Category: Historical Research

By Marquise Drayton, Community Engagement Assistant

This post is re-published from the February 2024 newsletter.

Last month’s edition of the newsletter featured a story that discussed enslaved people at Fort Hill Plantation and their lives with the Calhouns. This month, we will discuss the continuation of African American labor through sharecropping, tenant farming, and domestic workers. Following the Civil War, the formerly enslaved had newfound freedoms as they were no longer considered property. From once-prohibited education provided to Black children to voting rights given to Black men, these newly earned rights came after the divided country fought over “the peculiar institution” of chattel slavery. However, attaining citizenship, freedom, and “40 acres and a mule” was difficult for many formerly enslaved people. Conceptually, it was different to go from being considered commerce as 3/5th a person to becoming a whole person under the court of law. In various instances, the formerly enslaved returned to the plantations where they had labored for a new form of slavery by a different name: sharecropping.¹

The war left the South in financial disarray during the Reconstruction Era as former plantation owners tried to replace the institution of slavery with something similar. The sharecropping system was a 360-deal debtor loophole that the lender (typically, the previous enslavers) kept the borrower (the formerly enslaved) in through credit and repayment of agriculture.² Thomas Green Clemson, a Confederate soldier pardoned by US President Andrew Johnson,³ went into a sharecropping agreement with some former enslaved people of Fort Hill Plantation in 1868.⁴ It included living quarters for the sharecroppers’ families, farming tools, animals for farm labor, access to firewood, rationed bread, and seed from the previous season’s harvest.⁵ However, like the debt owed for previous crops, the profit made by the borrower was heavily in favor of the lender. Duff Green Calhoun, a Confederate veteran and Andrew Pickens Calhoun’s son, used 2 printed contracts provided by the Freedman’s Bureau for freedmen and women that kept them bound to the land they once worked for free, starting in 1866.⁶ Clemson wrote out four contracts for the formerly enslaved, beginning in 1867.⁷ The January 1871-January 1872 contract included many women who agreed to work for Clemson as sharecroppers.⁸

One thing to point out is the lack of transparency of these sharecropping contracts with the indication of illiteracy in marking an “X” between their first and last names.⁹ The contracts were read to them before they signed. But they would not be able to remember all the details. Clemson’s agent’s record book was used if any disputes arose about work/pay, making it even more difficult to ensure they were treated fairly. Understanding how the freedmen and women were not allowed to read during enslavement, there would be no fair way for them to understand what they signed up for.

The work agreements outlined by Thomas Green Clemson not only kept the formerly enslaved in a cycle of debt but checked for behavior while at work that was viewed as rebellious. These rules included “not keeping fire arms or deadly weapons” and “not inviting visitors nor leaving the premises during work hours without written consent.”¹⁰ In instances of theft at Fort Hill, the assumption of “guilty until proven innocent” ruled for those found with stolen goods.¹¹

Manual labor was not limited in the fields either. Domestic work occurred at Fort Hill, from cooking food to rendering childcare.¹² It was more common for women to work in the household—many of whom were formerly enslaved people.¹³

For decades, both free and enslaved Black laborers worked the land in which we see today. As the college was established in 1889, convicted laborers followed from 1890 to 1915, helping to build everything, including four buildings for Clemson College that are still standing. What followed them were wage workers in the early 20th century and their families. Enslaved persons and other laborers who work on the land may be buried in the cemetery.

During Black History Month 2024, we ask that you consider the intergenerational nature of the project with how African Americans have impacted the land grant institution from the antebellum era to contemporary times.

Citations

1) Tetreau, Jared. 2023. “Sharecropping: Slavery Rerouted.” PBS.Org. WGBH Educational Foundation. August 16, 2023. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/harvest-sharecropping-slavery-rerouted/.
2) Ibid.
3) Caroline M. Ross on behalf of Fort Hill. “Fort Hill-Parlor.” Clio: Your Guide to History. July 30, 2020. https://theclio.com/entry/104472.
4) “Articles of agreement between Thomas G. Clemson and freedmen and women, 1868 January 1” (1868). Thomas Green Clemson Papers, Mss 2. 1134.
https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/tgc/1134.
5) Ibid.
6) “The Reconstruction Era” in History of the African American Burial Ground. Woodland Cemetery Historic Preservation. https://www.clemson.edu/about/history/woodland-cemetery/histories/burial-ground.html.
7) Ibid.
8) “Articles of agreement between Thomas G. Clemson and freedmen and women, 1871 January 1” (1871). Thomas Green Clemson Papers, Mss 2. 1159.
https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/tgc/1159.
9) “Articles of agreement between Thomas G. Clemson and freedmen and women, 1867” (1867). Thomas Green Clemson Papers, Mss 2. 1133.
https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/tgc/1133.
10) “Articles of agreement between Thomas G. Clemson and freedmen and women, 1867” (1867). Thomas Green Clemson Papers, Mss 2. 1133.
https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/tgc/1133.
11) “Articles of agreement between Thomas G. Clemson and freedmen and women, 1871 January 1” (1871). Thomas Green Clemson Papers, Mss 2. 1159.
https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/tgc/1159.
12) Cassettes 1 & 2 (Viola Williams), Mss 282, Black Heritage in the Upper Piedmont of South Carolina Project Collection, Special Collections, Clemson University Libraries, Clemson, SC.
13) Cassette 1 (Lucille Vance/Yolanda Harrell), Mss 282, Black Heritage in the Upper Piedmont of South Carolina Project Collection, Special Collections, Clemson University Libraries, Clemson, SC.

By Dr. Mandi Barnard, Research Historian for the Cemetery Project

This post is re-published from the January 2024 newsletter.

The Cemetery Project works to recognize and recover the history of the African descended persons who lived on this land and were buried in the African American Burial Ground at Cemetery Hill. Over the past year, the Cemetery Team has made tremendous advances in research to recover the names of enslaved persons beyond the 1854 and 1865 inventories at Fort Hill and has gained an understanding of the broader experiences that enslaved people endured. In recognition of Black History Month, the team is producing a two-part history series featuring our latest research.

