USA > South Carolina > The history of South Carolina, from its first European discovery to its erection into a republic: with a supplementary chronicle of events to the present time > Part 4
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CHAPTER VI.
Thus ended the ill fated expeditions of the French to Carolina, and the initial attempt of Coligny to provide, in the wildernesses of the new world, a refuge from the tyrannies and persecutions of the old. France not only disowned the expedition of De Gourgues, but relinquished all pretensions to Florida. Spain and Britain preserved their claims upon the territory, but the former alone main- tained her possession of it. But the massacres which De Gourgues had avenged, aroused in Protestant Eng- land a feeling of indignation, like that which it had awakened in Catholic France. Her eye was drawn to a region, of which tales equally bloody and attractive had been told.
Walter Raleigh, then fighting the battles of the Hu- guenots under the banners of Coligny, listened with a keen ear to the strange narratives which, on every hand, he heard of the wild and picturesque regions of Florida. From the ideas and feelings thus awakened in his mind, we may trace that passion for adventure in the new world, which led him to the shores of North Carolina. He ob- tained a patent in March, 1584, for such lands as he should discover, not in possession of any Christian prince or peo- ple, and sent out two ships the month following. They reached the shores of the western continent, which salu- ted them with a fragrance which was "as if they had been in the midst of some delicate garden abounding with all
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kinds of odoriferous flowers." They ranged the coast for one hundred and twenty miles, in search of a convenient harbor, entered the first haven which offered, and landing on the island of Wokoken, the southernmost of the islands forming the Ocracocke inlet, took solemn possession of the country in the name of the Virgin Queen. The crews were landed on the 4th day of July ; a day that has since been made to distinguish a moral epoch in America. A. colony was established, and the new continent, for the first time, received the English name of North and South Vir- ginia. All lands lying towards the St. Lawrence, from the northern boundary of the Virginia province, belonged to the northern, and all thence to the southward, as far as the gulf of Florida, to the southern district.
The colony of Raleigh failed after a painful but short existence of a few years. The settlers disappeared, and no traces of their flight was found, and no knowledge of their fate has ever become known to the historians. They probably sank under the united assaults of famine and their Indian neighbors.
English discovery now became continuous along the coasts of the continent. The shores, bays, headlands and harbors of New England, were successively discovered, and in 1607, under the genius of the celebrated John Smith, the first permanent colony of England, in America, was planted at James River.
In 1620 a settlement was effected in New England; and ten years after, a grant was made to Sir Robert Heath, attorney general of Charles I., of all that region which stretches southward of the Virginia coast, from the 36th degree of north latitude, comprehending the Louisiana
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territory on the Mississippi, by the name of Carolana. It is said that Sir Robert conveyed his right to the earl of Arundel; that this earl planted several parts of the country, and afterwards conveyed his title to Dr. Cox, who was at great pains to establish his pretensions, explored a part of the country, and subsequently memorialized the crown on the subject of his claims. Heath's charter was, however, declared void, because of the failure of the grantees to comply with certain of its conditions; and for thirty years after, the territories of Carolina remained unsettled.
At length, in 1663, Edward, earl of Clarendon, and several associates, formed a project for planting a colony there. They obtained from Charles II., a charter con- veying all the lands lying between the 31st and 36th degrees of north latitude. The charter states that the applicants, " excited by a laudable and pious zeal for the propagation of the gospel, beg a certain country in the parts of America not yet cultivated and planted, and only inhabited by a barbarous people, having no knowledge of God." This was the pious pretence of the time, which seems, as a matter of course, to have furnished the burden of every such prayer. It may be said in this place, that the efforts were but few and feebly sustained, to promote the professed objects of the memorial. The chartists, be- side the earl of Clarendon, were George, duke of Albe- marle ; William, lord Craven; John, lord Berkley; Antony, lord Ashley ; Sir George Carteret, Sir William Berkley, and Sir John Colleton. The grant which they obtained, comprised a territory of which, subsequently, the several states of South Carolina, North Carolina, and Georgia
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were composed. Two years after this grant, it was enlar- ged by a second, making its boundaries from 29° of north latitude, to 36° 40", and from these points on the sea coast westward in parallel lines to the Pacific Ocean. Of this immense region the king constituted them absolute lords and proprietors, reserving to himself, his heirs, and successors, the simple sovereignty of the country. He in- vested them with all the rights, jurisdiction, royalties, privileges and liberties within the bounds of their province, to hold, use, and enjoy the same, in as ample a manner as the Bishop of Durham did in that county-palatine in England. The Bahama islands were subsequently inclu- ded in the gift of the monarch.
