South Carolina

by Edgar, Walter B.

• ISBN13: 9781570032554
• ISBN10: 1570032556
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1998-09-01
• Publisher: Univ of South Carolina Pr

Summary

In the first comprehensive history of South Carolina published in nearly fifty years, Walter Edgar presents a sweeping chronicle of a state with an illustrious, sometimes infamous, past. He describes in very human terms 475 years of recorded history in the Palmetto State, including the experiences of all South Carolinians -- those with roots in Africa and in Europe as well as Native Americans; male and female; rich and poor. In an eminently readable presentation, Edgar uses letters, diaries, and other writings to let voices from the past take part in telling the state's fascinating story. Recounting the period from the first Spanish exploration to the end of the Civil War, Edgar charts South Carolina's rising national and international prominence and its parallel economic ascendancy. He dispels myths about the state's early history -- including the notion that the colony was inhabited by a homogeneous white population -- and tells how South Carolina developed an agricultural economy that relied heavily on African American slave labor. Edgar examines, among other topics, the impact of the American Revolution, Charleston's significance as a metropolis and major seaport, and the state's leadership in the secession movement. With changes wrought by the Civil War, South Carolina slipped from national prominence into a period marked by economic, social, civil, and political strife. Edgar details the everyday life of blacks and whites during Reconstruction, the state's mixed efforts to join the "New South", and Benjamin Ryan Tillman's rise to power. He also chronicles South Carolina's changing politics in the once-solid South, the state's reawakening after World War II, the casualties andvictories of an extended civil rights struggle, and the Palmetto State's present economic, educational, and political challenges.

Table of Contents

List of Maps	ix	(2)
List of Illustrations	xi	(6)
List of Tables	xvii	(2)
Preface	xix	(2)
Acknowledgments	xxi
Chapter One The Land Called Chicora	1	(20)
Chapter Two Spanish South Carolina	21	(14)
Chapter Three The Colony of a Colony	35	(12)
Chapter Four Peopling the Province	47	(16)
Chapter Five More Like a Negro Country	63	(19)
Chapter Six The Proprietary Regime	82	(27)
Chapter Seven Trying Royal Government	109	(22)
Chapter Eight The Riches of the Province	131	(24)
Chapter Nine Everyday Life in Colonial South Carolina	155	(49)
Chapter Ten Threats: Foreign and Domestic	204	(22)
Chapter Eleven The American Revolution	226	(19)
Chapter Twelve Quest for Order	245	(20)
Chapter Thirteen To Raise Something for Sale	265	(23)
Chapter Fourteen A Visit to Antebellum South Carolina	288	(36)
Chapter Fifteen Calculating the Value of the Union	324	(30)
Chapter Sixteen The Civil War: Part I, 1860-1865	354	(23)
Chapter Seventeen The Civil War: Part II, 1865-1877	377	(30)
Chapter Eighteen Return of the Old Order	407	(23)
Chapter Nineteen Tillman	430	(23)
Chapter Twenty South Carolina and the First New South	453	(30)
Chapter Twenty-One The Draining Years	483	(29)
Chapter Twenty-Two All in One Lifetime	512	(41)
Chapter Twenty-Three Adjusting to New Circumstances	553	(34)
Notes	587	(94)
Selected Bibliography	681	(8)
Index	689