South Carolina has 32,021 square miles, making it one of the smaller states (only 10 are smaller) in America.
But we pack a lot in those miles. As mentioned last week, the Palmetto State has 187 miles of shoreline that lures visitors from all over. We have a renowned zoo, good hiking and acres of state parks. You know about that stuff.
But hidden in the shadows of the Grand Strand and the Blue Ridge Mountains are a few less known destinations.
“What’s particularly fascinating in South Carolina are the undiscovered places, the off-the-beaten path attractions that intrigue and surprise the visitor,” said Duane Parrish, Director of the South Carolina Department of Parks, Recreation & Tourism. “Those can be found in almost every corner of South Carolina from the mountains to the sea. Places like downtown Newberry with its abundance of boutique shops and cafes, and the Artisans Center in Walterboro, an entire store of gifts and items handcrafted by South Carolinians. The opportunities are endless.”
Those are the ones we’re going to expose this summer — spots even South Carolina natives might not know about that could be fun to explore these coming weeks. Places that are good for day trips. There are historical sites, spots for nature enthusiasts, unusual (weird) attractions, locations where you can relax, and spooky places.
Let’s start with the spooky places.
Charleston is perhaps the South Carolina capital of ghosts and specters, but Columbia, Beaufort and other parts of the state have their share of spooky too. Charleston, Columbia, Beaufort and Greenville offer ghost tours; you’ll have no problem finding them with a simple “ghost tours” search with the city you want.
Some of the spooky places aren’t necessarily haunted. This is far from a complete list of the spooky, haunted and creepy in South Carolina. But these are a few places not on the usual vacation list that might be worth a trip. And remember, these aren’t historical accounts — they’re ghost stories:
Old Water Tower
(97 miles; 1 hour, 38 minutes.)
The Old Water Tower in Walterboro can be creepy because of its history, even with no indication of resident ghosts.
According to www.walterborosc.org, the 133-foot-tall tower was built around 1915. The tank section above the windows holds 100,000 gallons of water.
The spooky part? At the base of the tower are three jail cells. After it was no longer used as a jail, stranded travelers unable to pay for lodgings were allowed to stay there.
Old Water Tower, Memorial Avenue and Washington Street, Walterboro.
Isaac Hayne Tomb & House Site
(108 miles; 1 hour, 50 minutes.)
Isaac Hayne’s burial site near Jacksonboro isn’t creepy, but the story of Hayne’s death is. Hayne was a wealthy rice planter and a colonel during the American Revolution. Born in 1745, he is buried at Hayne Hall, his ancestral home.
When he was ordered to sign an oath of allegiance to the British and bear arms for the king, he joined revolutionary forces and was captured. He was hung in Charleston in 1781 by British soldiers for treason.
Isaac Hayne Tomb & House Site, Parkers Ferry Road off S.C. 64, Jacksonboro. discoversouthcarolina.com.
Old City Jail
(120 miles; 1 hour, 55 minutes.)
Constructed in 1802, this building served as the Charleston County jail until 1939 — and many prisoners died there.
According to www.charlestoncvb.com, the unsettled spirits of those people linger in the jail. There’s a young boy and runner for the wardens who was accidentally shot, a “demented warden” and 19th-century pirates, slaves, Civil War prisoners, and thieves.
The old Charleston Jail housing the American College of the Building Arts in Charleston, S.C., is seen on Oct. 16, 2013. The college, the nation’s only liberal arts college that awards degrees in traditional building skills, plans to move across town to renovated quarters in an old trolley barn, bringing the decade-old college’s classrooms, offices and workshops together on one site for the first time.
Its most infamous prisoners were Lavinia and John Fisher. According to legend, the Fishers were innkeepers who gave their guests oleander tea, robbed them and stashed their bodies in the cellar; Lavinia Fisher has been called America’s first female serial killer. In recent years, former homicide detective Bruce Orr wrote a book arguing that the Fishers didn’t actually kill anyone.