Agreeably to these powers, the proprietors proceeded to frame a system of laws for the colony which they projected. Locke, the well known philosopher, was summoned to this work, and the largest expectations were entertained in consequence of his co-operation.
The code of laws called the " Fundamental Constitu- tion," which was devised, and which subsequently be- came unpopular in the colony, is not certainly the work of his hands. It is ascribed by Oldmixin, a contemporary, to the earl of Shaftesbury, one of the proprietors. The most striking feature in this code, provided for the crea- tion of a nobility, consisting of landgraves, cassiques, and barons. These were to be graduated by the landed estates which were granted with the dignity; the eldest of the proprietary lords was to be the superior, with the title of Palatine, and the people were to be serfs. Their tenants, and the issue of their tenants, were to be transferred with the soil, and not at liberty to leave it,
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but with the lord's permission, under hand and seal. The whole system was rejected after a few years exper- iment. It has been harshly judged as the production of a sciolous intellect ; but, contemplating the institution of domestic slavery, as the proprietors had done from the beginning, something may be said in favor of the project. Its failure was rather a failure of the proprietary scheme of settlement, than of any intrinsic defect in the plan for its government. The code contemplated a few wealthy noblemen, and a large body of serviles. But the set- tlers were generally poor, and the nobility created for the occasion, and from the people, was deficient in all those marks of hereditary importance, which, in the minds of men, are found needful to disguise, if not to justify, the inequalites of fortune. The great destitution of the first settlers, left them generally without the means of procuring slaves ; and the equal necessities to which all are subject who peril life and fortune in a savage forest and a foreign shore, soon made the titular distinctions of the few a mis- erable mockery, or something worse.
Having devised their plan of government, the proprie- tors began to advertise for settlers, though nothing seems to have been seriously done towards emigration, till some time after. A colony was formed upon the river Albe- marle, and another at Cape Fear ; the last of these two were conducted from Barbadoes, by John Yeamans, and many of these colonists afterwards found their way to the settlements on Ashley river.
In 1667, an exploring ship was fitted out, and the command given to William Sayle, who was simply commissioned to survey and give some account of the
,
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coast. In his passage he was driven by a storm among the Bahamas, of which he acquired some useful knowl- edge. By his representations of their value to Carolina, as places of retreat or defence against the Spaniards, the proprietors obtained an additional grant of them from the king. He sailed along the coast of Carolina, ob- served several navigable rivers, and a flat country covered with woods. He attempted to go ashore in his boat, but was discouraged by the hostile appearance of the savages on the banks. His report on his return to England, was so favorable as to prompt the energetic action of the proprietors. Two ships were put under his command ; a number of adventurers were embarked, and, well pro- vided with utensils for building and cultivation, together with arms and munitions of war, the little armament sailed in January, 1670. Twelve thousand pounds was the liberal sum expended on this venture.
