South Carolina Timeline
Return to home
ALH: http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Acres/4730/alhn/alhn.html
History: http://www.state.sc.us/histro.html
History: http://www.sciway.net/hist/
Historical Society: http://www.historic.com/schs/
Facts: http://www.50states.com/scarolin.htm
Newspapers: http://ajr.newslink.org/scnews.html
State page: http://www.state.sc.us/
James Hoban, architect of the White House, also
designed
the State House in Charleston, South Carolina.
(HNQ, 12/6/98)
48k BCE In 2004 archeologists
claimed to have found evidence of human habitation at a site along the
Savannah River in Allendale County, SC.
(SFC, 11/18/04, p.A7)
1524 Mar 19, Giovanni de Verrazano
of France sighted land around area of Carolinas.
(MC, 3/19/02)
1526 Oct 18, Lucas Vazquez de
Ayllp, Spanish colonialist who settled in SC, died.
(MC, 10/18/01)
1526 Nov, The 1st American slave
revolt occurred in SC at the Spanish settlement of San Miguel de
Gualdape near the mouth of the Pee Dee River in South Carolina.
(http://whgbetc.com/mind/slave_revolts_2.html)
1526 The 1st Africans to the US
arrived at a Spanish settlement South Carolina.
(www.inmotionaame.org/timeline.cfm?bhcp=1)
1562 May 1, The 1st French
colonists in the US, a 5-vessel Huguenot expedition led by Jean Ribault
(1520-1565), landed in Florida. He continued north and established a
colony named Charlesfort at Parris Island, SC.
(Arch, 1/05,
p.47)(www.infoplease.com/ce6/people/A0841765.html)
1566 Spanish conquistador Juan
Pardo arrived the Spanish settlement at Santa Elena, on what later
became known as Parris Island, South Carolina. He marched into the
interior and founded Fort San Juan next to a Catawba town called Joara.
Fort San Juan was burned down by the Catawba after about 18 months.
(Sm, 3/06, p.33)
1663 Mar 24, Charles II of England
awarded lands known as Carolina in America to eight members of the
nobility who assisted in his restoration. [see Apr 6]
(HN, 3/24/99)
1663 Apr 6, King Charles II signed
the Carolina Charter. [see Mar 24]
(MC, 4/6/02)
1690s Henry Laurens landed 40% of
the slaves sold at Sullivan Island. He was the ancestor to the Ball
family that settled in South Carolina.
(SFEC, 2/22/98, BR p.1,8)
1698 Elias “Red Cap “ Ball sailed
from England to claim his inheritance, a plantation called Comingtee on
the banks of the Cooper River. The Ball family kept a history and in
1998 descendant Edward Ball published “Slaves in the Family.”
(SFEC, 2/22/98, BR p.1,8)(SFEC, 4/19/98, p.A22)
1709 Sep 3, The 1st major group of
Swiss and German colonists reached the Carolinas.
(MC, 9/3/01)
1711 The city of Beaufort, SC, was
founded. It was later hailed as the state’s 2nd oldest city.
(SSFC, 1/19/03, p.C12)
1712 South Carolina law required
church attendance and prohibited work or travel on Sundays.
(AH, 4/07, p.30)
1715 Apr 15, Uprising of Yamasse
Indians in South Carolina.
(MC, 4/15/02)
1718 May, Edward Teach, aka
Blackbeard, used his 40-gun, captured French flagship (La Concorde),
renamed as Queen Anne's Revenge, to blockade the harbor at Charleston,
S.C.
(www.qaronline.org/history/search.htm)(AM, May/Jun
97 p.21)
1721 May 29, South Carolina was
formally incorporated as a royal colony.
(HN, 5/29/98)
1733 Jan 13, James Oglethorpe and
130 English colonists arrived at Charleston, SC.
(MC, 1/13/02)
1735 Feb 18, The 1st opera
performed in America, "Flora," in Charleston, SC.
(MC, 2/18/02)
1739 Sep 9, A slave revolt in
Stono, SC, led by an Angolan slave named Jemmy, killed 20-25 whites.
Three slave uprisings occurred in South Carolina in 1739. Whites soon
passed black codes to regulated every aspect of slave life.
(SFC, 12/18/96,
p.A25)(www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part1/1p284.html)(AH, 2/05, p.66)
1740 A slave plot was uncovered in
Charleston that resulted in the hanging of 50 blacks.
(HNQ, 6/10/98)
1756 Apr 14, Gov. Glen of South
Carolina protested against 900 Acadia Indians.
(MC, 4/14/02)
1760 Feb 16, Cherokee Indians held
hostage at Fort St. George, SC, were killed in revenge for Indian
attacks on frontier settlements.
(HN, 2/16/99)(MC, 2/16/02)
1767 Mar 15, Andrew Jackson
(d.1845), seventh President of the United States known as "Old
Hickory," was born in Waxhaw, South Carolina. The first American
president to be born in a log cabin, Jackson was a hero of the War of
1812, an Indian fighter and a Tennessee lawyer. Neither a particularly
intelligent man nor a wise one, Jackson became the symbol of his age by
being the right man believing in the right things at the right time.
Success was a race, Jackson believed, and the government’s primary
responsibility was to guarantee that every man got a fair chance at
winning. Jackson’s administration (1829-37) saw the development of
modern-style political parties and changes in the voting laws that
nearly tripled the electorate. Known for his strong will, Jackson was
fond of saying: “When I mature my course I am immovable.” Jackson was
the first congressman from Tennessee and later became a senator and
state supreme court judge. Jackson was involved in a number of duels
and killed a man in one. Personal feuds with Thomas Jefferson led him
out of public life for some time. Jackson was elected president in 1828
and served until 1837. He initiated the spoils system and had the
first “Kitchen Cabinet” of intimate advisers. Jackson died June 8,
1845. In 1997 Max Byrd wrote “Jackson,” a biographical novel.
(AP, 3/15/97)(WSJ, 5/14/97, p.A20)(HNPD,
3/15/99)(HNQ, 4/30/99)(HNPD, 4/30/99)
1771 Mark Catesby had his work:
“The Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands”
printed in London.
(WSJ, 7/7/98, p.A14)
1773 Jan 12, The first public
museum in America was established, in Charleston, S.C.
(AP, 1/12/98)
1775 Jan 11, In South Carolina
Francis Salvador became the 1st Jew elected to office in America. [see
Aug 1]
(AH, 2/05, p.16)
1775 Apr 13, Lord North extended
the New England Restraining Act to South Carolina, Virginia,
Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Maryland. The act forbade trade with any
country other than Britain and Ireland.
(HN, 4/13/99)
1775 Aug 1, Francis Salvador and
his men were ambushed by a group of Cherokees and Loyalists near
present-day Seneca, South Carolina, while leading a militia group under
the general command of Major Wilkinson. Salvador was wounded and then
scalped by the Cherokees.
(MC, 1/11/02)
1776 Jun 28, Colonists repulsed a
British sea attack on Charleston, South Carolina.
(HN, 6/28/98)
1776 Fort Sullivan, outside the
town of Charleston, S.C., was built primarily of palmetto logs and
sand. Commanded by Colonel William Moultrie--for whom it was later
renamed--the partially uncompleted Fort Sullivan on Sullivan’s Island
bore the brunt of gunfire from a British naval force when the British
tried to invade Charleston on June 28, 1776. The palmetto logs and sand
from which the fort was primarily constructed absorbed most of the
British shot, while the fort’s defenders managed to inflict
disproportionate punishment to the British warships, one of which, the
frigate Actaeon, ran hard aground and had to be abandoned and blown up
by her crew. The successful defense of Charleston effectively left the
Carolinas in the hands of the rebelling Patriots until a new invasion
force returned to Charleston in February 1780.
(HNQ, 10/25/01)
1780 May 12, Charleston, SC, fell
to the British in the US Revolutionary War.
(SC, internet, 5/12/97)(HN, 5/12/98)
1780 May, The Virginia
continentals surrendered to Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton,
commander of the British Legion, following his victory at Waxhaws, SC.
Tarleton then led the British troops to a massacre of the surrendering
Virginia regulars and militiamen, eliminating the last organized
force in South Carolina. During the course of the Revolutionary War,
Tarleton became one of the most hated men in America.
