Shem Creek Park with boardwalks over typical Low Country marsh grasses
warship Housatonic on February 17, 1864. Researchers suggest the force of the subsequent blast most likely killed or incapacitated the crew, or they simply ran out of air, thus ending the historic voyage. The vessel was found in 1995 about four miles offshore of Sullivan’s Island and was raised five years later. “The sub was completely filled with sand and silt.” says Kellen Butler, Executive Director of Friends of The Hunley . “The crew was still at their stations, very close together. There obviously wasn’t a lot of wiggle room in there,” she adds of the sub’s cramped four- foot by three-foot height and width. The museum housing the vessel has the crew members’ facial reconstructions and a display case with commanding officer Lt. George Dixon’s good luck charm: a bent gold piece he carried that was struck by a bullet, saving his life at the 1862 Battle of Shiloh. Daily tours for Fort Sumter depart daily by boat from the Fort Sumter Visitor Center along the city’s eastern shoreline. A national monument, the fort still stands on a small island at the mouth of Charleston Harbor. Its ramparts were in ruins after the Civil War but were rebuilt and remain today along a grassy interior with some original era cannons. Tours last about two hours and include boat rides there and back and about an hour on the island with a brief ranger talk. At night, ghost tours might scare you but are nonetheless very entertaining. During my first stay in Charleston in 2007, I felt a ghostly encounter at the upscale Mills House Hotel, one of the few antebellum hotels that remain in the city. It’s where Confederate
Gen. Robert E. Lee stayed and, from the balcony, watched the Great Fire of 1861 consume the city.
Beyond Charleston, Charles Towne Landing State Historic Site is where the first English colonists arrived along the shores of the Ashley River in 1670. It’s a park with history exhibits, hiking trails, gardens, and a replica 17th-century trading ship. Across the wide-spanned Arthur Ravenel Jr. Bridge, boardwalks line the Shem Creek waterfront with its hopping restaurant scene. Wooden walkways crisscross typical Low Country marsh grass-filled wetlands at Shem Creek Park, often bathed in a golden glow at sunset. My takeaway from Charleston—other than its friendly residents, great cuisine and very prominent Southern charm—is its history and architecture. “We have the second strictest preservation laws in the world, second only to Rome, Italy,” I recall Ford telling me. “When you think of giant ancient Rome compared to itty-bitty and relatively modern Charleston, it’s a source of great pride for us.”
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