The fame of Port Royal, of which, the name conferred by Ribault remained in use among the English, was remembered at this time ; and to this river Sayle directed his course. He safely reached his port, and proceeded with all due diligence to establish himself. The found- ations of a town and government were laid at the same time. A parliament was composed, and invested with legislative power. Already were the laws of Shaftesbury and Locke departed from ; and, deeming it impracticable at the very outset to execute the model which had been given them, they determined to follow it as closely as they could. As an encouragement to settle at Port Royal, one hundred and fifty acres of land were given, at an easy quit-rent, to every emigrant, and clothes and provisions
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bestowed upon all who could not provide for themselves. The neighboring Indians were conciliated by presents, and pledges of friendship freely exchanged with their cassiques and warriors. Here Sayle died in the midst of his labors, having fallen a victim to the climate. This event led to the extension of the command of Sir John Yeamans, who had hitherto ruled the plantation about Cape Fear, over that of Sayle ; and, gathering the plant- ers together, "from Clarendon on the north, from Port Royal on the south," he resorted, "for the convenience of pasturage and tillage," to the banks of Ashley river. This removal took place in 1671, and in the same year, " on the first highland," was laid the foundations of that settlement which we now distinguish as old Charlestown. For some years this became and continued the capital of the southern settlements ; but as the commerce of the colony increased, the disadvantages of the position were discovered. It could not be approached by large vessels at low water. In 1680, by a formal command of the proprietors, a second removal took place ; and the seat of government was transferred to a neck of land called Oys- ter Point, admirably conceived for the purposes of com- merce, at the confluence of two spacious and deep rivers, which, in compliment to lord Shaftesbury, had already been called after him, Ashley and Cooper. Here the foundation was laid of the present city of Charleston. In that year thirty houses were built, though this number could have met the wants of but a small portion of the colony. The heads of families at the Port Royal settle- ment alone, whose names are preserved to us, are forty- eight in number ; those brought from Clarendon by Yea-
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mans, could not have been less numerous ; and the addi- tions which they must have had from the mother country, during the nine years of their stay at the Ashley river settlement, were likely to have been very considerable.
Roundheads and cavaliers alike sought refuge in Car- olina, which, for a long time, remained a pet province of the proprietors. Liberty of conscience, which the charter professed to guaranty, encouraged emigration. The hopes of avarice, the rigor of creditors, the fear of punishment and persecution, were equal incentives to the settlement of this favored but foreign region. Groups of settlers, following favorite leaders-the victims of some great calamity, or the enthusiastic, under some general im- pulse-were no less frequent than individual emigrants.
In 1674, when Nova Belgia, now New York, was con- quered by the English, a number of the Dutch from that place, sought refuge in Carolina. The proprietors facili- tated their desire, and provided the ships which conveyed them to Charlestown. They were assigned lands on the southwest side of Ashley river, drew lots for their prop- perty, and founded a town which they called Jamestown, but which they afterwards deserted, and spread them- selves throughout the country, where they were joined by greater numbers from ancient Belgia.
Two vessels filled with foreign, perhaps French, pro- testants, were transported to Carolina, at the expense of Charles II., in 1679; and the revocation of the edict of Nantz, a few years afterwards, by which the Huguenots were deprived of the only securities of life, liberty, and fortune, which their previous struggles had left them, contributed still more largely to the infant settlement, and
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provided Carolina with some of the noblest portions of her growing population. The territory which had been soaked with the blood of their countrymen, under Ribault and Laudonniere, was endeared to them, probably, on that very account ; and they naturally turned their prows to a region which so great a sacrifice had so eminently hal- lowed to the purposes of their liberty and worship.
In 1696, a colony of congregationalists, from Dorches- ter in Massachusetts, ascended the Ashley river nearly to its head, and there founded a town, to which they gave the name of that which they had left. Dorchester became a town of some importance, having a moderately large population, and considerable trade. It is now deserted ; the habitations and inhabitants have alike van- ished ; but the reverend spire, rising through the forest trees which surround it, still attest the place of their wor- ship, and where so many of them yet repose.
Various other countries and causes contributed to the growth and population of the new settlement. After the restoration, the profligacy of English morals led to con- stant commotions between the two still great parties of cav- aliers and puritans. The former sought to revenge them- selves for the hardships which they had suffered during the protectorate. Having obtained the ascendency, they retaliated by every means which the partiality of the law, or the evil temper of the court towards the puritans, would allow. The latter were uniformly encountered with contempt, and commonly with injustice, and ardently wished for some distant retreat to which they might fly and be secure.
