Stepping Back to Ninety Six

Interstate #20 due east to South Carolina carried truck traffic, lots of it. We counted six piggybacks ahead of us at one point without a single car between them.
Wet snow on the roadside deepened the farther east we drove in Georgia. It had only been a thin coating in Atlanta, but the roads were clear there. By Rutledge, about 50 miles from the city, a puffy white blanket covered the land, white cotton clumps rested precariously on all the yellow pine boughs and even hardwood branches were outlined sticks of white against the blue sky.
"It's not going to last long," said Andy, "not with such a brilliant sun reflecting down, and the road is excellent."
Warren County was completely dry, not a speck of white anywhere, but we caught up with last night's storm clouds.

"I guess it pooped out when it blew this far east," I said.

"Yes, and it's not going to affect New England, because it's headed out to sea. This one swings south into Florida instead of up the coast," answered Andy.

In South Carolina we passed two large nurseries. Row after row of pots stood on sheets of black plastic.

"Do you think they did that to reflect heat?" I asked Andy.

"Maybe, but it's probably so the plants don't send roots out into the ground," he said.

The fields of black plastic covered acres with all kinds of potted varieties. Then we saw fields of ornamental trees and fruit trees encased in plastic tubes. One acre of grape arbors, strung overhead with lines of white gourds, rattled in the breeze, an obvious attempt to scare birds away from fruit crops.
The comfortable little town of Edgefield advertised turkeys with four-foot high statues in rainbow colors all around the business district.

No one really knows how Ninety Six got its name, but for nearly three hours we learned about the extinct colonial village and Revolutionary War battle site, now a National Historic Site, in northwest South Carolina. A private showing of the video with reenactments of historical events helped us understand the significance of Ninety Six as the first battle of the Revolutionary War fought in the South. About 96 miles south of the Cherokee Indian town of Keowee, Ninety Six grew at a crossroads of commercial arteries. Traders packed firearms, blankets, beads and wares along the Cherokee Path and Indians swapped furs by 1700. We followed the half-mile Cherokee Path on our return to the Visitor Center.

In 1751 Robert Gouedy opened a trading post, establishing Ninety Six as a community and a hub of back country Indian trade. Only one stake marks the site, but we walked the two-mile Gouedy Trail loop. Gouedy grew grain and tobacco; raised cattle; sold cloth, shoes, beads, gunpowder, tools and rum; and served as a banker with 500 people in his debt at the time of his death in 1775. He also amassed more than 1,500 acres. Locals built a Stockade around his barn for protection in the 1750's and called it Fort Ninety-Six. It saved their lives when the Cherokees attacked twice in 1760.

A one-mile walking tour in pleasant 46-degree weather led us past the old town site, around and through the Star Fort and into the Stockade Fort. Sentiment had divided settlers here on the eve of the American Revolution. Many had benefited from British incentives and protection. These Loyalists, 1,900 colonists sympathetic to the Crown, clashed with 600 Patriots under Major Andrew Williamson for two days in November of 1775.

Our path paralleled Island Ford Road, an old colonial highway cut by foot traffic and used by the early Patriot militia, and led to siege trenches and the British Star Fort.
A savage war of factions broke out here in 1775, that lasted until 1781. British Lieutenant Colonel John Cruger used Loyalist soldiers and slaves from nearby farms to reinforce the town's stockade and build Star Fort, 10-12 foot earthen walls with three additional feet of sand bags, in the shape of a star so it could be easily defended from any direction.

Outside the fort, we followed the Patriot siege trenches, the engineering operations designed by Colonel Thaddeus Kosciuszko to lay siege for his superior, General Nathaniel Greene.

Trench diggers called sappers zigzagged their way 200 yards closer and closer to the fort, and a tunneling crew worked its way nearer underground to plant explosives. Sharp shooters aimed inside the fort from a 30-foot tower of logs, but Greene failed to breach the walls because he learned that a relief column of 2,000 British regulars marched to Cruger's aid and could trap him in the crossfire if he didn't retreat from the area.
Even though Greene failed to take the Star Fort by siege, the Loyalists burned the village and left the back country to reinforce Charleston.

Inside the Star Fort the protective traverse and 25-foot deep attempt at a well are still visible. Our path followed the British communication trench back to the stockade-protected town of Ninety Six.

What an amazing story of persistence and ingenuity, all history I had never read or at least didn't remember.
"What's even more amazing is learning that this was the first battle of the American Revolution in the South," said Andy, "and the first South Carolinian to die for Independence died here."

Neither of us had ever heard of Ninety Six.

South Carolina pays tribute to her native sons who have made history, as evidenced by the statues and monuments in the gardens at the State Capitol. Arriving in Columbia late afternoon, we parked Little Red downtown and walked the grounds, enjoying the setting sun, the sedate atmosphere and the natural beauty of the Palmetto State. Sherman may have punished South Carolina with his 60-mile-wide swath of destruction after the Civil War because they were first to secede, but the Americans of South Carolina recovered with class. The sign on the Capitol building reads, "Construction of this state house was begun in 1855 and continued uninterruptedly to February 17, 1865, when Sherman burned Columbia. Work was resumed in 1867 and carried on irregularly to 1900." A monument to Black Americans with bronze panels and an imitation iron slave ship honors their contributions to society and recognizes their humanity.