Through Calhoun family correspondence, plantation ledgers, newspaper accounts, legal documents, and probate records, the team has pieced together more of the history of the enslaved community who lived and labored at Fort Hill. During the 18th century, Lowcountry planters acquired vast lands and large numbers of enslaved persons to cultivate rice, indigo, and sea island cotton. French Huguenot families, such as the Bonneaus, spread their wealth to the upcountry following the Revolutionary War. Samuel Bonneau owned multiple plantations and nearly 100 enslaved people at his death in 1788. His daughter Floride’s husband, John Ewing Colhoun, Sr., accumulated lands and inherited plantations at Santee, Ferry, and Pimlico in the Lowcountry from him. Colhoun began moving enslaved persons from the coast to Twelve Mile Plantation near present day Clemson by 1794. ¹

Of the enslaved people Colhoun inherited, Clemson Historic Properties and this team know that a woman named Menimin was from Africa. An 1849 article in the New York Herald mentions this fact, and she was said to be 112 years old. James Scoville, who wrote the article anonymously as “A Traveller,” since he was John C. Calhoun’s private secretary, gave readers a glimpse of the day-to-day life at Fort Hill. He wrote that Menimin had “63 living descendants on this plantation.” The Cemetery team has begun to identify some of their descendants after recovering nine new inventories from John Ewing Colhoun, Sr.’s papers held at UNC Chapel Hill. The team has found that Menimin and her partner Polydore had at least 10 children, including Tom, Katy, and Peggy. These three appear in the John C. Calhoun letters, and in later inventories already known to the project. We are working to reconstruct this family through the generations and hope to recover where Menimin was from in Africa to tie the histories at Fort Hill back to the transatlantic slave trade.²

Though Scoville’s article presented J.C. Calhoun as a benevolent and fair enslaver, relations between enslaved people and their enslavers were not often as harmonious. One dramatic instance of enslaved resistance occurred in 1798. In late summer, five people enslaved by John Ewing Colhoun, Sr., at Twelve Mile, plotted to poison their owners and flee the state. Court records state that Hazard developed the plan, and that Will obtained poison to carry out the plan. Hazard, Sukey, Sue, Jack, and Will did poison the Colhoun family and fled. None of the Colhouns died as a result. The five were captured and tried in court on August 12, 1798. Will was hanged for his role in obtaining the poison. The remaining four were all whipped, branded on the forehead, and had their ears cropped as punishment. In the records for Colhoun’s estate in 1804, all four people appear at Bonneau’s Ferry rice plantation near Charleston. No record exists explaining why the enslaved resisted the Colhouns in this way, but it could be in response to being moved from the coast, or due to the short distance to Cherokee territory, and freedom.³

Floride Bonneau Colhoun, John C. Calhoun’s mother-in-law, inherited the lands and enslaved of her husband, and divided them among her children, including Floride Colhoun Calhoun, who came to live at Fort Hill with her husband John and six children in 1826. Calhoun family letters, and oral history point us to instances of enslaved resistance in the 1830s and 1840s. For instance, Aleck ran away in 1831 after Floride Calhoun threatened to whip him. In 1842 and 1843, siblings Sawney Jr. and Issey both set fires to resist the overseer, and Floride Calhoun, respectively. Furthermore, oral history from descendants of the Calhoun enslaved implies that two enslaved persons also tried to poison Floride Calhoun at Fort Hill during the 1840s.⁴

Given the undercurrents of tension at Fort Hill the enslaved endured many hardships. Punishments for resistance included imprisonment, whipping, and relocation or sale away from the Calhoun family. In the early 1840s, several enslaved moved between Fort Hill and the Calhoun’s gold mine in Dalhonega, GA. In addition, throughout the 1840s, upwards of twenty enslaved at a time were moved between Fort Hill and John C. Calhoun’s son A.P.’s cotton plantations in Alabama. Issey was among those sent to Alabama as punishment for her arson of the Fort Hill home. Beyond punishment and control, relocation served the Calhouns as an attempt to maximize profit, by increasing labor to improve cotton harvests in Alabama, and to help extract gold. The Calhouns hoped that forcing their enslaved to labor across properties and in difficult conditions would bring financial security. In the end both John C. and A.P. Calhoun died heavily in debt, despite the toil of the enslaved. Next month, the team will discuss what we have learned about the sharecroppers at Fort Hill and the domestic workers, and wage laborers at Clemson College.⁵

Citations

1. October 1794 List of People at Twelve Mile Plantation, Collection 00130, Series 2, Folder 9, John Ewing Colhoun Papers, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, UNC Chapel Hill.
2. Joseph A. Scoville, “A Visit to Fort Hill,” The New York Herald (New York, NY), Jul. 26 1849. https://www.loc.gov/item/sn83030313/1849-07-26/ed-1/.; John Ewing Colhoun Papers, Collection 00130, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, UNC Chapel Hill.
3. Account of 1798, Folder 16, John Ewing Colhoun, Sr. Papers, South Caroliniana Library, University of South Carolina. See also W.J. Megginson, African American Life in South Carolina’s Upper Piedmont, (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press, 2022), 26-27.; Will of John Ewing Colhoun, May 30, 1802, in Ancestry.com. South Carolina, U.S., Wills and Probate Records, 1670-1980 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2015.
4. Robert Lee Meriwether, William Edwin Hemphill, and Clyde N. Wilson, eds., The Papers of John C. Calhoun, Vol. 1-27 (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press for the South Caroliniana Society, 1959-2003), August, 27 and September 1, 1831 v 11 462-463.; April 4, 1843 v 17 136.; December 3, 1845 v 22 314-315.
5. R.L. Meriwether, et. al, eds., The Papers of John C. Calhoun, v 12 371, 531-532.; v 16 282-624. v 15 656.; v 21 482-508.; v 23 308.

By Dr. Mandi Barnard, Research Historian for the African American Burial Ground, Andrew P. Calhoun Family Plot, and Woodland Cemetery Historic Preservation Project

This piece is re-posted from the November 2023 newsletter.

The war to end all wars ended in armistice at 11:00 AM on November 11, 1918. In the years since, Armistice Day, or Veterans Day, as it is known now in the United States, is a time to honor those who have served in the Armed Forces. On this year’s 104th Veterans Day, the cemetery project honors Sergeant Archie DePriest Stern. Sergeant Stern was a detached recruit with the 8th Infantry, USAR, who served his final years at Clemson College. He worked under Captain R. W. Johnson as an instructor of Military Tactics for the Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC). Stern was a veteran of the Philippines Campaign and served in the US Army of Occupation, in France and Germany from 1919-1923.

Archie Stern was born on March 8, 1881, near Glenville, WV. His father, Jacob Stern, immigrated from Germany to the United States in 1857, settling in the area of what is today West Virginia. Stern later served in the US Army during the Civil War. Jacob Stern married a local woman, Julia DePriest, and Sergeant Stern was the eighth of their 11 children. Stern’s father and brothers worked as saddlers, making saddles and tack for horses. In 1904, at 23, Stern enlisted in the US Army Coastal Artillery Corps (CAC). The CAC was tasked with harbor defense of the US mainland and US territories acquired in the Spanish American War of 1898. Each coastal port was fitted with innovative fixed munitions. By World War I (WWI), CAC installations were essential in preventing U-Boat attacks on the coast.