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To prevent open strife between these parties, Charles encouraged emigration. Grants of land in Carolina were the lures by which the turbulent were beguiled from home ; and hundreds of dissenters, with their families, embracing the proffer, transported themselves to the infant colony. At a later period, the wild, roystering cavaliers, who could not be provided from an exhausted treasury in England, received grants ; and the spectacle was no less strange than grateful, to behold those parties mingling peacefully in Carolina, who had seldom met but in deadly hostility at home.
Emigrants followed, though slowly, from Switzerland, Germany, and Holland; and the Santee, the Congaree, the Wateree, and Edisto, now listened to the strange voices of several nations, who, in the old world, had scarcely known each other except as foes. These for a while mingled harmoniously with the natives ;- the French Huguenots and the German Palatine, smoked their pipes in amity with the Westo and the Serattee ; and the tastes and habits of the Seine and the Rhine, became familiar to the wondering eyes of the fearless warriors along the Conga- ree. It was not long before a French violinist had opened a school for dancing, among the Indians on the Santee river.
CHAPTER VII.
The settlers of Carolina, thus accumulated from so many, and sometimes hostile European nations, entered upon their new enterprise with industry and spirit. They seem to have been of a singularly elastic and cheerful temper of mind. They could never else have withstood and triumphed over the oppressive influences of the climate, and the constant strifes of near and numer- ous savages. Though comparatively strong in numbers, by the frequent accession of emigrants already shewn, they were yet feeble in many of those elements of national strength, in which the best securities of a people are to be found. A common necessity had brought them together ; but when the pressure of external dangers was withdrawn, it was not found so easy for them to harmonize. They were apt to fall apart, revive old dis- likes-the result of their several European prejudices -and, if they did not join in actual hostility, to pursue differing objects and interests, which had all the effect of open strife upon the welfare of a small colony.
Many of them were dependents upon the bounty of others ; most of them were poor ; and all of them were so placed-an isolated community in a savage land-as to need, for a time at least, the continual and fostering providence of foreign patronage. This necessity, of itself, led to new weaknesses and much humiliation, from which they were only relieved by the withdrawal of the reluctant
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bounty upon which they had been too willing to depend. This unmanly disposition received its first and becoming rebuke from the proprietors, in a letter which announced to them their resolution to bestow no more "stock and charges upon the idle." "We will not," were the words of this opistle, "continue to feed and clothe you without expectation or demand of any return."
Thus forced upon their own resources, the Carolinians received that first lesson of independence which, perhaps, has done much towards giving them that high rank among their countrymen of the sister states, which cannot be denied them. A sense of mortified pride co-operated with their necessities to make them address themselves with earnestness to their labors. They proceeded to fell the forests and clear their fields, with a hearty resolution, which, while it - amply atoned for past remissness, as sufficiently guaranteed the realization of every future good,
New settlers, in all countries, are subjected to many hardships; but those of Carolina seem to have equalled, if they did not surpass, every thing of the kind to which men in any age have ever been subjected. To subdue the forest to the necessities of civilized man; to build habitations, and clear the ground for raising provisions, while it is always the first, would seem also to be the sufficient employment of the emigrant. In a low, flat coun- try, and under a climate so sultry as that of Carolina, the burden of such labors must have been greatly in- creased. The Europeans soon sank under the fatigues of laboring in the open air ; and those diseases which are peculiar to level countries, overflowed with water, and subject to the action of a constant burning sun, soon made
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their appearance among them, to diminish their strength, enfeeble their spirits, and lessen their numbers. To enhance the evils of such a condition, they were sur- rounded by Indian enemies, who were eminently irritable and warlike, and daily became more jealous of the en- croachments of their white neighbors.
