historic Preservation Office included 38 Reconstruction sites in African American Historic Places in South Carolina, published in 2015. The S.C. African American Heritage Founda­ tion incorporated those sites into a teacher’s guide with lesson plans. The Historic Columbia Foun­ dation in 2014 focused the Woodrow Wilson Family Home’s historical displays on Reconstruction. The ­president spent a portion of his teenage RENEWED INTEREST. History tours in Beaufort, S.C., already stop to admire Robert years in Columbia during the early Smalls’ house. Increased attention to Smalls and others from the Reconstruction era is 1870s. McLeod Plantation Historic Site on the way. on James Island opened to the public PHOTO/GRACE BEAHM in 2015 with panels describing its use during and immediately after the Civil McLeod facility. speaking in favor of a National Park War. “When we speak with visitors, The Reconstruction story also Service Reconstruction site. what strikes us is not only the lack of will be a component of the new Inter­ “There’s an upswell of interest in knowledge about Reconstruc­tion, but national African American Museum, Reconstruction, and this will be an the thirst for knowledge about it,” set to open in Charleston in 2019. important piece of that,” Moore says. says Shawn Halifax, coordinator of Michael Boulware Moore, the muse- “It’s so important that all young people historical interpretation for Charleston um’s CEO and the great-great grand­son have heroes to look up to, and this County Park and Recre­ation of Robert Smalls, was among the will bring the heroes from that period ­Commission,­ which man­ ages­ the crowd at the Brick Baptist Church to life.”

Reading and Websites

Billingsley, Andrew. Yearning to Breathe Gatewood, Willard B., Jr. “The Remark- Rollin, Frank A. (Frances). Life and Public Free: Robert Smalls of South Carolina able Misses Rollin: Black Women in the Services of Martin R. Delany. Lee and and His Families. University of South Reconstruction South Carolina.” The Shepard, 1883. Carolina Press, 2007. South Carolina Historical Magazine, http://digilib.nypl.org/dynaweb/digs/ January 1991. wwm9720 Black Americans in Congress, U.S. House of Representatives. Hampton, Christine W., and Rosalee W. S.C. African American Heritage Founda- http://history.house.gov/Exhibitions- Washington. The History of Lincolnville, tion. A Teacher’s Guide to African and-Publications/BAIC/Black- South Carolina. CreateSpace, 2007. American Historic Places in South Americans-in-Congress/ Carolina. Holland, Rupert Sargent, Ed. Letters and http://shpo.sc.gov/pubs/Documents/ Burke, W. Lewis, Jr. “Post-Reconstruction Diary of Laura M. Towne: Written from the TGAAHPfull.pdf Justice: The Prosecution and Trial of Sea Islands of South Carolina, 1862- Francis Lewis Cardozo.” South Carolina 1884. Cambridge, 1912. S.C. Department of Education, Eighth- Law Review, Winter 2002. Grade History Standards, 2016. National Park Service: Reconstruction http://ed.sc.gov/scdoe/assets/file/ Drago, Edmund L. Charleston’s Avery Era, National Monument South Carolina. agency/ccr/Standards-Learning/ Center: From Education and Civil Rights http://www.nps.gov/reer/index.htm documents/Grade8SupportDocument. to Preserving the African American pdf Experience. The History Press, 2006. Packwood, Cyril Outerbridge. Detour— Bermuda, Destination—U.S. House of Simms, William Gilmore (revised by Mary Foner, Eric. Reconstruction: America’s Representatives: The Life of Joseph C. Simms Oliphant). The History of South Unfinished Revolution, 1863-1877. Hayne Rainey. Baxter’s Ltd., 1977. Carolina. The State Company, 1916. HarperCollins, 2002. Powers, Bernard E., Jr. Black Charles­ tonians: A Social History, 1822-1885. The University of Arkansas Press, 1999.