Sergeant Stern served stateside at Fort Mott, NJ, and at Fort Casey and Fort Lawton in Washington State. He also served for a time in Panama at the Canal Zone. From 1915-1918, he was stationed in Manilla, The Philippines, defending that port during WWI. Though his enlistment record is incomplete, Stern reenlisted in 1919, at Camp Meade, MD, as a private with the 35th Co. Field Artillery, 9th Replacement Unit, US Army Expeditionary Force. While it is not known what role Stern played in France and Germany with the US Army of Occupation, it can be inferred that his years of experience with coastal defense and knowledge of munitions would be vital to the task of maintaining the peace in Europe following adoption of the Treaty of Versailles in 1919.

While in Europe, Sergeant Stern met his wife, Anna P. Schwartz. They returned to the United States separately, in 1923, relocating to Fort Screven, GA, where he was then stationed. Anna Stern was from Glogau, Silesia, Prussia which is now in Poland. In 1925, Stern and his wife came to Clemson, where he worked as a military tactics instructor for the ROTC program. They were both well-liked and respected among the campus community as evidenced by articles about them in The Tiger. Sadly, Anna Stern became sick with leukemia and died on May 17, 1927. She became the first person buried in Woodland Cemetery, which was established by the Board of Trustees in July 1924.

In August 1928, Sergeant Stern reenlisted for his final two years of Army service before retirement. At 47 years old, and recently recovered from an operation, he had just returned to Clemson in autumn of that year. On the evening of November 5, Stern was seen in his military uniform walking to Woodland to visit Anna’s grave. It was after 10 pm. The following morning, he did not report for duty. Three weeks later, the Board of Trustees went public with Stern’s disappearance and appealed for help locating him. He had left his car, belongings, and bank account untouched. Months passed. In March of 1929, a man in Elberton, GA, pulled a body from the Savannah River following a flood from a dam. Documents on the body and the uniform gave the identity of the deceased as Sergeant Archie Stern.

The Clemson community was in shock. The verdict of the coroner’s inquest was death by homicide. However, the Board of Trustees believed Stern took his own life in sorrow over the loss of his wife Anna. Stern’s siblings believed he had been killed. To this day, no one knows what happened to Sergeant Stern. His body was taken back to Clemson by Captain Johnson and buried beside Anna at Woodland Cemetery. Sergeant Stern was the fourth Clemson burial at Woodland. He was the first active-duty US military personnel to die and be buried here, and he was the first veteran of the US Armed Forces honored at the campus cemetery.

Citations

1. Press Clippings, Series 37, Military Science Department Information File, Clemson Special Collections Library, Clemson University Libraries.
2. US Armed Forces Enlistment Records, Ship Manifests, Immigration and Naturalization Files, and Press Clippings from US National Archives on Ancestry.com and Newspapers.com.

By Dr. Rhondda Thomas, Calhoun Lemon Professor of Literature, Call My Name Faculty Director, and Coordinator of Research and Community Engagement for the African American Burial Ground and Woodland Cemetery Historic Preservation Project

This piece is re-posted from the October 2023 newsletter.

Although Clemson University is devoting major attention to documenting the history of Woodland Cemetery and the African American Burial Ground Project on its main campus and honoring all who are buried there, the higher education institution is also seeking to preserve 15 grave sites on 33,000 acres it owns throughout South Carolina.

There are a variety of cemeteries on these off-campus sites, including those affiliated with families and churches, as well as some located in heavily wooded areas with graves that are both unmarked and marked by headstones.

Clemson is committed to working with researchers and local communities to document the history of all of these sacred sites and to ensure that they are protected. More information about this initiative can be found on Clemson University’s Statewide Grave Sites website.

1) The Clemson Experimental Forest (CEF) in Oconee/Anderson/Pickens Counties contains four sites identified and confirmed as known gravesite locations. These include the John Ewing Colhoun Family Cemetery, Lawrence Family Cemetery, Lieutenant William F. Grant Site, and Lieutenant Benjamin Lawrence Site. Acquired by Clemson University in 1954, the Clemson Experimental Forest encompasses approximately 17,500 acreage. The estimated number of graves in the CEF is approximately 255+, with 240 unmarked burials.

2) The cemetery for enslaved people who worked at Andrew Pickens’ Hopewell Plantation and the Simpson Cemetery site of Mt. Jolly Plantation are at the Piedmont Research and Education Center in Anderson/Pickens Counties. Hopewell contains three headstones, with most of the depressions marked by field stones. There are twelve headstones at the multigenerational Simpson and Taliaferro Family Cemetery. Like Hopewell, field stones lie within the space, denoting how old the graveyard is. Clemson University took ownership of the properties from 1932-1960, totaling approximately 4,400 acres.

3) The identified gravesites of the Edisto Research and Education Center (Edisto REC) in Barnwell County include three locations: one near the ruins of a church, another adjacent to a hay barn, and the third at the edge of an once alfalfa field. Clearing work was completed on these sites in February 2022. Old Church has identified five headstones, with 60+ estimated graves primarily unmarked. The Christmas Tree Field Hay Barn has an estimated 15-20 graves but no identifiable headstones. The V.L. Cave/Alfalfa Field has one Veterans Administration headstone, with an estimated two graves via the oral history of husband and wife. Clemson acquired the Edisto REC between 1936-1952, spanning approximately 2,360 acreage.

4) 1971 was when the university acquired the Pee Dee Research and Education Center (Pee Dee REC) from the Dargan and Pierce Families, covering approximately 2,300 acres of 20+ estimated graves. The Pee Dee REC in Darlington/Florence Counties includes one confirmed cemetery and two other possible sites. The Old Dargan/Pleasant Grove Cemetery has two headstones, with 20+ unmarked metal funeral home markers where some are legible to read. The estimated number of graves at the African American burial ground in the forest is unknown. The W. Standard site and Pitner Center Grassed area have no headstones nor estimated grave count. The former is potentially a family cemetery for a Revolutionary War officer where historical descriptions match the possible location, while the latter GPR survey found no evidence of graves despite oral history accounting for there being once.