(HNQ, 9/26/00)(AH, 10/07, p.29)
1780 Aug 16, American troops under
Gen. Horatio Gates were badly defeated by the British at the Battle of
Camden, South Carolina.
(HFA, '96, p.36)(HN, 8/16/98)(ON, 12/01, p.9)
1780 Oct 6, Over 1500 Patriot
fighters assembled on the outskirts of Cowpens, South Carolina, to
confront Loyalist forces of British Major Patrick Ferguson.
(ON, 12/07, p.6)
1780 Oct 7, Colonial patriots
slaughtered a loyalist group at the Battle of King's Mountain in South
Carolina. Patrick Ferguson (36), English Major in South Carolina, died
in the battle along with some 200 Loyalists. Patriot losses numbered 30
with 62 wounded.
(HN, 10/7/99)(ON, 12/07, p.7)
1780 Dec 4, At the Battle of
Rugeley‘s Mill, South Carolina, Colonel William Washington attacked a
fortified log barn with 107 Loyalists inside. When the Patriot‘s small
arms proved ineffective, Washington cut a log to resemble a cannon and
demanded the surrender of the Loyalists. The “Quaker guns” used in the
American War of Independence were fashioned out of logs to resemble
cannon. Fooled by the fake cannon, the promptly gave up. Quaker
guns were also decisive at the May 1780 Battle of Hunt‘s Bluff, also in
South Carolina.
(HNQ, 4/24/00)
1781 Jan 17, Daniel Morgan’s
Continental regiments routed British forces at Cowpens, South Carolina.
Some 100 British soldiers were killed, 299 wounded and 600 taken
prisoner. 12 American were killed.
(ON, 12/01, p.10)(AH, 2/06, p.71)
1781 Apr 25, Gen. Nathanael Greene
engaged British forces at Hobkirk’s Hill, South Carolina, and was
forced to retreat.
(ON, 12/01, p.10)
1781 May 2, In Charles Town, S.C.,
William Collings sold his wife to Thomas Schooler, with her bed and
clothing for $2 and a half dozen bowls of gross.
(SFEC, 2/8/98, Z1 p.8)
1781 Summer, Emily Geiger was said
to have crossed British lines to deliver an urgent message to American
Gen. Nathaniel Greene as Greene’s army retreated from British forces
under Gen. Francis Rawdon.
(ON, 11/01, p.9)
1781 Sep 8, Gen. Nathanael Greene
engaged British forces at Eutaw Springs, South Carolina, and was forced
to retreat.
(ON, 12/01, p.10)
1781 Apr 25, Gen. Nathanael Greene
engaged British forces under Cornwallis at Hobkirk’s Hill, South
Carolina.
(ON, 12/01, p.10)
1782 Dec 14, Charleston, SC, was
evacuated by British.
(MC, 12/14/01)
1788 May 23, South Carolina became
the eighth state to ratify the U. S. Constitution.
(AP, 5/23/97)(HN, 5/23/98)
1790 In South Carolina a
900-square-foot octagonal house was built about this time by Scottish
immigrant William McKimmy. Ruins of the structure were found in 2009 on
the banks of the May River in Blufton.
(SFC, 2/22/10, p.A6)
1822 Jun 16, Denmark Vessey
[Vesey] led a slave rebellion in South Carolina. [see Jul 2]
(MC, 6/16/02)
1822 Jun 18, Slave revolt leaders
Denmark Vesey [Vessey] and Peter Poyas were arrested in SC.
(MC, 6/18/02)
1822 Jul 2, Denmark Vesey [Vessey]
(b.1767) was executed in Charleston, South Carolina, for planning a
massive slave revolt.
(HN, 7/2/01)
1828 May 13, US passed the Tariff
of Abominations. Congress raised duties on manufactured goods from
abroad on which the South was dependent. South Carolina declared the
tariff null and void within its borders and pres. Jackson threatened to
send in troops. The tariffs were lowered in 1833.
(SS, Internet, 5/13/97)(WSJ, 1/11/99, p.R50)
1832 Nov 24, South Carolina passed
an Ordinance of Nullification. The US government had enacted a tariff.
South Carolina nullified it and threatened to secede. Pres. Jackson
threatened armed force on his home state but a compromise was devised
by Henry Clay that ducked the central problem.
(WSJ, 9/19/97,
p.A13)(www.loc.gov/rr/program/bib/ourdocs/Nullification.html)
1832 Nov 24, The doctrine of
nullification involved an argument concerning the nature of the union
as defined by the writers of the Constitution and addressed the
question: "Was the US a compact of sovereign states, each retaining
ultimate authority, or was the US one nation formed by the people
through the writing of the Constitution?" John C. Calhoun, supporter of
the doctrine of nullification, was Pres. Jackson's principal opponent
in the nullification crises.
(www.cr.nps.gov/history/online_books/butowsky2/constitution4.htm#17)
1832 Pres. Jackson dispatched the
US Navy to South Carolina to quash an effort to nullify federal tariffs
within the state.
(WSJ, 5/19/05, p.D8)
1835 Aug 31, Angry mob in
Charleston, South Carolina, seized U-S mail containing abolitionist
literature and burned it in public.
(MC, 8/31/01)
1835 In S. Carolina a 145-acre
lake was created when a dam was built on the Reedy River.
(USAT, 1/20/04, p.12A)
1836 Aug 7, Evander McIvor Law
(d.1920), Brig General (Confederate Army), was born in South Carolina.
(MC, 8/7/02)(Internet)
1838 Apr 27, Fire destroyed half
of Charleston.
(MC, 4/27/02)
1838 South Carolina Gov. John Lyde
Wilson published a dueling book of rules.
(WSJ, 9/19/03, p.W11)
1839 Apr 5, Robert Smalls, black
congressman from South Carolina, 1875-87, was born.
(HN, 5/5/97)
1850 Mar 31, John Calhoun
(b.1782), US vice-president (1825-1832), died while a senator from
South Carolina. He was elected vice president under two presidents,
John Quincy Adams in 1824 and Andrew Jackson in 1828.
(WUD, 1994 p.210)(HNQ, 8/19/99)(MC, 3/31/02)
1856 Representative Preston
Brooks, a pro-slavery Democrat from South Carolina, used a cane to
attack Senator Charles Sumner, a Republican abolitionist from Mass.
Sumner was beaten unconscious and was unable to resume duties for 3
years. Brooks resigned from his seat but was re-elected.
(SFC, 7/25/98, p.A6)
1857 Sep 12, A wooden-hulled
steamship, the SS Central America under Capt. William L. Herndon, sank
off the coast of Georgia. The ship carried 21 tons of gold from
California to New York and 425 of 528 passengers were drowned. The
wreck was in 8,000 feet of water and in 1987-1988 salvage operations
were begun by Tommy Thompson. He hauled in $500 million worth of gold
bars, coins and nuggets. After a court battle he was awarded 92% of the
gold. The story is told in the 1998 book “Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue
sea” by Gary Kinder. The loss of the gold sparked “The Panic of 1857.”
The SS Central America sank off Cape Romain, SC.
(WSJ, 5/22/98, p.W3)(WSJ, 6/19/98, p.W9)(SFEC,
6/28/98, BR p.3)(WSJ, 12/3/99, p.W16)(WSJ, 1/28/00, p.B1)(ON, 7/01,
p.2)(MC, 9/12/01)
1859 Dec 18, South Carolina
declared itself an "independent commonwealth."
(MC, 12/18/01)
1860 Apr 23, Democratic convention
in Charleston, SC, divided over slavery.
(MC, 4/23/02)
1860 Nov 6, Former Illinois
congressman Abraham Lincoln was elected 16th president. He defeated
three other candidates for the U.S. presidency. He won the US
presidential elections with a majority of the electoral votes in a
4-way race. Following his election South Carolina seceded from the
Union followed by Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and
Texas.
(WSJ, 9/19/97, p.A13)(AP, 11/6/97)(HN, 11/6/98)
1860 Nov 13, South Carolina’s
legislature called a special convention to discuss secession from the
Union.
