Charleston…Boone Hall Plantation…FT Sumter… The Civil War!



Very Crafty!

Boone Hall Plantation

South Carolina was the first to secede from the Union, yet Union forces still occupied Fort Sumter at the entrance of Charleston Harbor. The South demanded that Fort Sumter be vacated. The North refused. Finally, on April 12, 1861, South Carolina Confederate troops from nearby Fort Johnson fired on the fort…the start of a two day bombardment that resulted in the surrender of  Fort Sumter by Union troops. With the North’s withdrawal, the South held the fort until it was finally evacuated on February 17,1865. During that time, the fort experienced one of  the longest sieges in modern warfare. For almost two years 46,000 shells, estimated at more than seven million pounds of metal, were fired at Fort Sumter. For these reasons and more, Fort Sumter remains one of the most significant historic monuments in the United States. 

View from Camper Driving into Plantation

The above description of Charleston's’ Fort Sumter is to set ones’ mind into the geographical location. This is where the Civil War began! We didn’t take the ferry over to see Fort Sumter. Instead, we went to Boone Hall Plantation to see and learn about slavery and a major factor in the “Civil War!”
Boone Plantation had many, many slaves. They worked 4,000 acres of farming land. They also made bricks, four million bricks a year actually! Once the Cotton Gin was invented, the production of cotton swelled and the plantation owners became wealthy. More slaves were bought! The slave lived in crude brick buildings which still stand to this day. A lot of slave history was gained by us today.

In 1681, Englishman Major John Boone came to Charleston and established a plantation and gracious home on the banks of Wampocheone Creek. In 1743, his son Captain Thomas Boone, planted live oak trees, arranging them in two evenly spaced rows. This spectacular approach to his home became a symbol of Southern heritage. It would take more than 200 years for the trees to meet overhead to form the present-day scenic corridor that welcomes visitors to America’s most photographed plantation.
That is what we did and saw!