5) The Coastal Research and Education Center in Charleston County identified the Old Mill gravesite as a confirmed burial ground. There is an estimated 50+ graves among its 325 acres. Clemson University acquired the land from 1932 to 1944. Though to be called “Old Mill” from oral history, the cemetery has three headstones.

For more information on how Clemson University works to preserve grave sites in South Carolina, please click here.

By Marquise Drayton, Community Engagement Assistant for the Woodland Cemetery and African American Burial Ground Historic Preservation Project

This post is re-published from the September 2023 newsletter

Outside of the head coach for Clemson Football, the Clemson University President is one of the most identifiable campus leaders at the land grant institution in Upstate South Carolina. Only Clemson President Walter M. Riggs (1911-1924) served as both.¹ Dr. James Clements has served as the fifteen president of Clemson University since the Board of Trustees approved his hiring in December 2013.² Like the president of a nation, the university president’s involvement with different constituents during their tenure is paramount to a school’s growth in academics and athletics. Not only does one interact with students, faculty, and staff, but one has to engage with alumni, donors, partners, and other groups invested in the university. Even post-presidency, President Emeritus James Barker (1999- 2013) is still active in engaging people in the college town with his expertise in architecture and artistry in watercolor drawings.³

Presiding over commencement ceremonies in their ornate regalia is not the only thing they are known for. The current Clemson president has an advisory board comprised of current and former business people, a leadership institute for faculty and staff, and a president’s house for their family to reside in during their term.⁴ The latter is a Greek Revival-style private residence that mirrors the architecture of the nearby Fort Hill Plantation Mansion, where school founder Thomas Green Clemson and his wife, Anna Calhoun Clemson, lived.⁵ There are several other pots in which the president has his hand in that pertain to the university.

Following the South Carolina General Assembly’s establishment of Clemson Agricultural College of South Carolina in 1889, President H. Aubrey Strode (1890-1893) oversaw a college that had no students during his time as its first university president.⁶ However, he did hire the first faculty and created the initial curriculum.⁷ President Patrick H. Mell’s (1902-1910) primary focus was shifting Clemson College’s designation as an all-male military college to a top research institution in the South.⁸ President Enoch W. Sikes (1925-1940) advanced Mell’s vision further as Clemson College gained its first accreditation from the Association of Secondary Schools and Colleges of the Southern States.⁹ The enrollment of students grew, faculty hiring increased, and the college offered more advanced degrees during his administration.

There are lasting parts of Clemson’s campus where presidents are honored. Cox Plaza near Tillman Hall has a life-size statue of President Walter T. Cox (1985-1986) sitting on a bench, which documents his crucial role in student affairs.¹⁰ Edwards Hall holds the College of Behavioral, Social, and Health Science. President Robert C. Edwards (1958-1979) is the namesake for this campus building.¹¹ Dr. Edwards was the longest-serving president in Clemson’s history.¹² He is notable for his strategic measures with the state legislature to uneventfully usher in Harvey Gantt as the school’s first African American student 1963.¹³ A local middle school in neighboring Central, SC, also bears his name.¹⁴

Yet one section of campus began as a consequence of the untimely death of a university president. The Clemson University Board of Trustees created Woodland Cemetery in July 1924, six months after President Walter M. Riggs died of a heart attack in January 1924.¹⁵ Growing from the original Cemetery Hill where the Calhoun Family and African American enslaved persons, convicted laborers, and wage workers lie, the burial ground beside Memorial Stadium remains an active cemetery today.¹⁶ Every university president since Dr. Riggs is buried in Woodland Cemetery.¹⁷ The most recent president buried there was President Philip Prince (1994-1995), who passed away in February 2020.¹⁸

Woodland Cemetery was the brainchild of President Riggs in 1922 to honor white full-time employees at the land grant school.¹⁹ He worked with a committee that included early Clemson mathematics professor Major Samuel Martin.²⁰Later improvements were made with civil engineer H. E. Glenn to ensure the campus cemetery allocated 202 family plots for those eligible.²¹ Only the west side was empty at the time of the 1938 map.²²

In December 2000, President Barker appointed the Woodland Cemetery Stewardship Committee to “preserve and protect the landscapes and objects that reflect the architectural and cultural heritage of Clemson University as a part of the living fabric of the campus.”²³

Under the Clements administration, the $3.5 million Pathways Project enhanced the sacred space, tailgating in the cemetery ended in 2020, and a history task force placed interpretative signage around campus in 2016, including Woodland Cemetery.²⁴