(HN, 11/13/98)
1860 Dec 20, South Carolina became
the first state to secede from the Union. SC voted 169-0 for Ordinance
of Secession.
(AP, 12/20/97)(HN, 12/20/98)(MC, 12/20/01)
1860 Dec 26, Major Robert
Anderson, under cover of darkness, concentrated his small federal force
at Ft. Sumter, SC.
(MC, 12/26/01)
1860 By the time of the Civil War
the Ball family owned some 4,000 slaves who worked 25 plantations along
the Cooper River. The family kept a history and in 1998 descendant
Edward Ball published “Slaves in the Family.”
(SFEC, 2/22/98, BR p.1,8)(SFEC, 4/19/98, p.A22)
1861 Jan 2, SC seized the inactive
Ft. Johnson in Charleston Harbor.
(MC, 1/2/02)
1861 Jan 9, The Star of the West,
a merchant vessel bringing reinforcements to Federal troops at Fort
Sumter, S.C., retreated after being fired on by a battery in the
harbor.
(AP, 1/9/04)
1861 Mar 9, The first hostile act
of the Civil War occurred when Star of the West fires on Sumter, S.C.
(HN, 3/9/98)
1861 Mar 27, Black demonstrators
in Charleston staged ride-ins on street cars.
(MC, 3/27/02)
1861 Apr 5, Gideon Wells, the
Secretary of the Navy, issued official orders for the relief of Fort
Sumter in Charleston Harbor, S.C.
(HN, 4/5/99)
1861 Apr 6, Pres. Lincoln
dispatched 3 ships and 600 men to Fort Sumter as a relief expedition
carrying provisions. He followed this with a note to South Carolina
Gov. Francis W. Pickens that no arms were included.
(ON, 11/00, p.2)
1861 Apr 11, On April 11, 1861,
Brig. Gen. P.G.T. Beauregard ordered the Federals under the command of
Major Robert Anderson to surrender Fort Sumter, but Anderson refused.
Anticipating war between North and South, Confederate President
Jefferson Davis had ordered Beauregard to clear the harbor forts in
Charleston, South Carolina, of Union troops. For three long months,
Anderson and his besieged troops had waited for reinforcements at Fort
Sumter. Back in Washington, Union naval officer Gustavus Fox raced
against time to organize just such a mission.
(HNPD, 4/12/99)
1861 Apr 12, The Confederates sent
a final ultimatum for the surrender of Fort Sumter, South Carolina, at
12:45 a.m. Upon receiving Anderson's refusal, Gen'l. Beauregard's
artillery began to bombard Fort Sumter at 4:30 a.m. For 34 hours, the
Confederates and Federals traded fire before Anderson surrendered on
April 13. The Civil War had begun.
(Hem. 1/95, p. 70)(AP, 4/12/97)(HN, 4/12/98)(HNPD,
4/12/99)
1861 Apr 13, After 34 hours of
bombardment, Union-held Fort Sumter surrendered at 2:30 p.m. to
Confederates under the command of Gen PGT Beauregard. No Union
defenders were killed in the 34-hour rebel assault on Charleston
Harbor‘s Fort Sumter led by Major Robert Anderson. Likewise, none of
the Confederate attackers were killed in this action. Union Pvt. Daniel
Hough became the war‘s first official casualty when he was killed by a
premature discharge of a cannon used as a salute in the evacuation
ceremonies after the surrender.
(HN, 4/13/98)(HNQ, 8/31/00)(MC, 4/13/02)
1861 Apr 20, Thaddeus Lowe landed
in South Carolina only to be surrounded by a group of incredulous
Carolinians who believed he was a spy. Lowe managed to persuade the
crowd that his 500-mile trip from Cincinnati, Ohio, was merely an
innocent aerial journey to test his strange craft. He later tried to
convince the Union to use his skill as a balloonist.
(HNQ, 4/5/01)(ON, 2/05, p.7)
1861 Jun 16, Battle of Vienna,
VA., and Secessionville, SC (James Island).
(MC, 6/16/02)
1861 Aug 27, At the Battle of Cape
Hatteras, SC, Union troops took Fort Clark.
(MC, 8/27/01)
1861 Oct 6, Naval Engagement at
Charleston, SC, the USS Flag vs. Britain’s Alert.
(MC, 10/6/01)
1861 Nov 7, Union forces captured
the Hilton Head-Beaufort-Port Royal area of Southern Carolina.
(Smith., 4/95, p.14)(HN, 11/7/98)
1861 Dec 11, A raging fire swept
the business district of Charleston, South Carolina, adding to an
already depressed economic state.
(HN, 12/11/98)
1861 Dec 24, The USS Gem of the
Sea destroyed the British blockade runner Prince of Wales off the coast
at Georgetown, S.C.
(HN, 12/24/98)
1862 Apr 12, Union Gen. David
Hunter (1802-1886) formed the first official African-American regiment
during the Civil War. The First South Carolina Volunteer Infantry was
first organized in the Department of the South by Gen. David Hunter at
Hilton Head, SC, in May of 1862.
(AH, 4/07,
p.14)(http://johnib.wordpress.com/category/abraham-lincoln/)
1862 May 13, Robert Smalls, a
slave crewman on the Confederate steamboat Planter, stole the ship from
the harbor of Charleston and surrendered it to the USS Onward of the
Union blockade. In 1971 Okon Edet Uya published “From slavery to Public
Service: Robert Smalls, 1839-1915.
(ON, 5/00, p.2)
1862 Jun 6, Battle of Port Royal,
SC (Port Royal Ferry). [see Jul 4, 1862]
(MC, 6/6/02)
1862 Jul 4, Battle of Port Royal,
SC. (Port Royal Ferry). [see Jun 6, 1862]
(Maggio, 98)
1862 Aug 1, James Henley Thornwell
(b.1812), Presbyterian preacher from South Carolina, died.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Henley_Thornwell)
1863 Jan 31, The 1st South
Carolina Volunteers, later called the 33rd U.S. Colored Troops was
officially recognized. Components of the regiment had been in training
since early 1962.
(Smith., 4/95, p.14)(MC, 1/31/02)
1863 Apr 7, Battle of Charleston,
SC. The Federal fleet attack on Fort Sumter failed.
(MC, 4/7/02)
1863 Jul 11, The Battle of Fort
Wager began as Union forces assaulted the Confederate battery on Morris
Island at the southern approach to Charleston Harbor.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assault_on_the_Battery_Wagner)
1863 Jul 18, A 2nd assault in the
Battle of Fort Wagner, SC, left US1500 and CS174 casualties. Union
troops of the Massachusetts 54th Infantry assaulted Battery Wagner on
Morris Island in the harbor at Charleston, SC. The ultimately
unsuccessful attack, the 1st major engagement by a unit of freed black
soldiers, was later celebrated in the 1989 film “Glory.”
(www.awod.com/cwchas/wagner.html)(LP, Spring 2006,
p.58)
1863 Aug 17, Federal batteries and
ships bombarded South Carolina’s Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor
during the Civil War, but the Confederates managed to hold on despite
several days of pounding.
(HN, 8/17/98)(AP, 8/17/08)
1863 Aug 23, Union batteries
ceased their first bombardment of Fort Sumter, leaving it a mass of
rubble but still unconquered by the Northern besiegers.
(HN, 8/23/00)
1863 Sep 6, After 59 day siege,
confederates evacuated Ft Wagner, SC.
(MC, 9/6/01)
1863 Oct 15, For the second time,
the Confederate submarine H. L. Hunley sank during a practice dive in
Charleston Harbor, S.C, this time drowning its inventor along with
seven crew members. The 40-foot Hunley sank in August with five sailors
who had volunteered to test it.
(HN, 10/15/98)(SFC, 3/12/99, p.A3)
1863 Dec 4, Seven solid days of
bombardment ended at Charleston, S.C. The Union fired some 1,307 rounds.
(HN, 12/4/99)
1863 Dec 6, The monitor Weehawken
sank in the Charleston Harbor.
