Historical Society tours Walled City
By Warner M. Montgomery
Warner@TheColumbiaStar.com

Dr. Walter Edgar, president of the SC Historical Society, and Dr. Barbara L. Bellow, keynote speaker at the SC Historical Society Annual Meeting.

The S.C. Historical Society held its 152nd Annual Meeting in Charleston Jan. 27. Dr. Walter Edgar presided over the meeting at the Carolina Yacht Club.

Dr. Barbara L. Bellows, author of A Talent for Living: Josephine Pinckney and the Charleston Literary Tradition (LSU Press, 2006), gave the keynote address. Dr. Bellows, who holds a Ph.D. in history from USC, was formerly a professor at Middlebury College in Vermont. She presently divides her time between her hometown of Charleston and New York. She is also the author of Benevolence among Slaveholders: Caring for the Poor in Charleston, 1760- 1860 , and co- author of God and General Longstreet: Essays on the Lost Cause and the Southern Mind.

Bellows presented Josephine Pinckney (1895- 1957) as a key figure in the Charleston Renaissance whose work has been compared to that of Jane Austen, Edith Wharton, and Isak Dinesen. Pinckney lived and wrote in Charleston, first writing poetry then, when her "poetry ran dry," she turned to history saying, "History is like a river." Her essays of the 1930s lamented over how industrialism was sweeping away the old society and bringing in new social ills.

According to Bellows, Pinckney's best novels were Hilton Head (1941) , the story of Henry Woodward; Three O'Clock Dinner (1945) , which was made into a movie with Lana Turner, and Splendid in Ashes (1958), which she wrote on her death bed.

Following the meeting, the society toured five historic homes inside the old Walled City of Charleston:

+ Hoffman House (103 Church St.), was at the center of the early Walled City of Charleston. Sold by Joel Poinsett to George Huffman who built Flemish- bond bricking home in 1816. The house was renovated last in the 1990s as art gallery.

+ Thomas Rose House (59 Church St.), a land grant by Lords Proprietors to Elizabeth Willis in 1680. House constructed c. 1735. Restored in 1929 by Albert Simons.

+ James Veree House (58 Church St.), acquired by James Veree, a Huguenot carpenter in 1754 who built the house in 1759. Site of Mrs. Whaley's famous garden, which is still maintained by Mrs. Whaley's daughter.

+ Swain- Hussey House (10 Water St.), constructed c. 1800 by George Hussey, a mariner. Piazzas were added in 20th century. It was flooded by Hurricane Hugo.

+ James Chapman House (3 Water St.), constructed in Italian Villa style c. 1857. Land was reclaimed by filling in Vanderhorst Creek.

Information on the S.C. Historical Society is available at The Fireproof Building, 100 Meeting Street, Charleston, S.C., 29401, (843)723-3225, or www.southcarolinahistoricalsociety.org/.