titdilapa: Our Weekend Visit To Jenny and Brett in Charleston, SC

We got to drive down on Friday evening to Charleston. We made reservations at the Farifield Inn on University Blvd (the free breakfast isn't that good but it's eatable and the room was clean and comfortable). We stopped in Columbia and ate dinner at Carabba's Italian Restaurant. It was very good. We got in to the hotel about 9:30pm and we were so tired we went straight to bed. I have this compulsion...I have to have the house clean before I go just in case we died in an accident and everyone met at the house. I guess I think I would roll over in my grave if someone came into the house and found it messy. I do all the laundry, change our sheets, and leave everything sparkly. It also makes it nice to come home to.

Saturday morning we ate and then met Jenny and Brett about 9:30am. We drove over the Arthur Ravenel Bridge and parked along the road. I cannot BELIEVE Charleston has this wonderful walking area on the bridge AND a park with absolutely NO parking. I don't just mean there is a small parking lot, I mean there is NO parking places, NADA, ZIP! You have to park along a very busy road and walk to the park and bridge. On this gorgeous Saturday morning the bridge was full of people walking, jogging and riding bicycles and so we had to park a good ways away and walk. Once we got to the bridge, Stan pushed the baby stroller and walked briskly, Jenny jogged ahead and I meandered. I was determined to make it to the first cable and I can't believe I DID IT! Stan and Jenny both went to the 2nd tower and the end of those cables but baby Brett and I waited on them. Meanwhile I took tons of photos!

We stopped at the Shriner's building which was having a huge baby consignment sale. They have a little fountain out in the front lobby and Stan was showing Brett how to throw good money away... LOL! I mean how to toss in a penny and make a wish.

I wonder what his little wish was.

Here we go, as you can see we were parking on the road. There is no sidewalk so you had to walk in the road. I just couldn't believe it.

Here we are at the little park. I don't know, maybe there was parking under the bridge. We just never saw it.

There goes Jenny jogging and Stan pushing the baby stroller. They left me in the dust!

I'm about halfway to that first cable.

The Yorktown at Patriot's Point.

The sun was in poor Brett's eyes.

I made it to the first cable!

Jenny had made a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for Brett and cut it into finger pieces and so he's taking a little snack.

After we conquered the bridge, we stopped at a grocery store and got some salami, cheese, drinks, melon, and some granola. I had brought my picnic basket. We drove to Hampton Plantation State Park and had a picnic and toured the grounds and the house. The Camelia Garden was in full bloom. So here are the photos I took.

On our way.

Hampton Plantation may be named after a house in Hampton-on-the-Thames, England. Hampton-On-Thames was owned by David Garrick, a famous actor in the mid 1700s. Hampton Plantation was also known as the Horry Plantation. In 1744, Daniel Horry purchased 600 acres from Anthony Bonneau. Hampton would eventually become several thousand acres. The original part of the house may have been built in 1735 by French Huguenot, Noe Serre. It was a 4 room, center hall construction. After Daniel Horry got the property in 1744 he had the house built in the Georgian style. In 1762, Daniel Huger Horry inherited the plantation and slaves from his father, Daniel Horry. When Daniel Horry wrote his will in 1758 he stated that his son could not inherit until he turned twenty-one, or had children of his own, whichever came first. David was around 21 when his father died. He married Judith Serre and they made Hampton Plantation their home. Judith died in 1765 and Daniel remained at Hampton Plantation. They had no children. In 1768 he married Harriott Pinckney, daughter of Eliza Lucas and Charles Pinckney. They lived at Hampton Plantation. In the 1760's the two wings were added which included the ballroom on one side and the dining room and downstairs bedroom on the other side. The dining room ceiling was made to be 16 ft high which did not give them enough room over the dining room for a 2nd floor room (they lost a lot of upstairs living space doing this) but they added faux windows to make the outside look symmetrical. The wings upstairs only added 1 bedroom over the existing downstairs bedroom because the ballroom ceiling went the full height of the downstairs and upstairs. The ballroom has a rolled or barrel ceiling.

Between 1769-1770 Harriott had a son and daughter named Daniel and Harriott Horry. In 1778, the plantation became a refuge during the Revolutionary War for relatives and friends of Daniel and Harriott. In 1780, the British captured Charleston. They justified searches and seizures by saying any man still bearing arms against them would be treated as a traitor. They confiscated any valuables, including slaves. The Hampton Plantation was "visited" twice. The first time they were searching for Francis Marion, the Swamp Fox. He had come to the plantation looking for food and was sleeping while it was prepared. But the British came and Harriott woke him in time and told him to swim the river to the Hampton Island and hide in the rice fields. This he did and the British didn't find him. They took nothing at this time. On the second visit the British were looking for Daniel Huger Horry (owner of the plantation) and Major Thomas Pinckney. Major Pinckney escaped but Horry was made to surrender and pledge his loyalty to the British. He did so in order to protect his family and property. The house was thoroughly plundered but no buildings were burned. But because of his "pledge", he was considered a traitor after the War. But his Pinckney in-laws helped defend him. He had to pay an Amercement Tax (a fine) to keep his property. Before he died he worked to restore the plantation and fields. He died in November, 1785 of suspected liver ailment. His wife wrote this letter:
"Monday night
Nov.b 7th 1785
...We found M.r Horrÿ seriously ill... he is as yellow as the darkest Orange. The Bile is so much with the Blood.... he has had the hiccough’s almost continually these two days.... , he speaks very thick and is much confused, is scarce ever free from the hiccoughs and his tongue is much crusted...
..Tuesday Morning 11 O’Clock.M.r Horrÿ slept all night, but very uneasily, he breaths hard and complains much of a great oppression at his stomach he talks a good deal but very confusedly, his pulse appears to me to be good but I think he is too warm upon the whole as I think him worse than he was yesterday..."