(HN, 12/6/98)
1864 Feb 17, Confederate officer
George Dixon used the submarine H.L. Hunley to sink the USS Housatonic
in Charleston Harbor, S.C. 5 Union soldiers died on the Housatonic as
did the 9-man crew of the Hunley as it soon sank. In 1995 the Hunley
was found by Clive Cussler. The event was turned into a TNT cable movie
in 1999. On Aug 8, 2000, the Hunley was raised and returned to
Charleston.
(HN, 2/17/98)(SFC, 7/9/99, p.C1)(SFC, 8/9/00,
p.A3)(Econ, 4/10/04, p.25)
1864 Nov 30, Battle of Honey Hill,
SC, (Broad River). 96 were killed and 665 wounded.
(MC, 11/30/01)
1865 Jan 16, General Sherman began
a march through the Carolinas. Sherman issued an order that set aside
land in Georgia and South Carolina for freed slaves.
(HN, 1/16/99)(SFC, 6/20/00, p.A6)
1865 Jan 18, Battle of Ft.
Moultrie, SC.
(MC, 1/18/02)
1865 Feb 16, Columbia, S.C.,
surrendered to Federal troops.
(HN, 2/16/98)
1865 Feb 17, The South Carolina
capital city, Columbia, was half destroyed by fire as the Confederates
evacuated and Union forces under Major General William Tecumseh Sherman
marched through. It's not known which side set the blaze. Sherman had
made a swift and steady advance through Georgia and South Carolina, and
by late February 1865, his army was approaching Charlotte, North
Carolina.
(HN, 2/17/98)(AP, 2/17/98)
1865 Feb 17-18, Battle of
Charleston SC.
(MC, 2/17/02)
1865 Feb 18, Battle of Ft.
Moultrie, SC.
(MC, 2/18/02)
1865 Feb 18, Columbia, SC, was
evacuated and Sherman's troops burned the city.
(MC, 2/18/02)
1865 May 1, In Charleston, SC,
some 10,000 people paraded to a mass grave site of Union soldiers at a
former race track. This was likely the 1st large-scale US Memorial Day
event. [see May 5, 1866]
(SFC, 5/26/03, p.A1)
1865 Sep 3, Army commander in SC
ordered Freedmen's Bureau to stop seizing land.
(MC, 9/3/01)
1865 At Fort Wagner in South
Carolina the first Civil War regiment of emancipated black slaves, led
by Robert Gould Shaw, was destroyed. The event was later memorialized
by Augustus Saint-Gaudens in a bronze relief on display in Boston
Commons. The 1989 film “Glory” also portrayed the events.
(SFC,10/15/97, p.D3)
1866 Apr 2, Pres. ended war in
Ala, Ark, Fla, Ga, Miss, La, NC, SC, Ten & Va.
(MC, 4/2/02)
1867 Sep 13, Gen. E.R.S. Canby
ordered South Carolina courts to impanel blacks as jurors.
(MC, 9/13/01)( www.tsha.utexas.edu)
1868 Jun 25, Florida, Alabama,
Louisiana, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina were re-admitted
to the Union.
(AP, 6/25/97)
1868 The Ku Klux Klan was imported
to South Carolina from Tennessee, where it had originated. During South
Carolina’s election campaign this year the Klan murdered 8 blacks, two
of them state congressmen.
(AH, 6/03, p.27)
1869 Mar 3, University of South
Carolina opened to all races.
(SC, 3/3/02)
1870 Oct 10, In South Carolina
Republican Gov. Robert Scott (1826-1900) was re-elected, on the
strength of the black vote, enraging members of the Ku Klux Klan. A
wave of terror began the following day.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Carolina_gubernatorial_election,_1870)(AH,
6/03, p.27)
1870 Dec 12, Joseph H. Rainey
became the first black lawmaker sworn into the U.S. House of
Representatives. Rainey, a Republican from South Carolina, filled the
seat made vacant by the expulsion of Representative Benjamin F.
Whittemore. Rainey served for 10 years.
(AP, 12/12/97)(MC, 12/12/01)
1871 Mar, Pres. Grant sent federal
troops to South Carolina to suppress violence instigated by the Ku Klux
Klan.
(AH, 6/03, p.28)
1871 Oct 12, President Grant
ordered the South Carolina Ku Klux Klan to disperse and disarm in five
days.
(AH, 6/03, p.31)
1871 Oct 17, President Grant
suspended writ of habeas corpus in South Carolina in response to
violence by the KKK. It applied to all arrests made by US marshals and
federal troops in nine of the state’s western counties. By the end of
November some 600 arrests were made.
(AH, 6/03, p.31)
1871 Nov 27, Ku Klux Klan trials
began in Federal District Court in Columbia, SC.
(AH, 6/03, p.32)
1872 Sep 21, John Henry Conyers of
SC became the 1st black student at Annapolis.
(MC, 9/21/01)
1874 Former slave James Webster
Smith was expelled from West Point for failing an exam. He was
commissioned by the Army in 1997 and his certificate was presented to
South Carolina State Univ.
(SFC, 9/23/97, p.A3)
1876 Jul 8, White terrorists
attacked Black Republicans in Hamburg, SC, and killed 5.
(MC, 7/8/02)
1876 Sep 6, A race riot took place
in Charleston, SC.
(MC, 9/6/01)
1876 Oct 26, President Grant sent
federal troops to SC.
(MC, 10/26/01)
1877 Apr 10, Federal troops were
withdrawn from Columbia, SC.
(MC, 4/10/02)
1878 Apr 21, Ship Azor left
Charleston with 206 blacks for Liberia.
(MC, 4/21/02)
1881 Aug 27, A hurricane hit
Florida and the Carolinas; about 700 died.
(MC, 8/27/01)
1884 Feb 19, A series of tornadoes
left an estimated 800 people dead in 7 US states (Miss, Ala, NC, SC,
Tenn., Ky & In).
(WSJ, 9/13/01, p.B11)(MC, 2/19/02)
1886 Aug 31, An earthquake rocked
Charleston, S.C., killing 60 people, according to the US Geological
Survey.
(AP, 8/31/07)
1893 Oct 27, Hurricane hit the US
coast between Savannah, Ga., and Charleston, SC.
(MC, 10/27/01)
1894 Mar 19, Jackie "Moms" Mabley,
comedienne (Merv Griffin Show), was born in Brevard, SC.
(MC, 3/19/02)
1898 Feb 22, A black postmaster
was lynched and his wife and 3 daughters were shot in Lake City, SC.
(MC, 2/22/02)
1901 Mar 7, Blacks were found to
be still enslaved in certain parts of South Carolina.
(HN, 3/7/98)
1902 Apr 11, Wade Hampton (1818),
Confederate Civil War general and post-war governor of South Carolina
(1877-1879), died. In 2008 Rod Andrew Jr. authored Wade Hampton:
Confederate Warrior, Conservative Statesman.”
(WSJ, 6/7/08,
p.W9)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wade_Hampton_III)
1902 Nov 5, Strom Thurmond,
(Sen-R-SC, 1955-2003), was born.
(MC, 11/5/01)
1907 The US Tillman Act prohibited
national banks and corporations from making political contributions in
federal elections. It was named for Sen. Benjamin “Pitchfork Ben”
Tillman, a democrat from South Carolina.
(SFEC, 10/5/97, p.D9)(SFEC, 7/16/00, p.A8)
1911 Oct 29, Joseph Pulitzer
(1847), Hungary-born American newspaperman, died in Charleston, S.C. In
2002 Denis Brian authored "Pulitzer: A Life." In 2010 James McGrath
Morris authored “Pulitzer: A Life in Politics, Print , and Power.
(WSJ, 1/30/02,
p.A16)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Pulitzer)(SSFC, 3/7/10, p.F4)
1914 Mar 26, William
Westmoreland, U.S. army general and head of all ground forces in South
Vietnam during the Vietnam War, was born in Saxon, SC.
(HN, 3/26/99)(SS, 3/26/02)
1915 Jul 8, Charles Hard Townes,
physicist (developed lasers), was born in Greenville, SC.
(MC, 7/8/02)
1916 Anthony Crawford, black
farmer and father of 13 children, was beaten and lynched In Abbeyville,
South Carolina, following an argument with a white storekeeper.
