Lowcountry Confederates
Page 4
Not surprisingly, the Wachesaw Riflemen elected the eldest brother, Joshua Ward, who owned Brookgreen and Springfield Plantations, as their captain. They elected his younger brother, Mayham Ward, as their First Lieutenant. The youngest brother, Benjamin Huger Ward, even returned from his studies in Edinburgh, Scotland, to accept the post of Second Lieutenant for the group.
Passage of the Ordinance of Secession in December 1860 stimulated further growth of such military units. Georgetown rice mill engineer Thomas Daggett helped organize and fund a company called the Waccamaw Light Artillery. Its members promptly elected him captain.
When actual hostilities began in April 1861 with the firing on Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, local militia companies began reorganizing for state service. Captain Ward’s Wachesaw Riflemen became a part of Captain Daggett’s Waccamaw Light Artillery. When Captain Daggett took on the important job of Ordnance Officer for South Carolina’s whole northern coastal district, Joshua Ward took over command of the Waccamaw Light Artillery.
As Ordnance Officer, Captain Daggett, drawing on his engineering skills, immediately set to work organizing coastal defenses from Georgetown, on Winyah Bay, sixty miles up the coast to Little River, on the North Carolina line.
With the help of gentlemen from the Hot and Hot Fish Club and their workers, he first fortified a bluff on what had been Plowden Weston’s Laurel Hill Plantation, recently acquired by wealthy North Carolinian Colonel Daniel Jordan. This fortification held two cannon and overlooked a strategic bend in the Waccamaw River. It was designed to prevent Yankee gunboats from steaming upriver and destroying rice plantations. It also protected the shipping route of boats carrying precious loads of rice downriver. To the Confederacy, rice represented both vital food supplies and a source of desperately needed hard cash when sold on the international market.
Early in the War, soldiers from the Waccamaw Light Artillery, like my father’s father, Zack Dusenberry, who served as Sergeant Major of the unit, manned this fortification. They must have had plenty of free time, perhaps days of boredom waiting for something to happen. I say this because a letter my grandfather sent home in February 1862 from Camp Weston, as they called their location, contained a long poem he had written for his young daughter. It included this touching verse:
It’s for the love I have for you
And all the boys and mama too,
That I am here with sword in hand
To fight and free our native land.
After completing the fortification at Laurel Hill, Captain Daggett designed and supervised the building of Fort Randall at Little River and Fort Ward at Murrells Inlet, both intended to protect their small but important harbors. He then drew on his connections with local planters to stock these forts with cannon, shot, gunpowder, rifles, and ammunition. Fort Randall, Fort Ward, and later, Battery White each boasted several artillery pieces and a small garrison of Waccamaw Light Artillery soldiers.
Captain Joshua Ward, and later his younger brother, Captain Mayham Ward, commanded the Waccamaw Light Artillery throughout the rest of the War. They patrolled the entire sixty miles of coast from Georgetown up to Little River, but concentrated their efforts mainly around their fortified positions.
My Grandpapa Zack’s section of the Waccamaw Light Artillery called themselves Ward’s Rangers and usually operated out of Fort Ward, here at Murrells Inlet. Their main job involved protecting blockade-running vessels tied up at the docks and the saltworks operating along the shore from ground invasion. The threat of their cannon also kept most Union gunboats outside the mouth of the inlet, too far away for the shells they periodically lobbed in to hit any targets accurately.
Only about twenty five men and officers made up Wards Rangers. Still, they managed to capture several parties of Yankee invaders, sometimes under rather strange circumstances. I’ll have to tell you about that one day.
As the war continued and Confederate casualties mounted, demands to replenish diminished forces in other areas drew the younger, more fit men away from the Waccamaw Light Artillery. Soon, only older men like my forty-four-year old grandfather or others limited in their fighting abilities for one reason or another remained.
Some general even decided that Charleston, or somewhere else, needed artillery pieces more than we did and ordered most of ours moved to other locations. Our desperate but clever soldiers then painted pine logs black and set them pointing out of their defenseless forts in place of the missing cannon. This fooled the Yankees for the longest time.