Winter 2017 • 13 research issues in the state will be Sea Grant College Program, were USC President invaluable to the Consortium’s work submitted by the S.C. Sea Grant Pastides elected in meeting the needs of our diverse Consortium. board chair constituencies.” Osborne earned a B.S. in Geology The Consortium’s Board of at the College of Charleston and a University of South Carolina Directors is composed of the chief Ph.D. in Marine Science from the (USC) President Harris Pastides has executive officers of its member University of South Carolina. Her been elected chair of S.C. Sea Grant institutions. Currently serving on the graduate research focused on using Consortium’s Board of Directors. board in addition to Pastides are: Dr. marine sediment samples to quantify Pastides began his one-year term on David A. DeCenzo, president of ocean acidification in the coastal January 1, 2017. Coastal Carolina University; Dr. James California Current Ecosystem over the “I am delight- B. Clements, president of Clemson past century. During her fellowship, ed to have this University; Glenn F. McConnell, Osborne will work with the NOAA opportunity to president of College of Charleston; Arctic Research Program as an ocean work with Execu­ Dr. David J. Cole, president of Medical acidification specialist. tive Director Rick University of South Carolina; Col. Katalinas earned a B.S. in Biology DeVoe and the Alvin A. Taylor, director of S.C. at Dickinson College in Pennsylvania S.C. Sea Grant Department of Natural Resources; and an M.S. in Marine Biology at the

Consortium­ Board Dr. Harris Pastides James E. Clark, president of S.C. State College of Charleston. In his graduate of Directors,” PHOTO/UNIVERSITY OF University; and Lt. General John W. work, he assessed the genetic influence SOUTH CAROLINA Pastides said. “I Rosa, president of The Citadel. of stock enhancement of red drum on have a long-standing love for South the genetic diversity of the wild Carolina’s coastal waterways and will population, and he created a model to continue to be a staunch advocate for Two students chosen predict future influence. During his sustainable marine resource conserva- for Knauss fellowship Knauss year, he will be working with tion and scientific research.” the National Sea Grant Office Pastides, who has been the USC Emily Osborne and Christopher communications team. president since 2008, has a master’s in Katalinas have been selected for the The Knauss fellowship program, public health and a Ph.D. in epidemi- Dean John A. Knauss Marine Policy named for one of Sea Grant’s founders, ology from Yale University. Before Fellowship and will spend 2017 living, is designed to provide educational becoming USC’s president in 2008, working, and learning in Washington, experience to students who have an he served as dean of the university’s D.C. interest in ocean, coastal, and Great Arnold School of Public Health and as Their applications for the Lakes resources and in the national vice president for Research and Health fellowships, which are offered by the policy decisions that affect those Sciences. Pastides serves on many National Oceanic and Atmospheric resources. local, state, national, and internation- Administration (NOAA) National al boards, including the S.C. Gover­ nor’s School for the Arts and Community shellfish Humanities and the Fulbright restoration and Faculty Programs. ­research featured “I very much look forward to at conference working with Dr. Pastides this coming year as chair of the Consortium’s The closing of the May River Board of Directors,” DeVoe said. “His oyster beds for the first time due to leadership and many years of experi- pollution concerns in 2009 stunned Emily Osborne Christopher Katalinas ence working on education and PHOTO/NOAA PHOTO/NOAA SEA GRANT the community of Bluffton, South

