Ft Sumter

Just a few thoughts about Ft Sumter. First of all, it was a lot smaller than I expected. I had seen pictures of the original fort, and was thinking that it would certainly be damaged, but that at least a fair amount of the original three level fort would be there. Instead of 30-40 feet, it was little more than 10 feet tall in many places. The subsequent bombardment during the last two years of the war by Union forces effectively turned much of it to rubble. For those of you movie buffs, if you remember the movie "Glory" and the scene where they stormed the fort and Matthew Broderick was killed, that was on Morris Island. Just a short distance across the water from where we stood today. They couldn't dislodge the Confederate forces by frontal assault, so they laid siege to the battery and it fell a couple of months later. This was the beginning of the end for Sumter. It held out for over 500 days, but eventually fell and opened up Charleston to Union forces late in the war. It was said on our tour today that General Sherman presented Charleston to President Lincoln as a Christmas present that December of 1864.

More on Sumter tomorrow. Had something interesting happen today. I tried to visit the Confederate Museum in downtown Charleston. It is closed on Mondays, so couldn't go yesterday. Tried to swing by after the Sumter visit, but they were closed today for Confederate Memorial Day. I must admit, I was not prepared for this turn of events. Hailing from Maryland, this is not a holiday I am familiar with. ( although apparently in MD it is celebrated in June). Yes, in much of the South it is a state holiday, although the dates differ. North and South Carolina apparently uses May 10th as the commemoration as it coincides with death of Stonewall Jackson in 1863, and the capture of Jefferson Davis in 1865. At least, that is what I read. It is to honor the war dead from the conflict. In a future blog, I will talk about the various names for the war. Down here, it is not called the Civil War.

Charleston is a beautiful city, and is loaded with both Revolutionary and " Civil War" history, but it is interesting hearing more about living with the war as a civilian. Another major difference from back home is the extent to which slavery weaves through the story of South Carolina. We went to a museum on slavery today, and it was pretty powerful. More on that later, but I was always taught about the cotton plantations, and never really heard about rice plantations. In Carolina, rice was what made the money. I first got an understanding of this culture by reading a book a couple of years ago by Edward Ball. The Ball family goes back to the origins of South Carolina, and he explores his families' relationship with the slave trade, as well as how the Ball's and their slaves had children together that he traced descendants of. Not a story everyone was willing to speak openly about. I found it fascinating, and to now be here on the Ashley and Cooper rivers where these plantations existed is quite interesting.

Approaching Ft. Sumter by boat.

Ruins of the powder magazine and officer's quarters.