Old City Jail, 21 Magazine St., Charleston. The 45-minute tours are available nightly through Bulldog Tours, bulldogtours.com/the-haunted-jail-tour. $28, adults; $18, children 7-12. Not recommended for small children or, according to the tour website, “men who cry easily.”
Unitarian Church Cemetery
(119 miles; 2 hours.)
A young girl named Anna Ravenel fell in love with a soldier stationed at Fort Moultrie in 1827. The 14-year-old was dowered to an aristocratic young man, but that didn’t stop her from falling in love with 18-year-old Edgar Perry, who fell in love right back.
Anna’s father tried to separate them by locking Anna in the house and sending thugs to dissuade Edgar. But Anna and Edgar persevered, often meeting clandestinely in the local cemetery.
In December 1828, Edgar was transferred. Anna became very ill, and her sister got word to Edgar. Anna died before Edgar could get to her. He attempted to attend Anna’s funeral, but Anna’s father wouldn’t allow it.
Anna’s father remained determined to separate the young man from his daughter, even in death. He purchased six plots at the Unitarian Church Graveyard, the cemetery where Edgar and Anna secretly meet. He buried Anna in one grave and had the remaining five dug to a depth of three feet. All of the plots were unmarked so Edgar could never determine which was Anna’s grave.
Some say Anna Ravenel appears around her still-unmarked grave, searching for Edgar.
Plot twist: Service records show a man named Edgar A. Perry was at Fort Moultrie from November 1827 to December 1828. But “Edgar A. Perry” was a pseudonym.
His real name: Edgar Allan Poe.
Was Anna’s love the famous poet? Was Poe’s last complete poem, “Annabel Lee,”written for Anna Ravenel?
Unitarian Churchyard, between 161 and 163 King St., Charleston. Churchyard hours are 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Fridays through Sundays. Or, Tour Charleston offers a 90-minute nighttime Ghosts of Charleston tour ($25, adults; $23, students; $19, children 7-12); free, children younger than 7) that includes the graveyard. charlestonuu.org.
Alice Flagg’s home and grave
(The Hermitage: 146 miles; 3 hours, 9 minutes. All Saints Church: 139 miles; 2 hours, 49 minutes.)
In the mid-1800s, a teenage Alice went to live with her brother, a doctor, at his home, the Hermitage, near Murrells Inlet. She soon fell in love with a man of lesser social stature.
So Alice and her love met secretly, and she accepted a ring from him that she kept it hidden from her brother on a ribbon tied around her neck.
When her brother discovered she was still seeing the man, he sent her to live in Charleston. But she became ill, and he hurried to Charleston to bring her home.
On the way back to Murrells Inlet, the very ill Alice saw her brother snatch the ring and toss it into the marsh. She died soon after.
The cemetery at All Saints Church in Pawleys Island includes a tombstone marked “ALICE,” possibly the final resting place of one of the areas most popular ghosts.
A plain marker inscribed only with her first name is in the historic cemetery of All Saints Church in Pawleys Island. People have reported seeing Alice roaming the cemetery or the Hermitage and its grounds in search of her lost ring, wearing the white gown in which she was buried.
People leave gifts on her grave: they say Alice appreciates circular objects that resemble a ring. In fact, some say if you bring the right offering, Alice will appear.
The Hermitage, Oak Moss Court, Murrells Inlet; All Saints Church, 3560 Kings River Road, Pawleys Island. www.allsaintspawleys.org.
Agnes of Glasgow’s Haunted Grave
(34 miles; 38 minutes.)
Once again, love creates a story of a distraught ghost lingering about her grave. Agnes has been haunting the Quaker Cemetery in Camden for 225 years.
Agnes fell madly in love with her fiancé, Lt. Angus McPherson, in Scotland. When Angus came to America during the Revolution, Agnes stowed away on a ship and followed him.
