Highlights:
Horse carriage ride
Beautiful Historic Mansions
Charleston, SC
Oct. 20, 2008
307 miles and 7 1/2 hours from our last stop
Bob & Jenny's Cross Country Adventure
Day 65
Welcome to
Fort Sumter- off the coast of Charleston. This is where the Civil War started in 1851
Charleston is a very beautiful, historic city that is a destination worthy of consideration. It seems like everywhere you look you will see horse drawn carriages full of tourists, but the tours are well worth it as you are immersed in the history of the time.
Most of the Victorians date back to the 1700's and to preserve the city's heritage, there is a Historical Building Foundation which overseas every aspect of any changes that an owner may want to make.
Although the front door looks like it enters into the house, it actually opens onto the Piazza which is the covered porch. Back in the 1700 and 1800's when the women wore very warm clothing, the women would take off their outer clothing and relax on the Piazza with only their camisoles on. Men had to be very careful not to look up when passing otherwise if they were caught looking, they would be branded a peeper and an outcast.
Notice the two staircases? The one on the right was used by the women and the stairs on the left were used by the men. Why do you suppose? Because back then, looking at women's ankles, was considered a taboo.
This street was built with cobble stones that were thrown from a cargo ship that took goods back to England. When the ship came back to Charleston empty, it had to fill the bottom of the ship with the stones to act as ballast. When the king found out the colonists were using the stones, he started taxing them. This resulted in them throwing the stones in the bay which explains how a portion of the city's landfill was started.
Notice the placard in the middle of the building as well as the picture to the right? This was the starting of fire insurance. When the owner bought insurance, they would put up the placard on their building and in the event of a fire, all the insurance companies would show up with their fire fighting equipment and only the company who's placard was on the building would stay and fight the fire. All the others would go home.
The Colonist were poor but pretentious and wanted to make their houses look like they were built with stone, so they stuccoed over the brick and made grooves in it to appear like stone. In the above picture you can see the grooves in the front and on the side where it is light you can see the brick.
This is the largest house in Charleston which was owned by a shipping magnate. During the civil war he only took silver and gold as payment which made him very rich. This also made him very unpopular because many who accepted currency from either the north or south went broke.
The above picket fence was called a medal of honor fence. During the Civil war, the south had no industry like the north and hence no source of producing cannons and cannon balls. As a result, they asked the owners to donate their iron picket fences so they could make the weapons with the promise that it would be replaced at the end of the war. As you can see the fence was never replaced.
This house has an original Tiffany stained glass window. It is a B & B now and they don't allow any children.