Near the end of the War, Joshua Ward resigned his position as captain and moved to England for the remainder of the conflict. His brother, Mayham Ward, then took command of the unit.
About that same time, the few remaining men of the Waccamaw Light Artillery were ordered inland to guard Yankee prisoners at Florence. Able-bodied men had become so scarce in the Confederacy by that time that my Grandpapa Zack took his fourteen-year-old son with him to Florence to help with the guarding duties.
The Waccamaw Light Artillery finished the War fighting in scattered skirmishes away from the coast. Nobody kept much track of what happened during that confused time, so I can’t tell you a lot about their final days.
After the War, all three Ward brothers returned to their plantations, operating them as best they could under the economic and social realities of Reconstruction. My Grandpapa Zack also returned to his home on the Waccamaw Neck. He went on to live a long and productive life, but that’s another story.
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Would you like to read more Lowcountry stories?
Look for Lynn Michelsohn’s other short collections:
Lowcountry Ghosts
Crab Boy’s Ghost
Gullah Ghosts
and her longer collection, which includes all three of the shorter collections,
Tales from Brookgreen:
Folklore, Ghost Stories, and Gullah
Folktales in the South Carolina Lowcountry
Now, also available, Lowcountry Hurricanes,
the first book in her new series,
More Tales from Brookgreen.
Do you have comments, corrections, or questions for the author?
Contact her at: 2LynnMichelsohn@gmail.com
About the Storytellers:
The Hostesses of Brookgreen Gardens
One of my greatest treats as a child was to spend the day with Cousin Corrie at Brookgreen Gardens in Murrells Inlet, South Carolina. Here in the warm Carolina Lowcountry, Twentieth Century philanthropists Archer and Anna Hyatt Huntington had created America’s first public sculpture garden among the ancient, moss-draped live oak trees of four historic rice plantations: Brookgreen, Springfield, Laurel Hill, and The Oaks.
Back in those simpler days of the 1950s, visitors to Brookgreen Gardens turned off the narrow pavement of coastal Highway 17—the King’s Highway, of Colonial times—onto two parallel strips of gray-white concrete, spaced just far enough apart to support the wheels of a car.
Visitors drove slowly along those concrete ribbons through the fragrant pines of the wooded deer park and past an island built up in the black-water swamps to display a larger-than-life white marble sculpture, Youth Taming the Wild, to a sandy parking lot near the Diana Pool, with its snowy white blossoms floating among thick green lily pads. There, they left their cars in as shady a spot as possible and entered the Gardens on foot, with no admission fee or gatekeeper.
After a leisurely stroll through the majestic Live Oak Allee, with perhaps a detour into the sunny Palmetto Garden, alive with darting blue-tailed skinks, a peek inside the Old Kit
chen, and a dip of the fingers into the cool water of the Alligator Bender Pool, visitors arrived at the low, wide porch of a simple gray-brick building. This structure had housed the overseer and his family when Brookgreen operated as a busy rice plantation. Now it served as the Museum and the entranceway to two open-air galleries for small sculpture.
Inside the Museum, tinkling sounds of splashing water from the Frog Baby Fountain, in the first gallery, created a feeling of sanctuary from the summer heat that often grew oppressive by mid-morning in the Lowcountry.
This Museum served as the Visitors’ Center of its day. Here, two smiling and lavender-scented “sixty-ish” Southern ladies in sturdy shoes welcomed visitors. These two Hostesses represented the only staff in evidence throughout the Gardens, other than the occasional groundskeeper trimming ivy.
In the cool dim interior of the Museum, Miss Genevieve and Cousin Corrie sold postcards, gave directions, and told stories to visitors interested enough to ask questions about the Gardens.