Citations

1. Grubb, C. Alan. 1988. “The Master Executive Walter Merritt Riggs, 1910-1924.” In Tradition: A History of the Presidency of Clemson University, edited by Donald McK- ale, Pg. 99–100. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
2. Clements, James. 2013. “Welcome Letter.” Clemson Blogs. Clemson University. December 1, 2013. https://blogs.clemson.edu/president/2013/12/01/welcome-letter/.
3. Trotter, Stephanie. n.d. “Tiger Town Legends.” Vive. Community Journals. https://vive-mag.com/engage/tiger-town-legends-james-barker-and-marcia-barker/.
4. Clemson University. “Office of the President.” Clemson.Edu. Clemson University. https://www.clemson.edu/president/index.html.
5. Marsteller, Duane, and Tracy Marsteller. 2021. “President’s Family Residence.” The Historical Marker Database. J. J. Prats. November 21, 2021. https://www.hmdb.org/m.as- p?m=186401.
6. Lambert, Robert S. 1988. “The Builder of a College Henry Aubrey Strode 1890-1893.” In Tradition: A History of the Presidency of Clemson University, edited by Donald McKale, Pg. 21. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
7. Ibid, Pg. 26-29.
8. Green, Robert P. “A Scholar’s Turmoil Patrick Hues Mell, 1902-1910.” In Tradition: A History of the Presidency of Clemson University, edited by Donald McKale, Pg. 84-96. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
9. Yandle, Bruce. “The Plowboy Scholar Enoch Walter Sikes, 1925-1940.” In Tradition: A History of the Presidency of Clemson University, edited by Donald McKale, Pg. 154. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
10. Scott, Brian. 2009. “Walter T. Cox, Jr.” The Historical Marker Database. J. J. Prats. July 5, 2009. https://www.hmdb.org/m.asp?m=20566.
11. @clemsonuniversity. 2020. “Tour Tuesday: Edwards Hall.” Instagram. Meta Platforms, Inc. February 4, 2020. https://www.instagram.com/p/B8JbBFqFbbi/,
12. Wainscott, Stephen H. “A Take-Charge Businessman Robert Cook Edwards, 1958-1979.” In Tradition: A History of the Presidency of Clemson University, edited by Donald McKale, Pg. 187. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press.
13. “R.C. Edwards Learns Civil Rights History Milestone.” Independent Mail. Independent Publishing Company. April 10, 2013. https://archive.independentmail.com/features/ rc-edwards-learns-civil-rights-history-milestone-ep-361988615-347853001.html/.
14. Ibid.
15. Clemson Board of Trustees, Trustee Minutes, July 10, 1924, https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1388&context=trustees_minutes./ “Clemson Mourns President Riggs,” The Tiger (Clemson, SC), February 1, 1924, https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1420&context=tiger_newspaper.
16. Map of Clemson Agricultural College, 1920. Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries.
17. Clemson Board of Trustees, Trustee Minutes, July 10, 1924, https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/trustees_minutes/389/.
18. Nicholson, Zoe. 2020. “Former Clemson University President, Football Player Phil Prince Has Died.” Greenville News. Gannet Co, Inc. March 2, 2020. https://www.greenvilleonline. com/story/news/2020/03/02/former-clemson-university-president-and-trustee-phil-prince-has-died/4927542002/.
19. Clemson Board of Trustees, Trustees Minutes, July 4-5, 1922, https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/trustees_minutes/390; Cemetery Committee to Walter Riggs, May 17, 1923, Series 17, Box 23, Folder 269, Walter Riggs Presidential Records, Correspondence, Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries.
20. Ibid.
21. A Report on Woodland Cemetery, December 5, 1957, Mss 366, Box 2, Folder 17, Papers of Carrel Cowan-Ricks, Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries.
22. Ibid.
23. Series 0613 Woodland Cemetery Stewardship Committee Records, Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries, Clemson, South Carolina.
24. “Construction to begin on Woodland Cemetery enhancements.” Clemson News. Clemson University. February 13, 2023. https://news.clemson.edu/construction-to-be- gin-on-woodland-cemetery-enhancements/. / “PLEASE HELP US HONOR ALL WHO ARE BURIED AT WOODLAND CEMETERY.” Clemson Athletics. Clemson University. September 30, 2021. https://clemsontigers.com/please-help-us-honor-all-who-are-buried-at-woodland-cemetery/. / “Landmarks & Legends: Marking History.” Clemson World Magazine. Clemson University. September 5, 2016. https://clemson.world/archive/landmarks-legends-marking-history/.

By Deborah Robinson, Genealogist for the Woodland Cemetery and African American Burial Ground Historic Preservation Project

This post is re-published from the August 2023 newsletter.

The common thread that weaves through all those interred in Woodland Cemetery is each played an integral part in the university’s current existence. Part of the cemetery’s genealogy research agenda is contextualizing the stories of the enslaved African Americans, sharecroppers, domestic and convicted laborers, and wage workers, including their families, who do not have headstones. Genealogists understood early the importance of cemeteries to family history and spent time recording information gleaned from graveyards.¹ Through careful documentation, we’re researching descendants to identify current family members by gathering evidence from a variety of sources, including vital records, censuses, wills, and oral histories.

Our research uncovered information on Samuel Barber, a convicted laborer who worked at Clemson College during its inception. The 1880 federal census says Sam was born about 1856 in Fairfield County, South Carolina, to Jacob and Jemima Barber, was twenty-two, and lived at home with his parents and younger brother, Charles.² Jacob was a farmer. His wife and two sons were laborers. We have not found much about Sam’s daily life at Clemson except that he died at 41, 18 December 1900, while still a leased prisoner.³ Sam was one of twelve laborers, documented so far, who are likely buried in Woodland Cemetery in unmarked graves. Clemson College mainly leased African Americans from the South Carolina state penitentiary. All cleared the land, made bricks, erected buildings, planted and harvested crops, built dikes, and made roads and sidewalks.⁴

The 1900 federal census listed Sam Barber (transcribed as Bucher) as one of twenty-six prisoners at Clemson College. He and both parents were native-born South Carolinians. Sam was literate, a homeowner, and married for five years. South Carolina did not record marriage records state-wide until 1911. However, some counties did compile them earlier, like Charleston County. For example, [City of] Charleston, South Carolina, U.S., Marriage Records, 1877-1887 are on Ancestry.com. Because Samuel was married in 1895, likely in Charleston, since that’s where he was convicted of Grand Larceny and sentenced to four years, his marriage is not in this record set. We also have not identified his wife yet. That said, we did unearth significant information about Sam’s family through the life of his brother Charles.

A 1937 interview by the Works Progress Administration documents Charles, 81, living with his daughter Maggie. Mary Wylie, his wife, died two years earlier. Charles did not name his children in the interview, but said they had ten “. . . Some dead, some marry and leave.” He related that Ozmund [sic] and Elizabeth Barber enslaved his family in Great Falls, on the Wateree River, in South Carolina, where Charles was born.⁹ And, according to family lore, both his parents were born in Africa, (the 1900 census lists their birthplace as South Carolina¹⁰) brought to Virginia during the transatlantic slave trade, taken to Winnsboro [Fairfield County, South Carolina] by the slave driver, then sold to Osmond Barber’s father. Osmond Barber is the son of Sarah T. Barber according to her Chester County, South Carolina will dated, 14 December 1896.¹¹ His father likely predeceased his mom, since he is not mentioned in the will.

About his parents’ African birth, Charles says, “They never did talk lak [sic] de other slaves, could just say a few words, use deir [sic] hands, and make signs. . . Yes sir, they, my pappy and mammy, was just smuggled in dis part of de world, I bet you!” Charles was likely referring to the Slave Trade Act of 1807 meant to prohibit international importation of newly enslaved persons. It did not affect the domestic slave trade.¹²

Charles further recounted that during the Civil War “Mistress [enslaver Elizabeth Barber] and de chillum have to go to Chester to git a place to sleep and eat, wid kinfolks.” The 1860 Federal Slave Schedule dated 15 October 1860, for Chester County, South Carolina lists Osmund Barber holding twenty-three enslaved people in bondage.¹³ The oldest person was a 90-year-old male, the youngest were two eight-month-old infants. Sam and Charles could have been among the children listed since they were born about 1856 and 1862, respectively. Enslaved person’s ages are approximated since few slaveholders kept detailed vital record information for their bondspersons.

Charles died about 1950. He, his wife, and daughter are all buried in St. John’s African Methodist Episcopal Church in Winnsboro, Fairfax, South Carolina, their home church.¹⁴

Research on Sam Barber and others vital in building present-day Clemson University continues.