(Econ, 6/18/05, p.29)
1922 Mar 12, Lane Kirkland
(d,1999), later 16-year president of the AFL-CIO (1979-1995), was born
in Camden.
(SFEC, 8/15/99, p.D8)
1924 Apr 13, Stanley Donen, film
director, producer (Bedazzled, Damn Yankees), was born in SC.
(MC, 4/13/02)
1924 Strom Thurmond (22), later SC
Senator, fathered a daughter, with house servant Carrie Butler (16)
while living in his parents' home in Edgefield, South Carolina. In 2003
the Thurmond family finally acknowledged that Ms. Essie May
Washington-Williams was his illegitimate, biracial daughter.
(SFC, 12/16/03, p.A2)
1926 Jun 11, Carlisle Floyd,
composer (Slow Dusk), was born in Latta, SC.
(Internet)
1927 Feb 20, Golfers in SC were
arrested for violating Sabbath.
(MC, 2/20/02)
1927 Feb 27, For the 2nd Sunday in
a row golfers in SC were arrested for violating Sabbath.
(MC, 2/27/02)
1927 Aug 25, Althea Gibson
(d.2003), Wimbledon's 1st black tennis champion (1957), was born in
Silver, SC.
(HN, 8/25/98)(WSJ, 9/29/03, p.A1)
1928 Jan 26, Eartha Kitt, singer,
actress (Catwoman-Batman), was born in SC.
(MC, 1/26/02)
1928 James B. Davis (1916-2007)
organized the Dixie Hummingbirds from members of his church choir in
Greenville, SC. In 1973 the group backed Paul Simon in the hit “Loves
Me Like a Rock.” In 1999 the House of Blues released a Dixie
Hummingbirds album: “Music in the Air.”
(SFC, 4/30/07, p.B8)
1929 Oct 16, Etta Jones (d.2001 at
72), jazz vocalist, was born in Aiken, SC.
(SFC, 10/18/01, p.A21)
1939 Caroline Hembel (d.2001 at
82) was one of 3 women accepted for the Civilian Pilot Training Program
at the Univ. of South Carolina. She became its 1st female graduate.
(SFC, 1/27/01, p.A24)
1941 Mar 25, Carolina Paprika
Mills in Dillon, SC, was incorporated.
(MC, 3/25/02)
1941 Oct 8, Jesse Jackson, civil
rights leader, was born in Greenville, SC.
(HN, 10/8/98)(MC, 10/8/01)
1944 Apr 13, South Carolina
rejected black suffrage.
(MC, 4/13/02)
1949 The Briggs vs. Elliot case
was filed in federal court in Charleston. It was later merged with the
landmark Brown vs. Board of Education, in which the 1954 Supreme Court
overturned the “separate but equal” doctrine of racial segregation in
schools.
(SFC, 3/8/01, p.C4)
1951 Feb 21, SC House urged that
"Shoeless Joe" Jackson be reinstated.
(MC, 2/21/02)
1951 South Carolina passed an
anti-lynching law in response to the mob murder of Willie Earle, who
was dragged from jail and gunned down in retaliation for the death of a
cabbie.
(SSFC, 5/18/03, p.A6)
1952 Aug 2, Paul David Crews,
murderer (featured in the FBI Most Wanted List), was born in SC.
(MC, 8/2/02)
1953 Mar 11, An American B-47
accidentally dropped a nuclear bomb on South Carolina, however the bomb
did not go off due to 6 safety catches.
(HN, 3/11/98)(MC, 3/11/02)
1953 Jun 10, John R. Edwards, US
Senator, was born Seneca, South Carolina. In 2004 he ran as a Democrat
presidential candidate and then agreed to run for the vice-presidency
under Sen. John Kerry.
(SSFC, 2/29/04, p.D2)(SFC, 7/7/04, p.A9)
1954 Nov 2, Strom Thurmond
(1902-2003) of South Carolina became the 1st US senator elected by
write-in vote.
(http://constitutioncenter.org/timeline/html/cw10_12231.html)
1956 Apr 8, Six marine recruits
drowned during exercise at Paradise Island, SC.
(MC, 4/8/02)
1956 May 17, Sugar Ray [Charles]
Leonard, boxer (Olympics-gold-76) was born in Willington, SC.
(MC, 5/17/02)
1957 Aug 29, Congress passed the
Civil Rights Act of 1957. South Carolina Sen. Strom Thurmond (then a
Democrat) ended a filibuster against a civil rights bill after talking
for 24 hours and 18 minutes. Arnold Aronson (d.1998 at 86) help to
lobby for the bill.
(AP, 8/29/97)(SFC, 2/20/98, p.A23)(SSFC, 12/17/00,
Par p.15)
1958 Mar 11, A B-47 out of Hunter
AFB in Savannah, Georgia, had just leveled off at 15,000 feet, when a
bomb lock failed and dropped a nuclear bomb on the suburban
neighborhood of Florence, South Carolina. The bomb's high explosives
exploded on impact, wrecking a house and injuring several people on the
ground. The extent of radioactive contamination was never revealed.
(www.willthomasonline.net/willthomasonline/Broken_Arrows.html)
1960 Nov 15, The first submarine
with nuclear missiles, the USS George Washington, took to sea from
Charleston, South Carolina.
(HN, 11/15/98)
1962 The Confederate flag was
raised over the Statehouse to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the
Civil War.
(SFC, 5/24/00, p.A7)
1966 South Carolina passed a law
banning tattoo parlors.
(WSJ, 7/22/02, p.A1)
1968 Feb 8, At South Carolina
State 3 black students were killed in a confrontation with highway
patrolmen in Orangeburg, during a civil rights protest against a
whites-only bowling alley. Nearly 50 were injured in the Orangeburg
Massacre during confrontations with the National Guard. In 2001 Gov.
Jim Hodges voiced his regret over the massacre. In 1970 Jack Nelson
(1929-2009), LA Times reporter, authored “The Orangeburg Massacre.”
(SFEC, 2/22/98, BR p.8)(AP, 2/8/99)(SFC, 2/9/01,
p.A3)
1968 Feb 8, In South Carolina Lee
Roy Martin, called the editor of a local newspaper, and told him where
to find the bodies of two women he'd dumped in the woods. He threatened
to kill even more women until he was "shot down like the dog I am."
Clues in the area led to Martin's arrest. Martin, dubbed the “Gaffney
Strangler,” was convicted of four murders and sentenced to four life
terms. In 1972, he was stabbed to death in his cell.
(AP, 7/4/09)
1970 The Bob Jones Univ. in
Greenville lost its federal tax exempt status due to its ban on
interracial dating and marriage. This was the first year that African
Americans were admitted to the school
(SFC, 10/24/98, p.A3)(SFC, 3/10/00, p.A5)
1970 The Babcock Center was
founded as a nonprofit facility to care for the mentally ill. It
eventually became South Carolina’s largest provider of Medicaid-funded
housing.
(WSJ, 9/13/05, p.A1)
1971-1975 John C. West (d.2004) served as Democratic
governor of South Carolina.
(SFC, 3/24/04, p.B7)
1974 Apr 3, A series of 148 deadly
tornadoes struck wide parts of the South and Midwest before jumping
across the border into Canada; some 330 people were killed in 13 states
(Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Mississippi,
North Carolina, Ohio, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, and West
Virginia. Total property damage was estimated at $600 million. In 2007
Mark Levine authored “F5: Devastation, Survival, and the Most Violent
Tornado Outbreak of the 20th Century.”
(AP, 4/3/99)(WSJ, 9/13/01, p.B11)(SSFC, 9/4/05,
p.A7)(WSJ, 6/16/07, p.P10)
1980 Pat Conroy authored “The
Lords of Discipline,” based on the Citadel academy in Charleston, South
Carolina.
(NW, 10/14/02, p.63)
1982 Video poker began as a
back-room game of dubious legality. It gained judicial and legislative
sanction in the 1990s.
(WSJ, 12/2/97, p.A1)
1982 Dorothy Ely Edwards (75) was
raped and stabbed 52 times. Edward Lee Elmore was convicted twice for
the murder but DNA evidence in 2000 suggested that he was innocent.
