Of the four South Carolinians who signed the Constitution, three are buried in famous Charleston church yards. Charles Pinckney, who is buried in eastern churchyard at St. Philip’s Episcopal, was the youngest South Carolina signer at age 29, but is considered to be one of the most influential in the final wording of the Constitution document. His version of Congressional representation included the tabulation of slaves, and Article 1, Section 2 of the Constitution famously bases representation on each state’s number of free persons, indentured servants, Indians who paid taxes, and three-fifths of the number of slaves.
Charles’ cousin, Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, is buried at St. Michael’s churchyard near a third signer, John Rutledge. Charles C. was a son of the famous Eliza Lucas Pinckney, who perfected the processing of indigo, which brought great wealth to Charleston in the 1740’s and 1750’s. Charles C’s career included being an officer during the Revolution and a diplomat thereafter, crafting compromises that created the Federal tariff system in 1789 and ended the international slave trade in 1808. He was most noted as minister under president John Adams, and responding to threats of war and demands for brides by Napoleon’s ministers by saying “millions for defense, not one cent for tribute.”
John Rutledge, who like Charles C. lived and studied in England during his early life, was nonetheless the most resolute of the signers in his determination to break from British rule. Rutledge was elected the first and only President of South Carolina after the province declared independecce from England in March of 1776. When an English fleet was sent to Charleston to crush the revolution, Military asked for him to order retreat from the tiny fort defending the city on Sullivan’s Island. In reply, Rutledge wrote that he would rather cut off his hand than sign such and order, and the fort and Charleston were saved.
Pierce Butler is the least well-known of the four signers and the only one who was not America born or buried in Charleston today. Butler was Irish, and actually came to America as a British officer. This is an interesting note for those who dismiss Confederates as traitors, but call fighters in the Revolution patriots. Butler was also an owner of hundreds of slaves and argued for slavery to be protected by the Constitution. Butler was one of a small number of American officers who avoided capture when the British seized Charleston in 1780, and joined ranks with other famous partisan fighters such as Francis Marion and Thomas Sumter, who eventually drove the English army out of South Carolina. Butler died in Philadelphia and is buried in the city’s Christ Episcopal Church graveyard.

I often have guests from other parts of the country who are surprised that I don’t speak like Forrest Gump, and tell me, “Southerners speak with a drawl”. To that I respond that the South is comprised of 11 states covering more than 1 million square miles, and that people from west Texas, for example, have no more common lingual traits with Charlestonians than they do with folks from Wisconsin. As for the drawl, that kind of speaking is more common to southern Indiana than Charleston, so it really isn’t so much Southern as it is country (take Larry Bird for instance). And by the way, Tom Hanks’ accent in Forrest Gump was a far-fetched rendition – Hanks is a Californian who obviously hasn’t been around many Southerners. I’ve also thought it interesting that people talk about Southern accents as unusual, but not “Northern accents”. To my ear, there are very pronounced accents from other regions as well.
Charlestonians do not drawl, but we do have distinguishable dialects that set us apart. We have a very diverse mix of language backgrounds with various European and African influences, and many areas that were so isolated for so long that certain dialects became even more unique. To my ear, there are three basic dialects that are spoken by old Charleston families. There is the “Tidewater accent” of those like me whose English was spoken among the more aristocratic families (not mine, we were a family of French artists and teachers who learned to speak this way from associating with the “blue bloods” when we emigrated here). This dialect sounds to many people like the English spoken in Canada, with pronounced emphasis on words such as “house” and “about”, and earlier generations still added a “y” sound to certain words such as “cyar” for an automobile and “gyarden” for the place you grow flowers.
Another common dialect was a brogue that came from the large Scottish, Irish and north country English who settled here. Their way of speaking sounds very much like what you might here in Donegal or Edinborough, as they give many words a double-syllable or compress the vowel sounds. The word “gate” sounds more like “gehyet”, “boat” like “bowat” and “door” like “dowah”. Vowels are compressed as “line” sounds like “loyn”, “fish” like “fush” and “to” like “toe”.
The most unusual Charleston-area dialect is Gullah, a name that has a questionable origin but most likely comes from the Gola tribe of West Africa. Large numbers of West Africans were brought to coastal islands as slaves, where they learned English by mimicking overseers. Over the years in these remote places with little English-speaking influence, Gullah transformed into what many consider a language of its own.
It is distinguished by metaphorical phrases such as “ee foot in ee han’”, meaning “his foot is in his hand” referring to the image of a rabbit running so fast that his back foot seems to rest in his front paw. This term simply means “he’s fast”. Gullah words include African terms such as “yam” and “gumbo”, but most of it is a pigeon-English as words were corrupted by sound, and terms such as “you are” became “onna”, “there” became “de-dey”, “yent” became “are not” and certain “th” and “r” sounds were dropped altogether.
Perhaps the best way to explain how Gullah sounds is the great story told by the late Dick Reeves, who made his life’s work the preservation of Gullah. He told the tale of a man from up North who came South looking for a place to hunt deer and came across a Gullah-speaking man, and asked him if deer were in the vicinity to hunt. The Gullah-speaker shook his head knowing well how deer were never around when you wanted them to be, and only showed when you didn’t want them, so he replied by saying, “No suh, wen onna de-dey, de deh de no deh deh, but onna yent deh, de deh, den dey deh.”
Simply translated, this means, “no sir, when you’re there, the deer are not there, but when you’re not there, the deer, then they’re there.”