Citations

1. Recording Historic Cemeteries: A Guide for Historical Societies and Genealogists. Chicora Foundation Inc., Columbia, South Carolina, 1998.
2. 1880 U.S. Federal Census, Township 14, Fairfield, South Carolina; Roll: 1229; page 17A; Enumeration District: 066.
3. 1900; Census Place: Township 5, Fairfield, South Carolina; Roll: 1527; Page: 15; Enumeration District: 0034.
4. Annual Reports of the Board of Directors and Superintendent of the South Carolina Penitentiary, Reports and Resolutions of the General Assembly of the State of South Carolina at the Regular Sessions, South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Columbia, SC.
5. FamilySearch Wiki contributors, “South Carolina Vital Records,” FamilySearch Wiki, https://www.familysearch.org/en/wiki/index.php?title=South_Carolina_Vital_Records&oldid=5361257 (accessed July 27, 2023).
6. Charleston, South Carolina, U.S., Marriage Records, 1877-1887 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2007. South Carolina Department of Archives and History, Columbia, South Carolina.
7. 1900; Census Place: Township 5, Fairfield, South Carolina; Roll: 1527; Page: 15; Enumeration District: 0034.
8. Thomas, Rhondda Robinson. Convicted Laborers Deaths at Clemson. (Clemson University, 16 December 2022.)
9. U.S. Interviews with Formerly Enslaved People, 1936-1938 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc. This collection was indexed by Ancestry World Archives Project contributors. A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves, 1936–1938. Vol. 1-17. Federal Writers’ Project of the Works Progress Administration microfilm publication SCM 000 320, SCM 000 321, SCM 000 322, SCM 000 323, SCM 000 325, 5 rolls. Library of Congress, Washington D.C.
10. 1900; Census Place: Township 5, Fairfield, South Carolina; Roll: 1527; Page: 15; Enumeration District: 0034.
11. South Carolina, U.S., Wills and Probate Records, 1670-1980. Chester County, South Carolina Wills; Author: South Carolina. Probate Court (Chester County). Ancestry.com, Anestry.com Operations, Inc. 2015, Provo, UT, USA.
12. Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves. (2023, March 13). In Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Act_Prohibiting_Importation_of_Slaves (accessed 28 July 2023.)
13. 1860 U.S. Federal Census – Slave Schedules [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2010. United States of America, Bureau of the Census. Eighth Census of the United States, 1860. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1860. M653, 1,438 rolls.
14. U.S., Find a Grave® Index, 1600s-Current [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012. Original data: Find a Grave. Find a Grave®. http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi.

By Dr. Rhondda Thomas, Calhoun Lemon Professor of Literature, Call My Name Faculty Director, and Coordinator of Research and Community Engagement for the African American Burial Ground and Woodland Cemetery Historic Preservation Project

This post is re-published from the June 2023 newsletter. Download the full June 2023 newsletter

On March 11, 1946, among the five topics that members of Clemson College’s Buildings and Ground Committee discussed was “Markers for graves of convicts and slaves on Cemetery Hill.” According to committee member Mr. Newman, “it was his understanding that on Cemetery Hill are buried some 200 to 250 slaves and convicts.” After a discussion, the committee “unanimously voted to recommend that some type of permanent marker be established on Cemetery Hill to indicate this colored graveyard.” One day later David J. Watson, chair of the committee, advised Clemson President R. F. Poole and Business Manager John C. Littlejohn of the motion and recommended that “accurate information should be obtained and placed on the marker.”¹ Eleven years later, Watson sent a memo to Henry Hill, director of auxiliary enterprises at Clemson, for the “Clemson Cemetery.” Although they were mainly concerned about the maintenance of Woodland Cemetery, the following recommendation was also included: “Enclose area of colored graveyard within a securely constructed wire fence. There is a space approximately 100’ x 125’ about 400 feet west of Calhoun plot enclosure.”² Neither of the recommendations was enacted. Thus, Clemson missed the opportunity to memorialize and protect the African American Burial Ground. What follows is a brief overview of the history of this sacred site based on research we have conducted thus far.

The first burials of people of African descent on the land where the Fort Hill Plantation was established and later the Clemson Agricultural College of South Carolina was built likely occurred during the antebellum period. In 1801, Reverend James McElhenny, a Presbyterian minister for the Old Stone Church in Pendleton, SC, moved onto the land with his family. McElhenny owned 25 enslaved African Americans who likely built Clergy Hall, the four-room home where the minister and his extended family lived.³ Some of the enslaved persons who labored for the McElhenny family may have been buried on the site that would become known as Cemetery Hill.

After Rev. McElhenny died in 1812, Floride Bonneau Colhoun purchased the land. John C. Calhoun moved his family to the property in 1826. Enslaved carpenters added 10 rooms to the four-room Clergy Hall, and Calhoun renamed the property Fort Hill. The Calhouns along with Thomas Green Clemson owned over 100 enslaved persons who labored on their plantations and in John Calhoun’s mines in South Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama. To date, however, researchers have only been able to find documentation for one enslaved person, 74-year-old Thom, owned by Mrs. J.C. (Floride) Calhoun, who died in 1850 and was buried at Fort Hill.⁴ Although there are other death records for enslaved persons who labored at Fort Hill, their burial place is not noted in the documents. These include Nelly, owned by Floride Calhoun, who died in childbirth in 1856.⁵ Then at the end of the Civil War, 70 persons, mostly children, died of whooping cough and measles.⁶

However, there are several elderly enslaved persons listed in various records who are not included in the last inventory of enslaved persons at Fort Hill completed in 1865. For example, was 100-year-old Phebe was listed in the “Schedule of Slaves with the Names and Ages” in the deed for the sale of Fort Hill in 1854.⁷ Additionally, in 1849, Joseph Scoville reported meeting 112-year-old widow Monemi whose husband Polydore “had lived to a very old age.”⁸ Also, enslaved persons died in America at disproportionately higher rates during the antebellum period because of harsh living working conditions and the violence associated with slavery.

After the Civil War ended, African Americans continued living, working, and dying on the land where Clemson University was built through the mid-twentieth century. Recently emancipated African Americans were employed as sharecroppers, domestics, and tenant farmers at Fort Hill during Reconstruction. Clemson trustees leased mostly African American convicted laborers, ages 14-67, from the state penitentiary to build a school for young white men. Twelve African American convicted laborers died while building Clemson and are believed to have been buried on Cemetery Hill. Clemson administrators and faculty hired African American wage workers as cooks, barbers, farm hands, laundry workers, nurses, construction laborers, and domestics to provide much needed support services for the college. Initially, they lived near white employees on the main campus but were gradually pushed into segregated neighborhoods, including areas in and around the cemetery.

