Charleston is
the second largest city in the U.S.
state of
South
Carolina.
It was made the county seat of Charleston
County in
1901 when Charleston County was founded, named after Charles II. The city's
original name was Charles Towne in 1670, and it moved to its present
location (Oyster Point) from a location on the west bank of the Ashley River
(Albemarle Point) in 1680. It adopted its present name in 1783. In 1690,
Charleston was the fifth largest city in North America, and remained among the
ten largest cities in the United States through the 1840 census. In 1790 the population was 16,359. In 2010 it
was 120,083. The racial/ethnic makeup of Charleston is 65.2% White
Americans,
34.6% Black
Americans,
1.6% Asian
Americans,
and 2.4% Hispanics or
Latino (who may be of any race).
The City Marina provides a courtesy bus
that has various drop off points in town. One day we took it to West Marine as
Bear can’t go too long without a chandlery fix, meantime I did a shop in Harris
Teeter next door. Bear found me, and by way of a change he had a small, discreet
brown bag whilst I had a full trolley. Today though, being our last day we went
to be tourists. The bus dropped us at its furthest drop in Liberty Plaza. Great water features and a sign telling us that we are
4061 miles from London – a wee
bit further to Beijing.
The Port of
Charleston,
owned and operated by the South Carolina Ports Authority, is one of the largest
ports in the U.S., consisting of
five terminals. Two are in Charleston, on the Harbour. Two are on the Cooper
River in the City of North Charleston and one is located on the Wando River in
the Town of Mt. Pleasant. Despite occasional labour
disputes, the port is ranked number one in
customer satisfaction across North America by supply chain executives. Port
activity, behind tourism, is one of the leading source of Charleston's revenue.
The port has links to one hundred and forty three countries, sees 2,300 ships
annually, a huge ten billion dollar industry and awarded the Presidential E Star
award in excellence.
Today Charleston boasts the deepest
water in the Southeast region and regularly handles ships too big to transit
through the Panama
Canal. A
next-generation harbour deepening
project is currently underway to take
Charleston's shipping channel deeper than forty five feet at mean low tide.
Union Pier also includes a cruise ship
passenger terminal and hosts numerous cruise departures annually.
In May 2010, the Carnival Fantasy was permanently stationed in Charleston, offering weekly cruises to
the Bahamas and Key
West, eventually to include Bermuda.
Hurricanes are a major threat to the
area during the summer and early autumn, with several severe hurricanes hitting
the area - most notably Hurricane
Hugo on
the 21st of September 1989 (a Category
4 storm).
Charleston was hit by a large
tornado in 1761, which temporarily emptied the
Ashley River, and sank five offshore warships.
After Charles II of England,
Scotland and Ireland
(1630–1685) was restored to the English throne following Oliver
Cromwell's
Protectorate, he granted the chartered Carolina territory to eight of his loyal
friends, known as the Lords Proprietors, in 1663. It took seven years before the
Lords could arrange for settlement, the first being that of Charles Town. The
community was established by English settlers under William
Sayle in
1670 on the west bank of the Ashley River, a few miles northwest of the present
city. It was soon chosen by Anthony Ashley-Cooper, one of the Lords Proprietors,
to become a "great port towne", a destiny which the city fulfilled. By 1680, the
settlement had grown, joined by others from England, Barbados,
and Virginia,
and relocated to its current peninsular location. The capital of the
Carolina
colony,
Charles Town was the center for further expansion and the southernmost point of
English settlement during the late 17th century.
The settlement was often subject to attack from sea and from land.
Periodic assaults from Spain and France, who still contested England's claims to
the region, were combined with resistance from Native
Americans, as well as pirate raids. While the earliest settlers primarily came
from England, colonial Charleston was also home to a mixture of ethnic and
religious groups. French, Scottish, Irish and Germans migrated to the developing seacoast town, representing numerous
Protestant denominations, as well as Roman
Catholicism and Judaism. Sephardic
Jews migrated to the city in such numbers that Charleston eventually was
home to, by the beginning of the 19th century and until about 1830, the largest
and wealthiest Jewish community in North America. Africans were brought to
Charleston on the Middle Passage, first as servants, then as slaves, especially
Wolof, Yoruba, Fulani, Igbo, Malinke, and other peoples of the Windward Coast.
The port of Charleston was the main dropping point for Africans captured and
transported to the United States for sale as slaves.
Charleston is known as The Holy City
due to the prominence of churches on the low-rise cityscape, particularly the
numerous steeples which dot the city's skyline, and for the fact that it was one
of the few cities in the original thirteen
colonies to provide religious tolerance, albeit restricted to
non-Catholics.
America's most-published etiquette
expert, Marjabelle Young
Stewart,
recognised Charleston 1995 as the "best-mannered" city in the U.S, a claim lent
credibility by the fact that it has the first established Livability
Court in
the country. In 2011, Travel and Leisure
Magazine
named Charleston "America's Sexiest City", as well as "America's Most Friendly."
Subsequently, Southern Living Magazine named Charleston "the most polite and
hospitable city in America." The city has won the most polite award for sixteen
years straight. One local said “We are over tourists and visitors like a cheap
suit”. Everyone has been friendly enough to us.
We went out this morning at low tide, returning to a much prettier vista with the tide in. It shows why Bear has to wash
the anchor chain as he winds it in, it does pong some
Meet our
Oodle. When we met Steve, Maggie and Trooper in the Dismal Swamp they told us
about Oodles. They showed us their one in Beaufort. Well we are pleased to
report we have one living aboard Beez Neez. Their purpose is to guard against
baddies; I immediately put ours to use on the upword board to protect me from
bad letters and to thump Big Bear on the score. Result. Hmmmmmmmmmm. We have enjoyed our time here, time to
move off in the morning en route to Beaufort (the one that is pronounced
Bew-fort, South Carolina).
ALL IN ALL A NICE
TIME
GOOD TO BIMBLE AND HAVE A LOOK AT THE
HISTORY
.