Boxy glass display cases formed a counter along the front wall of the Museum. Mostly, these cases held stacks of picture postcards. Black-and-white cards sold for five cents, sepia cards for ten cents, and colored cards for twenty-five cents each. Books and pamphlets about the Gardens were also available. Intermixed with this literature stood other objects, not for sale, that stimulated frequent questions and often led to Miss Genevieve and Cousin Corrie’s stories.
Cousin Corrie, my first cousin one generation removed, was born Cornelia Sarvis Dusenbury in 1888, as her home state of South Carolina emerged from the chaos of Reconstruction. She spent much of her childhood at Murrells Inlet, a fishing village on the South Carolina coast, and then worked for many years as a schoolteacher and librarian in the larger town of Florence.
In retirement, Cousin Corrie returned to Murrells Inlet where she joined writer, artist, and local historian Genevieve Wilcox Chandler to become a Hostess at Brookgreen Gardens.
Miss Genevieve was just a bit younger than Cousin Corrie. As a youngster, she had come to Murrells Inlet with her family from Marion, South Carolina, but stayed, married, and raised five children here. She often supported them by writing articles on local subjects after the early death of her husband. When the Huntingtons created Brookgreen Gardens, they asked Miss Genevieve to become its Hostess.
During my visits to Brookgreen Gardens, Cousin Corrie and Miss Genevieve—as I called her, using the traditional Southern form of address for a grown-up family friend—let me help them with their hostess duties, much to my delight. I also enjoyed playing hide-and-seek among the sun-dappled sculptures and looking for painted river turtles sleeping on logs that floated in the old ricefield swamps. I loved darting from the shelter of one live oak canopy to the next as gentle summer showers brought forth earthy aromas from the garden undergrowth.
I especially thrilled at wading in cool out-of-the-way sculpture pools when no one was looking. But my very favorite treat was listening to Miss Genevieve and Cousin Corrie tell stories of Brookgreen and the Carolina Lowcountry to spellbound Garden visitors, me included.
Each Hostess had her own distinct repertoire. One never encroached on the other’s territory. “Now you will have to ask Mrs. Chandler about that,” or “Miss Dusenbury can tell you that story,” were common responses to visitors’ queries. If one or the other of the ladies were absent that day, then the unlucky visitor left without hearing her special tales.
Miss Genevieve tended to cover historical figures and folktales. She had collected local stories for “Mr. Roosevelt” as a writer for the 1930s WPA government employment program and had an ear for lowcountry dialects.
Cousin Corrie focused on hurricanes, family tales, and accounts of Confederate and Yankee conflicts along the Carolina coast. Her stories related more to her own personal experiences. Of course, each cherished her own unique collection of ghost stories.
I heard some of these narratives repeated to countless visitors. The tale of the haunted Wachesaw beads became a favorite. Other stories, I only heard once or twice and remember only in snippets, although I have often been able to fill in gaps from other sources. All these stories excited my interest in the historical figures and everyday people who came here before us to the broad ricefields and wooded uplands that became Brookgreen Gardens.
These are the stories Miss Genevieve and Cousin Corrie told, as best I remember them. In my mind, these tales weave themselves together with swaying Spanish moss, sparkling splashing fountains, and the gray-brick latticework walls winding through Brookgreen Gardens. They create visions of the timeless spirit forever living in the heart of the Carolina Lowcountry.
About the Author
Charles Town blacksmith William Green purchased his first land near that new Carolina settlement in 1695. His descendents have continued to live and thrive in the Carolina Lowcountry for more than three hundred years.
Lynn Michelsohn, one of William Green’s ninth-generation granddaughters, was born not too far away in Durham, North Carolina. She grew up steeped in Lowcountry stories, as well as in the black mud of its tidal marshes. Her heart remains among the moss-draped live oaks lining the saltwater creeks of South Carolina’s Waccamaw Neck. Now, she and her husband have two sons who love the Lowcountry almost as much as she does.
In these tales, this native Carolinian retells stories she heard from two early hostesses at Brookgreen Gardens: Mrs. Genevieve Wilcox Chandler and the author’s cousin, Miss Corrie Dusenbury. Through these stories, she conveys her sense of romance, history, and mystery hidden just beneath serenely beautiful surfaces at Brookgreen Gardens, one of South Carolina’s most popular tourist attractions.