Shortly after Clemson sought and received permission in 1960 from the Oconee County Court to dissenter the remains of African Americans from the west side of the cemetery and reinter them on its south side. This order led Clemson to destroy the African American Burial Ground, utilizing the soil to build dikes around Lake Hartwell. As the soil was removed, however, the remains of what were believed to be several African American children were disturbed and then reburied on the south side of Woodland Cemetery.⁹

Until July 2020, Clemson had designated about a one-acre site on the south side of Woodland Cemetery as the “Fort Hill Slave and Convict Cemetery.” After then Clemson students Sarah Adams and Morgan Molosso discovered the neglect of the burial ground shortly after being encouraged to visit the site during a Call My Name campus tour in February 2020, they initiated a process that led to the hiring of a team that conducted Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) to detect the number of possible unmarked burials on the site.¹⁰ Researchers are currently analyzing the GPR data and historical records to ensure that all who are buried in Woodland Cemetery and the African American Burial Ground are respected and honored.

Citations

1. Minutes of the Building and Grounds Committee, March 11, 1946, Series 7, Box 1, Folder 6, Robert F. Poole Presidential Records, Committee Files, 1928-1955, Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries.
2. David J. Watson to Henry Hill, November 22, 1957, Mss 366, Box 2, Folder 17, Papers of Carrel Cowan-Ricks, Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries.
3. Third Census of the United States, Pendleton, South Carolina, 1810, Bureau of the Census, Record Group 29, National Archives, Washington, D.C. Accessed through Ancestry.com.
4. Register of St. Paul’s, Saint Paul’s Episcopal Church Records, 1819-1971, South Carolina Digital Library Collections, https://scdl.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/spr/id/1367/rec/52, 307.
5. Register of St. Paul’s, 307.
6. Floride Clemson, A Rebel Came Home; the Diary of Floride Clemson Tells of Her Wartime Adventures in Yankeeland, 1863-64, Her Trip Home to South Carolina, ed. Charles M. McGee, Jr. and Ernest M. Lander, Jr. (Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press, 1961), 90-91.
7. Calhoun, Floride; Calhoun, Cornelia M.; and Calhoun, Andrew P., “Deed to Fort Hill plantation and enslaved persons between Floride Calhoun, Cornelia M. Calhoun and Andrew P. Calhoun, 1854 May 15” (1854). Thomas Green Clemson Papers, Mss 2. 210, https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1209&context=tgc.
8. Joseph Scoville, “A Visit to Fort Hill,” New York Herald, July 26, 1849, 1.
9. State of South Carolina, County of Oconee, Court of Common Pleas, Ex parte: The Clemson Agricultural College of South Carolina, In Re: The Purported Cemetery of Unknown Deceased Persons, Petition, 22 August 1960, and Order, 3 September 1960, Mss 366, Box 2, Folder 17, Papers of Carrel Cowan-Ricks, Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries; Carrel Cowan-Ricks, Note to File, September 18, 1991, Mss 366, Box 2, Folder 17, Papers of Carrel Cowan-Ricks; Carrel Cowan-Ricks, Report of Interview with Robert E. Ware, July 17, 1992, in Series 613, Site History, 1895-2008, The Woodland Cemetery Stewardship Committee Records, https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1012&context=woodland, all in Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries.
10. Zoe Nicholson, “Clemson students to honor unmarked burial ground for slaves, convict laborers on campus,” Greenville News, March 26, 2020.

This is a special post re-published from the May 2023 newsletter. Read the full May 2023 newsletter.

By Dr. David Markus, Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Criminal Justice

One of the most significant points the ongoing research and community engagement of the Woodland Cemetery and African American Burial Ground Historic Preservation Project has brought to the fore is the deep and often overlooked history of the landscape Clemson University now occupies and the connection this history has to different eras and the University’s rise and development. Archaeology has an important role to play in this effort to document and honor the legacy of the communities that once lived on this landscape through the identification, preservation and long-term stewardship of cultural resources.

As a land grant institution, Clemson University is responsible for over 42,000 acres of property throughout the state of South Carolina provided by the Morrill and Hatch Acts that consists, in part, of the ancestral landscape of the Cherokee people, a revolutionary war fort, several former plantations where enslaved African Americans were forced to reside and work, Civilian Conservation Corps work sites, university buildings that were built by African American convict laborers, and World War II military training grounds. Collectively, these time periods constitute what is believed to be well in the hundreds of archaeological sites, though most of our knowledge of their locations come from the broader Clemson and South Carolinian community who have a deep passion for the history of the school and the state.

The site of Fort Rutledge highlights the way in which archaeology can serve to illustrate the interconnectedness of the university’s cultural landscape. Indigenous occupation on the land that is now Clemson started at least 10,000 years ago, and radiocarbon dating from pottery recovered from the site point to a considerable presence of peoples approximately 1,400 years ago. These peoples were the ancestors to the Lower Town Cherokee who established the town of Esseneca prior to the arrival of Europeans. Colonial era naturalists and botanical explorers, such as William Bartram, were guided to Cherokee lands by enslaved persons who represent the first people of African descent to pass through Clemson’s eventual landscape. These explorer accounts give an indication of the size of Esseneca when, during a nighttime raid on July 31, 1776, South Carolina militia attacked the British-allied Cherokee town. The battle, while small, resulted in the death of the first Jewish American soldier in the Revolution, Francis Salvador, who died in the care of a servant who was likely African American. The battle is notable not only for the casualties it caused on both sides but the transformation that occurred to the landscape in its aftermath. Following their defeat to the Cherokee, the South Carolina militia returned several months later and completely razed the town and all of its crops along the Seneca River, now beneath the waters of Lake Hartwell. In an effort to exert control of the region, Fort Rutledge was erected on the ridgetop overlooking the river basin. In operation until it was dismantled by the British in 1780, the fort served as the location for prisoner exchanges during the treaty of Dewitt’s Corner and as the holding location for at least one runaway slave.

After its dismantling, memory of the fort’s location and its history began to fade, and during the 19^th century, references to its deteriorating state were common. In an effort to preserve its memory, members of the Pickens Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, comprised mostly of the wives of Clemson faculty, commissioned an excavation to locate the corner bastion of the fort using African American convict laborers provided by the university, some of whom may be buried in Woodland Cemetery. In 1908, the Board of Trustees authorizes the use of funds and labor to erect a monument at the fort’s location at the request of DAR using that same labor. Throughout the early 20^th Century this landscape is incorporated into the university infrastructure; as cattle and alfalfa fields, as the location for pumping stations and farm storage and eventually as water treatment and hazardous water disposal facilities. During this time articles in The Tiger reference Clemson cadets looting the site as a recreational activity, underscoring the community’s interests in campus history.