She arrived in Charleston and heard that Angus was in Camden, but by the time she arrived he was gone, and Agnes had grown gravely ill. She died in 1780, without finding Angus. She was buried near the Quaker Cemetery, and some say her spirit still searches for him.
The gravesite of Camden legend Agnes Glasgow is one of the many sites to be seen on the Trace trail. (Christopher Aluka Berry041204)
While you’re near the Quaker Cemetery, you may also see headstones used as target practice before a duel in the 1800s; the grave of Abraham Lincoln’s brother-in-law, Dr. George Rogers Clark Todd, a Confederate doctor and brother of Mary Todd Lincoln; the grave of Josephine Brown, a female Confederate spy buried under the name Josephine Lovett Noel; and the tombstone of Richard Kirkland, “The Angel of Marye’s Heights,” a Confederate soldier who likely gave water to dying Union soldiers at the Battle of Fredericksburg.
Quaker Cemetery, 713 Meeting St., Camden. Open 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily. www.quakercemetery.com.
University of South Carolina
(University of South Carolina locations, less than a mile away, are a 7- to 12-minute walk from the S.C. State House.)
The Horseshoe — the site of the university’s original campus, which dates to 1805 — has a few ghost stories.
Some have seen the lights on overnight at South Caroliniana Library — when former University President James Rion McKissick, who is buried in front of the library, is said to be wandering the building and perusing the books.
Students have also reported feeling sudden cold spots, as well as seing doors opening and things inexplicably moving around.
In DeSaussure College, now a dorm, some have seen a female apparition with long, dark hair; she is said to be the daughter of Dr. Black. The daughter avenged her father’s murder by poisoning the group of soldiers who killed him. After accidentally drinking some of the tainted wine herself, her spirit and those of the soldiers now reside in the building.
DeSaussure College, formerly North Building, around 1910
About a mile away, Longstreet Theatre is also purported to be haunted. During the Civil War, the theater as used as a hospital, complete with a morgue. People have reported walking into a sudden cold spot, feeling an inexplicable sense of unease, witnessing the appearance of a spirit or hearing odd noises, such as doors slamming or floorboards creaking. The elevators in the building also tend to open of their own accord when no one is there to have summoned one.
South Caroliniana Library, 910 Sumter St.; library.sc.edu. DeSaussure College, on the Horseshoe; www.sc.edu. Longstreet Theatre, 1300 Greene St.; artsandsciences.sc.edu/thea.
Elmwood Cemetery
(2 miles; 8 minutes.)
Maybe it’s haunted, maybe it’s not. But the cemetery, founded in 1845 with more than 25,000 people buried in its 168.5 acres, is defintely spooky.
Among those buried are about 500 Confederate soldiers, prominent Southern families and a young bride who mysteriously died the night before her wedding.
Historic Columbia gives monthly guided tours of Elmwood Cemetery. The next is Thursday, June 14. These are historical tours, but you’re in the creepy cemetery. Secrets from the Grave Tours, at 7:30 p.m. study the symbols on many of the markers and headstones. Moonlight Cemetery Tours, 8 and 8:30 p.m., focus on the lives, burials, cemetery plots and tombstones of families and prominent Columbia residents in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Elmwood Cemetery, 501 Elmwood Ave. www.historiccolumbia.org.
About this series
This is the second in a series abuot road trips within South Carolina. Throughout the summer, GoColumbia will explore some of the state’s lesser-known attractions. Travel distances and times are calculated from the S.C. State House. Other road trips:
« Places every South Carolinian should visit at least once.
« 230 years of South Carolina history and where to see it.
Do you know of some “undiscovered” spots in South Carolina that could make for a fun day trip? Please share! Tweet any suggestions you have to @gocolumbiasc.
May 25, 2018 | State, The: Web Edition Articles (Columbia, SC)
Author/Byline: Lezlie Patterson, The State | Section: local_events