Carolina is said to have been occupied, at its first set- tlement, by no less than twenty-eight Indian nations. Their settlements extended from the ocean to the moun- tains. The Westos, Stonos, Coosaws, and Sewees, occupied the country between Charleston and the Edisto river. They were conquered by the Savannahs and expelled from the country. The Yemassees and Hus- pahs held the territory in the neighborhood of Port Royal. The Savannahs, Serannahs, Cussobos, and Eu- chees, occupied the middle country, along the Isundiga, or Savannah river. The Apalachians inhabited the head waters of the Savannah and Altamaha, and gave their name to the mountains of Apalachy, and the bay of Apa- lachicola. The Muscoghees, or Creeks, occupied the south side of Savannah and Broad rivers-the latter being, at that time, called the Cherokee-and by this river they were divided from the Cherokees, a formidable nation, which dwelt upon the territory now included in the districts of Pickens, Anderson, and Greenville The Congarees, Santees, Waterees, Saludahs, Catawbas, Pe- dees, and Winyaws, lived along the rivers which bear their names. The Chickasaws and Choctaws dwelt, or roved, westward from the borders of Carolina, to the banks of the Mississippi. To speak in more correct language, the greater numbers of these people constituted tribes,
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rather than nations, and belonged to a few mighty fami- lies which dwelt permanently in the interior. They were tributaries of one or other of the several nations of Muscoghees, Cherokees, Catawbas, Choctaws, and Chickasaws, among which the territory of the Carolinas was divided, and perhaps frequently disputed. These Indians, united, could probably bring fifty thousand men into the field. The Muscoghees and Catawbas were the most warlike; the Cherokees were as numerous as either, but not esteemed so brave. The Choctaws and Chickasaws seem to have been less stationary than these tribes, and most probably resembled those roving bands of the west, who drew their stakes and changed their habitations with the progress of the seasons.
To the infant colony of Carolina, these nations, or the tributary tribes which owned their sway, suggested con- stant alarm and danger. The Westo and Stono tribes, as they were most contiguous, seem to have been the most troublesome. Their assaults were doubly danger- ous and annoying, as it was found so difficult to provide against them. The superiority of the musket over the bow and arrow was very small. Concealed in the thicket in which he has almost grown a part and is a native, the Indian launches his shaft ere the European has dreamed of the presence of an enemy. Its leaves hide him from the aim, and its mighty trees effectually shield him from the bullet which the angry stranger sends in reply. He ranges the woods in safety while the invader sleeps ; and the swamps, in the atmosphere of which European life stagnates and perishes, yield a congenial element to him. Thus circumstanced in con-
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nection with their Indian neighbors, the Carolinians were compelled to stand in a continual posture of de- fence. While one party slept, an equal number watched. He who felled the tree of the forest, was protected by another who stood ready with his musket in the shade ; and so persevering were these stealthy enemies, that the settler dared not discard his weapon, even while gathering the oyster on the shores of the sea. From the woods they were almost wholly exiled, by reason of the swarms of foes which infested them; and, but for the fish from the rivers, they must have perished of famine. Their scanty crops were raised, not only by the sweat of their brows, but at the peril of their lives ; and when raised, were exposed to the plundering assaults of the foe. A single night frequently lost to the planter the dearly bought products of a year of toil.
It is no easy matter to describe the dreadful extremi- ties to which the Carolinians were at last reduced ; and a civil disturbance was the consequence, which threat- ened the ruin of the colony. Robbed of the slender stock of grain which their fields had produced, and fail- ing to receive supplies from Europe, they were ready for any measure to which the phrensy of despair might prompt them.
Where a people are discontented, there will not be long wanting some unruly spirit to take advantage of their sufferings, and stimulate their sedition ; and one Florence O'Sullivan, to whom the island at the entrance of the harbor which now bears his name had been entrusted for defence, deserting his post, joined the discontents of the town; and the popular fury might have expended
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itself in violence and bloodshed, but for the prudence and firmness of Sir John Yeamans, the governor.
O'Sullivan was arrested on charges of sedition, and the people were quieted, while vessels were despatched for supplies to Barbadoes and Virginia. A timely arrival from England, bringing provisions and a number of new settlers, revived the spirits of the people, and cheered them to renewed efforts. Yeamans, sensible of their hardships, readily forgave their commotions ; but Cul- pepper, the surveyor-general, who had stimulated their excesses-a man afterwards prominent in an insurrection in North Carolina-was sent to England to be tried for treasonable conspiracies against the settlement.
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