(SFC, 12/22/00, p.A7)
1983 Hilton Head Island was
incorporated.
(SSFC, 1/19/03, p.C12)
1983 Christy Johnson (86) was
stabbed 27 times and his wife Corrie (82) was stabbed 17 times. They
were cousins of Andrew Lavern Smith, who rented a house from them.
Smith was convicted and executed in 1998.
(SFC, 12/19/98, p.A15)
1984 Gov. Richard Riley of South
Carolina pushed thru his Education Improvement Act.
(Econ, 4/2/05, p.30)
1985 Jan 21, 19F (-28C) was
recorded at Caesar's Head, South Carolina, a state record. 34F (-37C)
was recorded at Mt. Mitchell, North Carolina, a state record.
(http://tinyurl.com/yaleou)
1986 South Carolina-based 3D
Systems introduced the first commercially available 3-D printer,
pioneering the development of stereolithography.
(Econ, 9/5/09, TQ p.28)
1988 Mar 5, Vice President George
Bush won the South Carolina Republican primary, with Kansas Senator Bob
Dole running a distant second, followed by Pat Robertson and New York
Congressman Jack Kemp.
(AP, 3/5/98)
1988 Mar 12, Rev. Jesse Jackson
won the Democratic precinct caucuses in his native South Carolina.
(AP, 3/12/98)
1989 Sep 21, Hurricane Hugo,
packing winds of up to 135 mph, crashed into Charleston, S.C.
(AP, 9/21/99)
1989 Sep 24, Residents of
Charleston, S.C., attended church services as they faced a third day of
recovering from the devastation of Hurricane Hugo. Hugo caused 56
deaths in the Caribbean and 29 in the United States. The storm hit
Guadeloupe, Montserrat, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico before
striking South Carolina.
(AP, 9/24/99)(AP, 9/11/04)
1993 Jul 23, In South Carolina
Larry Demery and Daniel Green came upon James Jordan sleeping in his
car and proceeded to rob him. As Jordan awoke Green shot Jordan, the
56-year-old father of basketball star Michael Jordan. Green was found
guilty of murder in April 1995, largely based on the testimony of his
life-long friend, Larry Demery, and was sentenced to life in prison.
Demery pleaded guilty in May 1995 and was sentenced to life in prison.
Both killers were sentenced at the Robeson County Courthouse in
Lumberton, North Carolina.
(SFC, 5/21/96,
p.A-3)(http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1355/is_n1_v88/ai_16951730)
1993 Aug 3, James Jordan (b.1936),
the father of basketball star Michael Jordan, was found dead in a South
Carolina creek, 11 days after he was slain; his remains were not
identified until Aug. 13.
(AP,
8/3/98)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_R._Jordan,_Sr.)
1993 Sep 18, Kimberly Clarice
Aiken of South Carolina was crowned Miss America at the pageant in
Atlantic City, N.J.
(AP, 9/18/98)
1993 Oct 26, National Football
League owners selected Carolina as the 29th NFL franchise.
(www.panthers.com/team/history.jsp)
1994 Jan 20, Shannon Faulkner
became the first woman to attend classes at The Citadel in South
Carolina. She joined the cadet corps in August 1995, under court order,
but soon dropped out, citing isolation and stress.
(AP, 1/20/99)
1994 Apr, A 6-year-old boy was
killed in an accident due to a defective rear latch of a Chrysler
minivan. In 1997 a jury in South Carolina
ordered Chrysler Corp. to pay $262.5 mil to the parents. $250 mil was
for punitive damages.
(SFC, 10/9/97, p.A6)
1994 Nov 3, Susan Smith of Union
(23), S.C., was arrested for drowning her two young sons, nine days
after claiming the children had been abducted by a black carjacker. She
was convicted on July 22, 1995, of murdering her two sons, aged 3 and
14 months, when she drove her car into a local lake. She was later
sentenced to life in prison. Smith will be eligible for parole on
November 4, 2024, after serving a minimum of thirty years. She is
currently incarcerated at Leath Correctional Institution, near
Greenwood, South Carolina.
(AP, 11/3/99)(http://tinyurl.com/3yhjlc)
1994 Nov 4, In Union, S.C.,
townspeople jeered as Susan Smith was led into court, a day after the
23-year-old secretary was arrested and charged with murder in the
drowning of her sons, 3-year-old Michael and 14-month-old Alexander.
(AP, 11/4/99)
1994 Nov 6, About 300 people
crowded a small church in Union, S.C., for the funeral of 3-year-old
Michael and 14-month-old Alex Smith, who'd been drowned by their
mother, Susan Smith.
(AP, 11/6/99)
1994 The Carolina Panthers and
Jacksonville Jaguars, expansion football teams, began playing. They
benefited from a newly established salary cap.
(WSJ, 1/10/97,
p.A1)(www.panthers.com/team/history.jsp)
1995 Jan 16, In Union, S.C., a
prosecutor announced he would seek the death penalty for Susan Smith,
the woman accused of drowning her sons, 3-year-old Michael and
14-month-old Alex. Smith was later convicted of murder and sentenced to
life in prison.
(AP, 1/16/00)
1995 Jan 22, The Macedonia Baptist
Church in Manning, S.C., burned down. Arson was suspected and
investigations by the FBI and ATF were later begun. Four Klansmen were
later arrested and convicted.
(SFC, 6/11/96, p.A16)(SFEC, 7/21/98, p.A3)
1995 Jun 20-21, The Mount Zion AME
Church in Greeley Ville, S.C., was destroyed by fire. On the next day
the Macedonia Baptist Church in Bloomville was burned. In 1996 two KKK
members, Gary Cox and Timothy Welch, were charged in federal court for
setting the fires. They pleaded guilty on 8/14/96. Former Klansmen
Hubert Rowell and Arthur Haley pleaded guilty to 4 counts of conspiracy
in the fires in Dec 1996. In 1998 the Christian Knights of KKK and
Horace King, Grand Dragon of South Carolina, were ordered to pay $37.8
million in damages for the burning of the Macedonia Baptist church.
(SFC, 7/9/96, p.A6)(SFC, 8/15/96, p.A4)(SFC,
12/10/96, p.A3)(SFC, 7/25/98, p.A3)
1995 Aug 14, Shannon Faulkner
officially became the first female cadet in the history of The Citadel,
South Carolina's state military college. She quit the school less than
a week later, citing the stress of her court fight, and her isolation
among the male cadets.
(AP, 8/14/97)
1995 Aug 18, Shannon Faulkner,
who’d won a two-and-a-half-year legal battle to become the first female
cadet at The Citadel, quit the South Carolina military college after
less than a week, most of it spent in the infirmary. After her
departure, the male cadets openly celebrated on the campus. By May
2005, The Citadel's Corps of Cadets included 118 female cadets, 6% of
the total student population.
(AP,
8/18/00)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shannon_Faulkner)
1996 Oct 27, In South Carolina
Joshua Grant Kennedy, a Ku Klux Klan member, fired 11 times into a
crowd of black teenagers outside a nightclub and wounded three teens.
Kennedy was sentenced to 26 years in prison in 1998.
(SFC, 9/30/98, p.A3)
1996 Mary French (38) set out to
provide every third-grader in the state with a dictionary. In 2002 she
began expanding her project to other states.
(WSJ, 3/4/02, p.A1)
1997 Jan 12, Two recently enrolled
female cadets at South Carolina’s Citadel Academy announced they were
not returning for the spring semester, citing harassment by male cadets.
(AP, 1/12/98)
1997 Sep, A 10-day-old infant died
in a sweltering car while her mother played video poker.
(WSJ, 12/2/97, p.A1)
1997 Dec 2, It was reported that
video poker takes in $2 billion a year in South Carolina.
(WSJ, 12/2/97, p.A1)
1998 Mar 10, In South Carolina the
FBI received a videotape made by Daniel Rudolph, brother of abortion
clinic bombing suspect Eric Robert Rudolph, in which he amputated his
left hand with a circular saw.
(SFC, 3/11/98, p.A3)
1998 Jul 6, A planned shipment of
nuclear rods was to be transported across Northern California, Nevada
and Utah to Idaho for processing before final storage in South
Carolina. The federal government had made 154 secret shipments of spent
nuclear fuel rods over the last 40 years. Four more shipments from 7
Asian countries were planned to occur by 2009.