I am often asked why the old panes of glass on Charleston’s historic buildings have a ripple or wavy texture. The answer comes from the old methods of making window panes. Prior to the 1830’s, glass was made by hand, as individual artisans created windows with a simple, rustic process. The basic ingredients of soda and lime were baked into a molten mass called a “crown”, which was then attached to a metal pole called a pontil. The pontil was mounted on hand-powered gears to spin the molten mass at high speeds, spreading the still-liquid glass by centrifugal force into wide, thin circles that were cooled and cut into individual panes. This became universally-known as Crown Glass.
The spinning motion itself created the wavy ripple that characterized old glass, and also made certain imperfections. Where the spinning began at the pontil attachment had larger ripples and became known as the “bulls eye”. Air pockets were common as the shape of the molten glass change with exposure to sudden cooling. Both the bulls eye and air pockets were still cut into functional panes, typically mounted in lesser-viewed windows. One such window is on the North side of St. Michael’s church, where the imperfect panes are clearly visible.
Another limitation of the old Crown glass-making was that the thin sheets became more brittle as larger sections were cut, leading to the preponderance of colonial “nine-over-nine” windows that feature so many individual panes.

Charleston’s historic buildings retain much of their historic look and character, but the city’s streetscape has dramatically changed over the years. Going back to colonial times, streets were largely unpaved, and even with the advent of cobblestone and Belgian block, were rough rides for the carts, wagons and carriages that rumbled past in no particular order.
Early attempts to create some efficient traffic flow included an 1842 order by police captain James Duffus, stating that all drivers must use the right side of the road. In overlooking the fact that many illiterate slaves drove wagons, and would not be able to read the order, Capt. Duffus actually created more traffic confusion in truly living up to his unusual name.
Throughout the early days of Charleston, streets were plied by lamp lighters and ward foot patrols, vultures and wandering livestock were a common sight, street vendors pushed carts and carried baskets full of goods, and on curbs such as East Bay, slaves were displayed in open-air sales.
A dramatic change in the streets came in 1866, with the laying of the first trolley rails, and the hulking, train car-looking bodies would dominate traffic for nearly 70 years. Automobiles made their first appearance in the 1890’s, but were not common on the streets of Charleston until the 1910’s. The city had to create new ordinances to offset awkward confrontations between auto and wagon drivers. At first, hand signals and compass-direction right-of-way rules were implemented, but didn’t do much better than the efforts of poor Capt. Duffus. By the late 1920’s, the first stop signs were in place, followed by the traffic light.
Parking would soon become an issue, and on busy streets such as Broad where space was limited, autos were parked diagonally, with the trolley line running down the middle of the street. The 20th century would usher in the era of asphalt, and the old stone and brick surfaces largely disappeared. Trooleys gave way to buses in 1938, and as streets became busier, and cars larger, traffic was funneled down the first one-way streets in 1949.
Even with busier thoroughfares, street vendors continued to push carts by hand until the 1960’s, and as a boy, I remember the “shrimp man” and the “sugarcane man” coming down Legare Street on early mornings with hearty voices echoing their wares. At that time, a lone horse and buggy strode the streets with a then-tiny tourist contingent. Driven by John Waggoner, the old carriage was in many ways a transition from Charleston’s streets of long ago, and the busy tour trade that dominates them today.

During the Revolution, Charleston was captured by the British and occupied by English troops for two years, between 1780-82. Local families were ordered to house British officers, who also insisted upon social events in which the daughters of the city were compelled to attend and entertain. Three pre-Revolutionary houses in the South of Broad district have interesting stories involving those British officers’ interest in Charleston’s young ladies.
At 22 Legare Street, Charleston’s Elliott family was instructed to hold an event, and their young daughter Jane attended and attracted the attention of several English cavalry officers. Jane had fallen in love with an American officer, Col. William Washington, before the occupation, and was able to follow accounts of his battles with the British in the areas outside the city. Washington had famously defeated the English cavalry shortly before the social event at the battle of Eutaw Springs, where his cavalry charge caused the British to turn and run. When Ms. Elliott was approached by the English officers, she reminded them that she was engaged to Col. Washington. When one cavalryman dismissively said, “who’s he?, Jane answered by saying, “if you looked behind you during your retreat from Eutaw Springs, my fiance’ was the officer leading the charge that chased you off the field.” After that, no English officer bothered Jane Elliott again.
At the 1740’s house 2 Ladson Street, another legendary encounter took place between British officer Archibald Campbell and Charleston’s Margaret Philp. “Mad Archie”, as he was known, became so enchanted with Ms. Philp that he invited her for a carriage ride, then drove to the Goose Creek church, where he orderd the minister at gunpoint to perform a marriage ceremony. The marriage that began at gunpoint ended when a gunshot killed Campbell at the late stages of the war.
Campbell’s cousin, Lord William Campbell, fared better by actually getting a Charleston woman, Sarah Izard, to consent to marriage before the Revolution began. Campbell was appointed Royal Governor of South Carolina by King George III, and took his post in 1775, living in the house at 34 Meeting Street, which belonged to the Izard family. Lord William instantly antagonized the local sons of liberty by sending messages to the upstate to arouse loyalists. Fortunately for him, the 1760’s era house was built with a rear passageway that led to old Vanderhorst Creek (now Water Street), and it was through this back door that Lord William escaped in September, 1775, when it looked as though he might be hanged from the nearest tree.