As South Carolina begins to commemorate the Semiquincentennial of its role in the American Revolution, so does Clemson University. Through a grant from the National Park Service and with various stakeholder partnerships including the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, the sites of Fort Rutledge and Esseneca are being relocated and their histories interpreted for the public, histories that are holistic and inclusive of the many peoples that lived and worked on what is now Clemson’s campus. Archaeology aides in the Woodland Cemetery Project in serving as a reminder that the history that must be honored and memorialized may not always be visible and the narratives that make up this landscape’s past often extend beyond the boundaries of time and space that are placed on them. The history of the Woodland Cemetery and African American Burial Ground is the history of this place.

This is a special post re-published from the April 2023 newsletter. Read the full April 2023 newsletter.

By Lucas DeBenedetti, Undergraduate Research Assistant

This past month Sue Hiott, curator of exhibits for Clemson University Libraries’ Special Collections and Archives, recovered new evidence, in the form of four color photographs, which adds more context to the destruction of the lower, western half of Cemetery Hill and how it connects to the construction of the upper and lower dikes around Clemson’s campus.

Previous editions of the history series have detailed the removal of the lower, western half of Woodland Cemetery and its relation to the construction of Lake Hartwell and the protective dikes around Clemson University’s campus.

For context, this removal occurred as a result of the construction of Lake Hartwell by the United States Army Corps of Engineers and the 1960 Court Order, in which Clemson College petitioned Oconee County in August 1960 for the right to disinter the remains of Black laborers they came across while grading and clearing the western slope.¹ The judge granted Clemson permission to do this and together with the Nello Teer Construction Company, Clemson made plans in September 1960 to proceed with the grading and clearing of the western slope.²

While the lower western half was being graded and cleared, the remains of at least five African American children were found and identified by their hair, teeth, coffin nails, and the size of their burial.³

Based on the evidence the project has collected thus far, the dirt taken from the lower. western half of the cemetery was used to build the dikes that currently protect Clemson University’s campus from being flooded by Lake Hartwell.

The photographs depict the lower western half of Woodland Cemetery during different stages of its destruction. Each image bears a small caption detailing the context behind each specific image.

The first image depicts a man staring at a number of field stones and bears the caption “Rotie looking at slave grave markers Cemetery Hill.”⁴ A black and white version of this photograph is also located in the Papers of Carrel Cowan- Ricks in Clemson’s archives. The name Salley was previously known in relation to these images, but the name ‘Rotie’ was unknown to the project. The man is standing in an unknown location on Cemetery.

The three other photographs in the series detail the lower western half of the cemetery in various stages of its destruction:

The second color image includes the caption “Cemetery Hill being cut for use in upper dike Oct. ’60” and shows construction equipment moving dirt from the lower western slope, which has been completely cleared of trees. This photograph appears to confirm that dirt from the lower western half of the cemetery was utilized in the construction of the upper dike near the Esso Station.⁵

The remaining third and fourth photographs found last month were both taken after October 1960. They bear the captions “Moving dirt from Cemetery Hill Nov ‘60”⁶ and “Cutting down Cemetery Hill.”⁷ Both images portray how the lower western section of the cemetery was completely cleared and leveled, demonstrating how the lower western slope was destroyed over the course of two months. Prior to the destruction of this section, the cemetery sloped all the way to the Seneca River and Perimeter Road, with a much greater elevation. The second image showcases this change in elevation, as the lower, western half is almost parallel to Perimeter Road as opposed to sloping into it.

These photographs were likely taken around the time of the 1960 Clemson homecoming football game on November 5, where an aerial image of the stadium and cemetery was taken showcasing the removal of dirt from the western slope. Today, the cleared area serves as a parking lot for Clemson University’s students.

These primary source photographs are the best evidence that the cemetery team has received and analyzed that confirm that the dirt from the lower, western half of the cemetery was used in the construction of the dikes to protect Clemson from the flooding of Lake Hartwell.

Despite the fact that the construction of the dikes around Clemson’s campus was ordered by the US Army Corps of Engineers and contracted by Clemson and the Nello Teer Construction Company, there is a scarcity of documentation, official or otherwise, pertaining to the use of the dirt from the lower, western half of Woodland Cemetery to build the dikes.

It is important to remember that these are not just photographs of dirt being moved or part of a hill being destroyed. They are images of the destruction of individuals’ gravesites, some of them children’s, whose names will likely never be known.

Citations

1. State of South Carolina, County of Oconee, Court of Common Pleas, Ex parte: The Clemson Agricultural College of South Carolina, In Re: The Purported Cemetery of Unknown De- ceased Persons, Petition, 22 August 1960, Mss 366, Box 2, Folder 17, Papers of Carrel Cowan-Ricks, Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries.
2. Memorandum of Understanding between Clemson and Nello L. Teer Company, September 13, 1960, Mss 366, Papers of Carrel Cowan-Ricks, Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries.
3. Carrel Cowan-Ricks, Interview with Robert Ware, July 17, 1992, Series 613, Site History, 1895-2008, The Woodland Cemetery Stewardship Committee Records, Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries.
4. “Rotie looking at slave grave markers Cemetery Hill,” 1960, Unaccessioned Collection of Rotie Salley, Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries.
5. “Cemetery Hill being cut for use in upper dike Oct. ’60”, October 1960, Unaccessioned Collection of Rotie Salley, Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries.
6. “Moving dirt from Cemetery Hill Nov ’60,” November 1960, Unaccessioned Collection of Rotie Salley, Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries.
7. “Cutting down Cemetery Hill,” 1960, Unaccessioned Collection of Rotie Salley, Special Collections and Archives, Clemson University Libraries.

In this issue we provide information about the research symposium keynote speaker Kamau Sadiki of Diving with a Purpose, update the public on Woodland Cemetery, explain the contributions that Carrel Cowan-Ricks put toward the African American Burial Ground, provide research and community engagement updates, and highlight some upcoming local events.

The Woodland Cemetery and African American Burial Ground Historic Preservation Project seeks to tell the stories of the known and previously unknown burials located in Woodland Cemetery on the Clemson University campus. Through research and community engagement we intend to uncover as much as we can about this historic space and to properly commemorate all who are buried here.

Download the full October 2022 newsletter..