(SFC, 7/6/98, p.a1)
1998 Dec 7, South Carolina ended
its participation in the antitrust case against Microsoft.
(SFC, 11/6/99, p.A3)
1998 Dec 18, In South Carolina the
500th execution took place since capital punishment was resumed in
1977. Andrew Lavern Smith died by lethal injection for his 1983 murder
of an elderly couple.
(SFC, 12/19/98, p.A15)
1998 The Cross Island Parkway,
South Carolina’s 1st modern toll road, opened.
(SSFC, 1/19/03, p.C12)
1999 Feb, South Carolina removed
its provision against interracial marriages.
(SFC, 4/17/99, p.A4)
1999 May 8, Nancy Mace (21) became
the first woman to graduate from The Citadel state military school.
(SFC, 5/3/99, p.A9)
1999 Oct 14, The state Supreme
Court ruled that the video poker machines in the state must be
unplugged by June 30.
(SFC, 10/15/99, p.A3)
2000 Jan 17, In Columbia, South
Carolina, some 46,000 demonstrators marched on the Statehouse and
called for the removal on the Confederate flag.
(SFC, 1/18/00, p.A1)
2000 Mar 3, In South Carolina Bob
Jones Univ. lifted its ban on interracial dating.
(SFC, 3/4/00, p.A1)
2000 May 1, The governor approved
the observance of the Martin Luther King holiday, the last state to do
so, and a Confederate Memorial Day for May 10.
(WSJ, 5/1/00, p.A1)
2000 May 23, Gov. Jim Hodges
signed legislation to remove the Confederate flag from the Statehouse
on Jul 1.
(SFC, 5/24/00, p.A7)
2000 Jul 1, The Confederate flag
was removed from the Statehouse dome, where it had flown since 1962. A
smaller version was hoisted in front of the Statehouse at the
Confederate Soldier Monument.
(SFEC, 7/2/00, p.A3)
2000 Aug 8, The Civil War
submarine Hunley was raised and returned to Charleston, SC. State Sen.
Glenn McConnell raised funds for the Hunley project, which by 2006
reached $13.8 million, with another $15.5 million committed.
(SFC, 8/9/00, p.A3)(Econ, 4/10/04, p.25)
2000 Johnnie Lee Gray (58), self
taught African-American painter from Spartanburg SC, died. His
paintings included “The Revolution: We Shall Overcome.”
(WSJ, 12/3/02, p.D4)
2001 Aug 16, Floyd Spence,
Republican congressman since 1971, died at age 73.
(SFC, 8/17/01, p.D1)
2001 In South Carolina Christopher
Pittman (12) killed his grandparents with a shotgun and then torched
their rural home. He later blame the anti-depressant zoloft for his
actions. In 2005 he was found guilty and sentenced to 30 years in
prison.
(SFC, 2/16/05, p.A4)
2002 Jun 13, A federal judge
blocked SC Gov. Jim Hodges’ suit to block a plutonium shipment from
Rocky Flats in Colorado to the Savannah River Site nuclear facility for
re-processing.
(SFC, 6/14/02, p.A3,E6)
2002 Dec 5, A severe ice and snow
storm snarled the eastern US down into the Carolinas, where over a
million customers lost power. 29 deaths were blamed on the storm and
its aftermath.
(SFC, 12/6/02, p.A3)(SSFC, 12/8/02, p.A14)
2003 Jun 26, Strom Thurmond
(1902-2003), former South Carolina Senator, died at 100.
(SFC, 6/27/03, p.A1)(WSJ, 6/27/03, p.A1)
2003 Dec 8, In Abbeville, S.C.,
Arthur Bixby and his son Stephen (36) killed 2 police officers during a
13-hour standoff. They refused to give up some of their land for a
highway.
(SFC, 12/10/03, p.A6)
2004 Jan 25, In Greenville, SC, a
fire at a Comfort Inn left 6 people dead.
(SFC, 1/26/04, p.A3)
2004 Mar 12, In S. Carolina a Navy
bus crashed into a tractor-trailer on Highway 17, 60 miles SW of
Charleston, and 3 sailors were killed.
(SFC, 2/13/04, p.A1)
2004 Mar 21, John C. West (81),
former Democratic governor of South Carolina (1971-1975), died. He was
also a former ambassador to Saudi Arabia.
(SFC, 3/24/04, p.B7)
2004 Aug 29, Tropical storm Gaston
hit South Carolina.
(SFC, 8/30/04, p.A3)
2005 Jan 6, In South Carolina a
freight train carrying chlorine gas struck a parked train, killing
eight people and injuring more than 240 others, nearly all of them
sickened by a toxic cloud that at nightfall persisted over the small
textile town of Graniteville.
(AP, 1/7/05)
2005 Feb 15, Christopher Pittman,
a teen who claimed the antidepressant Zoloft had driven him to kill his
grandparents at age 12, was found guilty in Charleston, S.C., of murder
and sentenced to 30 years in prison.
(AP, 2/15/06)
2005 Mar 31, South Carolina
defeated Saint Joseph's, 60-57, in the NIT championship game.
(AP, 3/31/06)
2005 Apr, Gov. Mark Sanford of
South Carolina pushed for a “Put Parents in Charge Act” to provide
tuition credits to parents who want to teach their children at home of
send them to private or parochial schools.
(Econ, 4/2/05, p.30)
2005 A circuit judge ruled that
South Carolina had no obligation to repair tumbledown facilities or
raise teacher’s pay. In 2006 the film “Corridor of Shame” was used in a
campaign to make public the dilapidated conditions of South Carolina’s
rural schools.
(Econ, 6/10/06, p.28)
2006 Apr, Sue Ellen Wooldridge,
the US government’s top environmental prosecutor, purchased a $980,000
vacation home at Kiawah Island, SC, along with J. Steven Griles, an oil
and gas lobbyist, and Donald R. Duncan, a vice-president for
ConocoPhilips. 9 months later Wooldridge agreed to let ConocoPhillips
delay a half-billion-dollar pollution cleanup.
(SFC, 2/15/07, p.A6)
2006 May 26, Tiffany Marie Souers
(b.1986), a Junior Civil Engineering major at Clemson University, was
found dead in her apartment at The Reserve in Central, SC. In 2009
Jerry Buck Inman was sentenced to death for raping and strangling
Souers.
(www.clemsonwiki.com/wiki/Tiffany_Marie_Souers)(SFC,
4/23/09, p.A4)
2006 Jul 16, Robert Brooks
(b.1937), chairman of Hooters of America, died in South Carolina. He
made a fortune selling chicken wings served by scantily clad waitresses.
(www.cnn.com/2006/US/07/16/obit.hooters.ap/index.html)(Econ, 7/29/06,
p.78)
2006 Jul 17, Mickey Spillane
(b.1918), American mystery writer, died in South Carolina. His 13 Mike
Hammer novels began with “I, the Jury” (1946). A number of his books
were made into films including “The Girl Hunters” (1963) in which he
played the starring role.
(SFC, 7/18/06, p.B5)(Econ, 7/29/06, p.78)
2006 Sep 17, In South Carolina
Vinson Filyaw (36) was arrested and charged with raping a 14-year-old
girl. Filyaw had abducted the girl on Sep 6 and kept her in an
underground bunker. The girl was rescued Sep 16 after she used Filyaw’s
cell phone to send a text message to her mother.
(SFC, 9/18/06, p.A4)
2006 Sep 27, In Charleston, South
Carolina, a video store was held up by a group of children, including a
14-year-old girl suspected of wielding a BB gun that looked like a
pistol. City Council member Larry Shirley, reacting later to the video
store holdup, said parents who can't properly care for their kids
should be sterilized.
(AP, 10/1/06)
2006 Sep 30, Police in North
Charleston, SC, discovered the bodies of Detra Rainey and her 4
children. Michael Simmons (41), her husband but not the father of the
children, was charged the next day with the murders.