14 • Coastal Heritage Carolina, and started a movement beds above sea level. Tom Ysebaert of trash invariably are smiling. And they similar to several discussed at the 18th Wageningen University and Research keep coming back every year. International Conference on Shellfish spoke about the diversity of shellfish “For 26 years, the National Park Restoration (ICSR’16). beds in The Netherlands. Service at Fort Sumter National “Oysters are our bald eagle,” said Monument has acted as site captains Kim Jones, the town’s Watershed on Sullivan’s Island,” said Olivia Management Division manager. “This Beach Sweep/River Williams, a former interpretive ranger is our rallying cry. When those beds Sweep nets 24 tons of with the park service. “One of the closed, there was darn near a riot. Our debris most compelling things about this community cares about this river.” event is the loyalty of our volunteers. The closure prompted community The bags of trash and piles of Some groups have been volunteering leaders to come together and create debris dominate the front row in the every year for nearly as long as we the May River Watershed Action end-of-the-pickup photographs from have been doing the Sweep. Plan. Following the recommendations Beach Sweep/River Sweep sites, but “We are amazed every year by the in that document, the community has it’s the proud faces in the background results of Beach Sweep. We would be begun to cut down on polluted runoff. that make the annual event work. unable to pull off this kind of cleanup Yet the oyster beds have been opened During the 28th annual Beach effort without the support and and closed several times in recent Sweep/River Sweep, nearly 4,100 reputation of S.C. Sea Grant years, emphasizing how much work volunteers formed teams at 99 sites in Consortium.” still needs to be done. South Carolina, from the coast to the The Consortium partners with the Community efforts to restore mountains. They covered almost 1,000 S.C. Department of Natural Resources shellfish beds were one focus of miles and picked up nearly 24 tons of to coordinate the event. Traditionally, ICSR’16, held November 16-19 in trash. it’s scheduled the third Saturday in Charleston, South Carolina. About The volunteers also track which September. The data gathered from 130 attendees heard presentations items are picked up. Cigarette butts each site was entered into Ocean from researchers, shellfish growers, and (35,559) remain the most common Conservancy’s Trash Information and community groups from 20 states and object, followed by plastic bottle caps Data for Education and Solutions web nine countries. (9,577), food wrappers (7,490), and tool. Go to www.coastalcleanupdata. Researchers also discussed the plastic beverage bottles (6,472). org to see what the most common impact of the El Niño weather pattern It’s often dirty, sweaty work, yet items were in each coastal community on growing conditions; the best the people posing behind the gathered or waterway worldwide. methods for seeding shellfish beds in various parts of the world; and the success of using concrete oyster castles, reef balls, and repurposed crab traps as reef substrate. The international aspect of the conference was emphasized as opening day keynote speaker Tristan Hugh- Jones of Atlantic Shellfish Ltd. explained the challenges of breeding oysters in ponds in Ireland. New Zealand researcher Tom McCowan switched gears from his original Members of Girl Scout Troop 609 are all smiles after cleaning debris from the Shem Creek marsh in presentation to discuss the impact of a Mt. Pleasant, S.C. recent earthquake that raised abalone PHOTO/SUSAN FERRIS HILL/S.C. SEA GRANT CONSORTIUM

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North Carolina’s SEERS/Benthic Gullah/Geechee Coastal Conference Ecology ­Meeting Coastal Cultures Raleigh, North Carolina Myrtle Beach, South Carolina Conference April 4-5, 2017 April 12-16, 2017 Saint Helena Island, South Carolina Natural disasters tested the resil- This joint meeting of Benthic April 22, 2017 ience of many North Carolina Ecology Society and the Southeastern communities in 2016. The conference Estuarine Research Society brings The Gullah/Geechee covers the impacts and lessons learned together researchers to talk about the Sustainability Think Tank is hosting in terms of fisheries, climate changes, best theories and practices to ensure an interactive environmental community health, planning, sustainable oceans. Featured speaker engagement program for the entire ­economics, and ecosystem health. Jon Grant will discuss ecosystem-based family. The event is free, but advanced Visit https://ncseagrant.ncsu.edu/ management of aqua­ culture.­ For more registration is required. Visit nc-coastal-conference for more information, visit http://www.bemsociety. https://gullahgeecheenation.com for information. org/bem-2017.html. more information.

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ATTENTION SCHOOL TEACHERS! The S.C. Sea Grant Consortium has designed supplemental classroom resources for this and past issues of Coastal Heritage magazine. Coastal Heritage Curriculum Connection, written for K-12 educators and their students, is aligned with the South Carolina state standards for the appropriate grade levels. Includes standards-based inquiry questions to lead students through explorations of the topic discussed. Curriculum Connection is available online at www.scseagrant.org/education.

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16 • Coastal Heritage