We cross several cobblestone surfaces during the tour, which once spread across more than ten miles of city streets. Cobblestones are lump-shaped rocks weathered by erosion, and should not be confused with cut stone surfaces known as Belgian Block. Cobblestones are not native to coastal South Carolina, but come from places such as New England, where sailing ships built during the colonial era needed heavy ballast in their hulls to keep them upright in strong winds.
The piles of cobblestones were an easy solution to the ballast needs, but took up space that could be used for cargo. So when ships came to old Charleston to load bales of cotton or barrels of rice, there ballast was often dumped on our wharves to make room for the weighty goods. The new stone was ideal for paving Charleston’s sandy muddy streets, and for building foundations for fortifications, and providing landfill for mudflats and marshes. By the 1720’s, Charleston customs officers were offering freedom from taxes and duties on goods in return for tons of ballast, and long stretches of street benefitted from the layers of stones.
In old pictures, it is hard to see some of the cobblestones buried in soil and sand, and it has been erroneously written that many of our streets were dirt up through the War Between the States. Cobblestones were and still are rough, however, and Belgian Block, vitrified brick, and creosote planks were also used to make some streets less teeth-chattering. By the end of World War I, many city streets had been paved in the new synthetic surface of asphalt, and the cobblestone streetscape was greatly diminished.
Only five driveable thoroughfares are paved in cobblestone today – Chalmers Street, Maiden Lane, South Adgers Wharf, North Adgers Wharf, and Gillon Street. There are some still scattered in place such as Longitude Lane and Philadelphia Alley, but in areas primarily for walking. Many cobblestones survive as pavement in private driveways, obviously “borrowed” over the years from the aging streets.

Each day on my tour, I typically show people the work of Sweetgrass basket weavers such as Betty Manigualt and Marilyn Dingle. Both Betty and Marilyn learned this ancient African weaving method as children, carrying on a long-standing tradition that has been handed down among local families for many generations. I have also been fortunate to have as friends the Wigfall family out in Six Mile, and have been invited on several occasions to document their interesting work in keeping this art work alive. The Wigfalls showed me how they gathered sweetgrass by hand in wetlands on Dewees Island, where they had to stoop over bundles of the wispy green plant and reach down into areas where cottonmouth moccasins often lurk. The key is to twist the bundles of sweetgrass above the roots and harvest it in a way that the plant can continue to grow. The grass has to be dried before weaving, and one of the more interesting methods that the Wigfalls used was to throw bundles up on a gable roof to dry in the sun without blowing away. We also cut some palmetto fronds and bull rush as well as picking up long leaf pine, all of which complement the sweetgrass in a typical basket.
I’ve learned from all the weavers that stitching all these materials together is a laborious process that take a great deal of patience and skill. I was particularly impressed that Betty and Marilyn learned to stitch as children using 10-penny nails and beef bones. Today, most weavers stitch with a broken fork or spoon handle that is filed down to a narrow point, and they still call the tool a “nailbone”, with the obvious reference to days when all their enslaved ancestors had to work with was a discarded nail or animal bone.
The Wigfall’s have a family Marilyn sets up along the sidewalk next to St. Michael’s church, where she weaves in front of passersby. She is a very good-natured person who has been weaving for 64 years, so I tell people on the tour that she started when she was two, which always gets a laugh out of her. Betty is also a very pleasant, engaging person who sets up in front of the Historic Charleston Foundation shop at 108 Meeting Street, where she weaves each day and sometimes includes her daughter and grand daughter. She always tells the tour group “come back and let’s make a deal!”
In buying sweetgrass baskets, it is a acceptable to barter, but people should remember that some of these creations are painstakingly done by hand stitch by stitch, and that some more elaborate baskets will take weeks to weave, working until hands get aching and weary. So I hope all will remember Betty, Marilyn, and the Wigfall family and that the sweetgrass tradition will remain in such good hands.