(SFC, 10/2/06, p.A3)
2006 Oct 17, Pres. Bush signed
into law a bill to provide grant money for the Gullah/Geechee Cultural
Heritage Corridor. In September Congress had declared a swathe of
coastline from North Carolina to Florida the Gullah/Geechee Cultural
Heritage Corridor, in an effort to preserve the region’s distinctive
black culture and creole language.
(Econ, 2/2/08,
p.42)(www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6283153)
2007 Apr 21, A US Navy Blue Angel
jet went down during an air show in South Carolina, plunging into a
neighborhood of small homes and trailers and killing the pilot.
(AP, 4/22/07)
2007 Apr 26, In Orangeburg, S.C.,
8 Democratic presidential hopefuls gathered for their first debate of
the 2008 campaign.
(AP, 4/26/08)
2007 May 23, In South Carolina Al
Parish (49), an economics instructor at Charleston southern Univ.,
pleaded not guilty to 10 federal mail and wire fraud counts. He was
accused of defrauding clients of $50 million.
(SFC, 5/29/07, p.C3)
2007 Jun 18, In Charleston, SC, a
fire swept through a furniture warehouse, collapsing the building's
roof and claiming the lives of nine firefighters.
(AP, 6/19/07)
2007 Jun 19, Thomas Ravenel,
treasurer of South Carolina, was indicted on federal cocaine
distribution charges.
(WSJ, 6/20/07, p.A1)
2007 Aug 16, US officials said
C&D Distributors in Lexington, South Carolina, collected about
$20.5 million over six years from the Pentagon for fraudulent shipping
costs, including $998,798 for sending two 19-cent washers to a Texas
base. The firm was run by sisters Charlene Corley and Darlene Wooten
(d.2006).
(Reuters, 8/16/07)(Econ, 8/25/07, p.31)
2007 Aug 4, Yousef Megahed (21) of
Egypt and Ahmed Mohamed (24) of Kuwait, students from the Univ. of
South Florida, were arrested following a speeding stop in the vicinity
of the Naval Weapons Station, located in Goose Creek, South Carolina.
Pipe bombs were found in their vehicle. They were later indicted for
carrying explosives across state lines. In 2008 Ahmed Abdellatif Sherif
Mohamed pleaded guilty in a Tampa court to making a video demonstrating
how to build a remote bomb detonator to help terrorists.
(www.charleston.net/news/2007/aug/17/fbi_backs_off_arrests13265/)(WSJ,
9/1/07, p.A1)(WSJ, 6/19/08, p.A2)
2008 Jan 19, In South Carolina
John McCain (33%) bested Mike Huckabee (30%), a former Arkansas
governor, in a GOP fight that focused on the economy.
(AP, 1/20/08)(SSFC, 1/20/08, p.A6)
2008 Jan 26, Barack Obama routed
Hillary Rodham Clinton in the racially charged South Carolina primary,
regaining campaign momentum in the prelude to a Feb. 5 coast-to-coast
competition for more than 1,600 Democratic National Convention
delegates. Nearly complete returns showed Obama winning 55% of the
vote, Clinton gaining 27%. Edwards had 18% and won only his home county
of Oconee. The South Carolina Democratic Party broke its own turnout
record in the presidential primary.
(AP, 1/27/08)
2008 Apr 26, In South Carolina,
Nathaniel Dickson (18) was arrested for the shooting of his father
(46), stepmother, stepsister and younger brother. The family was found
shot dead earlier in the day at their home just outside of Easley, SC.
(SFC, 4/28/08, p.A4)
2008 Apr 28, In South Carolina the
new 140-acre Hard Rock Park opened for business in Myrtle Beach. The
official opening was set for May 9. The park closed in September. On
Jan 6, 2009, a Delaware court approved a request the company to begin
liquidating. Private investors had put up some $75 million for the them
park and raised another $320 million in debt to fund the operation.
(WSJ, 1/7/09,
p.B1)(www.oceancreek.com/blog/hard-rock-park/2008/04/)
2008 Jun 11, In South Carolina a
bill allowing an “I Believe” license plate with the image of a cross
and a stained glass window became law after Gov. Mark Sanford declined
to veto it. The state legislature allowed several
religious-themed bills to become laws in its closing session.
(SFC, 6/13/08, p.A5)
2008 Sep, The City Council of
Myrtle Beach, SC, adopted a series of anti-motorcycle rally laws to
discourage bikers from their annual May rallies.
(SSFC, 5/3/09, p.A9)
2008 Oct 7, Lee W. Dubois (32) of
Lexington, SC, a former Army contractor, pleaded guilty to stealing
nearly $40 million worth of jet and diesel fuel from a US Army base in
Iraq and selling it on the black market. Dubois admitted he and others
used false paperwork to draw more than 10 million gallons of fuel from
Camp Liberty in Baghdad between October 2007 and May.
(AP, 10/8/08)
2009 Apr 24, South Carolina's
worst wildfire in at least three decades threatened to intensify after
a lull overnight, when calm winds and firebreaks helped contain the
blaze that demolished homes and roared through woods just miles from
the most-populated stretch of the state's tourist beaches.
(AP, 4/24/09)
2009 Jun 4, South Carolina’s
Supreme Court ordered Gov. Mark Sanford to request $700 million in
federal stimulus money, which was aimed primarily at struggling schools.
(SFC, 6/5/09, p.A6)
2009 Jun 24, South Carolina
Republican Gov. Mark Stanford confessed to having an affair with a
woman in Argentina and resigned as head of the Republican Governors
Association.
(SFC, 6/25/09, p.A6)
2009 Jul 2, In South Carolina 2
victims were found in their family's small furniture and appliance shop
near downtown Gaffney around closing time. Stephen Tyler (45) was
killed. His daughter, Abby Tyler (15) died from her wounds on July
4. A day earlier and about seven miles away, family members found
the bodies of Hazel Linder (83) and her 50-year-old daughter, Gena
Linder Parker, bound and shot in Linder's home. The killing spree began
June 27, about 10 miles from Tyler Home Center, where peach farmer
Kline Cash (63) was found shot in his living room.
(AP, 7/4/09)(SSFC, 7/5/09, p.A11)
2009 Jul 6, In North Carolina
suspected killer Patrick Burris (41), a career criminal paroled just
two months ago, was shot to death by officers investigating a burglary
complaint at a home in Gastonia, 30 miles from Gaffney, SC, where the
killing spree started June 27.
(AP, 7/7/09)
2009 Sep 9, President Barack
Obama, in a major speech before Congress, promised to overhaul the
nation's health care system. Not a single Republican has endorsed any
of the plans approved so far by four House and Senate committees. Rep.
Joe Wilson, R-S.C., heckled Obama with a shout of “You lie!” regarding
Obama’s assertion of no planned medical care to illegal immigrants.
Wilson soon apologized but refused to do so on the House floor.
(AP, 9/9/09)(SFC, 9/11/09, p.A18)
2009 Sep 25, In South Carolina a
medical helicopter, which had just dropped off a patient in Charleston,
crashed near Georgetown killing the pilot, a flight nurse and a
paramedic.
(SSFC, 9/27/09, p.A8)
2009 Oct 15, Two F-16 planes
collided around 8:30 p.m. about 40 miles off Folly Beach, near
Charleston, SC. One jet, piloted by Capt. Lee Bryant, landed safely at
Charleston Air Force Base. The missing plane was piloted by Capt.
Nicholas Giglio.
(AP, 10/16/09)
2009 Nov 4, In South Carolina
Rodell Vereen, caught on video having sex with a horse, was sentenced
to three years in prison after pleading guilty for the second time in
two years to abusing the creature.
(AP, 11/4/09)
2009 Dec 11, Jenny Sanford, South
Carolina's first lady, filed for divorce more than five months after
his tearful public confession of an affair with an Argentine woman. The
former Wall Street vice president helped launch her husband's political
career and has been a quiet presence since her husband took office in
2003.
(AP, 12/11/09)
2009 Dec 16, South Carolina
lawmakers voted to formally rebuke Gov. Mark Sanford, sparing him from
impeachment over secret trips to his Argentine mistress and his use of
state planes.
(SFC, 12/17/09, p.A12)
Go to http://www.timelinesdb.com
Subject = South Carolina
End of file.