His will left the plantation to his son, Daniel Horry, with the stipulation that Harriott would have use of it until her death. But Daniel Huger Horry, Jr. was living in Europe when his father died. For some reason he changed his name to Charles Lucas Pinckney Horry and never returned home. Between 1790-1791, Harriott and her mother, Eliza Lucas Pinckney, had a portico built on the land side of the house in the Adam style that was almost an exact match for the portico on the Hamptons-On-Thames house in England. Eliza Lucas Pinckney managed her father's plantations, her husband's plantations (after his death), and, evidently, helped her daughter manage the plantation after her husband's death. She was the daughter of a royal governor and was born in in the West Indies on Antiqua, educated in England and lived there for awhile after marriage. Her husband was a political leader in South Carolina and her sons were Patriot leaders in the Revolutionary War. But, after her husband's death, she did not return to England. She was known for her successful indigo experiements and even presented the Princess of Wales with a silk dress made from her own silkworms. She had education, wealth and status which was unusual for the American colonies. She read voraciously and had extensive correspondence and was known for her intelligence, accomplishments and activity.

In 1791, George Washington visited the Hampton Plantation on his Southern Tour and breakfasted there. While visiting, the President was asked whether a certain oak tree should be cut down to create a better view from the portico. He replied that he liked the tree, and it was saved. From then on the tree was known as the Washington Oak .

In 1793, Harriott's mother, Eliza Lucas Pinckney, died in Philadelphia. She may have had stomach cancer and was there for treatment. George Washington asked to be a pallbearer because of his admiration for her. In 1797, Daniel and Harriott's daughter, Harriott, married Frederick Rutledge. Because Hampton Plantation was to go to their son, Harriett Pinckney Horry had Harietta Plantation built for Harriett Horry and Frederick Rutledge in 1807. But it was not finished. She learned that her son would not leave Europe so Hariot Horry and Frederick Rutledge moved in with Harriott Pinckney Horry at Hampton Plantation. Harrietta Plantation was purchased by Stephen D. Doar in 1858 and nearly complete with 2 wings added. Rice was cultivated until 1903 and the house was lived in until 1930 when it was sold. When it was sold, there were rooms that had yet to be plastered.

Frederick died in 1824 leaving Harriott with 8 children. She and her mother continued to run the plantation. One of Frederick and Harriott's children, John Henry Rutledge, committed suicide by shooting himself in the house. He had fallen in love with a girl from Georgetown whose father was a pharmacist. Both families were against their marriage and she later married someone else. He was 21 yrs old and thought life wasn't worth living without her. He shot himself with a sawed off shotgun in one of the upstairs bedrooms. He was supposedly sitting in his rocking chair in his room when he did it. He lingered for a few days before dying. His body was buried near the back steps of the home because, back then, you didn't bury suicides in a consecrated cemetery. Sadly his tombstone was removed by a previous owner. It is said that the sounds of a rocking chair rocking in that bedroom are heard. And if a rocking chair is in the room, it will rock by itself.

In 1828, Daniel Horry (Charles Lucas Pinckney Horry) died and left all of his property in South Carolina and France to his mother, Harriet Pinckney Horry, and wife, Elenore Marie Florimonde de Foy La Tour Marbourg Horry. They were to have equal shares and could not dispose of their half without the consent of the other. His wife sold her part. In 1830, Harriot Pinckney Horry died and she left Hampton to her daughter, Harriott Horry Rutledge. Harriott Horry Rutledge ran the plantation with the occasional help of 2 of her sons. She died in 1858. Henry Middleton Rutledge, a grandson, inherited the plantation from his father, Edward Cotesworth Rutledge, and he took over management after he returned from fighting in the Civil War. He first married Anna Marie Blake who lived for 10 years before dying. Then he married Margaret Hamilton Seabrook and their youngest son was Archibald Rutledge.

Archibald Rutledge went on to teach school in Pennsylvania. He wrote numerous books and poems and became Poet Laureate of South Carolina. He moved to the Hampton Plantation in 1937. He restored the house and wrote a book about it called Home By the River. He and his wife donated the property to the South Carolina State Park Service in 1970 and it was opened to the public as a state park in 1971.

The house was built from pines and cypresses growing on the property. It is done in the mortise and tenion method. The ballroom has floor boards that are 40 ft long made from pines on the property. It has 12 rooms. The raised basement under the house is open around the portico and then enclosed under the house. Archibald had a section cut out of the side under the ballroom in order to park his automobile in the basement. When Archibald and his wife moved in they made one of the smaller downstairs room into a kitchen. The outdoor kitchen was burned probably 2 different times. The current kitchen is the 3rd one and was used as a sharecropper's house after Archibald moved the kitchen indoors. It is still there. The camellia and azalea garden run to the right from house to Santee river.