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The author welcomes your comments and questions. If you would like to contact her, or receive notification of her new books or special sales, please email her at:
2LynnMichelsohn@gmail.com
The author as she was …
and remains always
… in her heart.
Acknowledgements
The youthful delight that my elder son Moses expressed at hearing these stories reminded me of my own enthusiasm for them. My younger son Aaron, ever the editor, guided me in writing them down. Suggestions from members of the Melody Lane Writers Guild improved the manuscript. Alice Duncan typed and retyped it. Robin Angel proofread the final draft with great care.
My husband Larry supported this, as he does all my writing. My parents gave me their love and support always. Honey’s Horry County heritage and Daddy’s interest in “local color” shaped my love of the Carolina Lowcountry.
Genevieve Chandler Peterkin encouraged me to recall these stories from my early visits to Brookgreen. She was also kind enough to show me her mother’s mysterious Wachesaw beads, as well as the Old Methodist Parsonage, and to arrange a family tour of Alice’s home in its new location, all of which figure in stories of the Tales from Brookgreen series.
The kind hospitality of Mary Emily and Nelson Jackson II repeatedly brought me back to South Carolina. Their daughter Kaki Williamson shared her own recollections of our Cousin Corrie with me.
Helen Benso, Vice President of Marketing at Brookgreen Gardens, assisted with this project in several ways, including obtaining permission to use materials, correcting factual errors, and providing encouragement.
Most importantly, Cousin Corrie and Miss Genevieve told the tales recorded on these pages. I thank them for sharing their wonderful stories from Brookgreen with all of us who love the Carolina Lowcountry.
A Selection from Gullah Ghosts …
Stories from Lynn Michelsohn’s first series …
Tales from Brookgreen:
Folklore, Ghost Stories, and Gullah
Folktales in the South Carolina Lowcountry
Cousin Corrie, one of the Hostesses at Brookgreen Gardens in the middle of the Twentieth Century, occasionally recounted stories that old “Dr. Wardie,” beloved physician of Brookgreen Plantation had told her many years previously. This was a st
ory Dr. Wardie had heard from his aunt, “Miss Bessie.” He, Cousin Corrie, and Miss Bessie all enjoyed the story because it revealed that high and mighty rice planters of olden times didn’t always have everything their own way.
Although the rice harvest was bountiful that year in the mid-1800s on Brookgreen Plantation, the Overseer was troubled. The yield in rice didn’t seem to be as large as he had expected. The Overseer thought and thought about this and finally became convinced that someone was stealing rice from the barn where they stored it after threshing.
But who could be taking the rice, and how? No one could steal rice during the day with so many people about, yet how could anyone get into the rice barn at night? It was locked carefully each evening and there were no signs of breakin.
Suddenly the Overseer realized who locked the barn each evening! Devine, the head slave on the plantation, held the keys. Old stories began to recall themselves to the Overseer, stories about Devine stealing rice and selling it to buy liquor (and of how Devine had gotten caught but I won’t go into that right now).
“So!” mused the Overseer to himself, “Devine is sneaking into the barn at night and stealing rice again! And he is probably bringing other slaves with him because a lot of rice seemed to be missing. Now how can I catch Devine and his accomplices in their act of thievery?”
The Overseer thought, and thought some more, and finally devised a plan. He would hide in the rice barn at night and surprise Devine when he and the others came in to steal rice. And he would put his plan into effect that very evening!
After the day’s work was completed, the workers all went home to the Street, as the community of slave cabins was called. The Overseer also went home to his cottage near the Street but after dark, he crept back to the rice barn, which was located where the Dogwood Garden stands today at Brookgreen Gardens, just behind us here in the Museum.
The Overseer looked around stealthily but all was still. He unlocked the door, slipped into the barn, and carefully relocked the door from the inside.