Mapping Reconstructed History
In spring 2023 USCB undergraduate students Samantha Mischke and Grace Farish, overseen by USC Beaufort History Professor Dr. James Shinn undertook an ambitious project to document land ownership by soldiers of the 1st SC Volunteers of African Descent, also known as the 1st SCVAD. Their findings were presented at the Institute for the Study of the Reconstruction Era (ISRE) inaugural spring symposium on April 8, 2023.
This research was made possible by funding through the McCausland grant from USC College of Arts and Sciences.
“When identifying the 1st SC properties, it was a bit of a lengthy process," said student Samantha Mischke.
Research conducted by the two identified 12 properties owned by nine different soldiers during the Reconstruction Era, most of them located in Beaufort's Point, Old Commons and Northwest Quadrant historic districts.
Explaining the process of their research Mischke explained, “To break it down, we would look at enlistment files and [compare] the information on those files to local tax sales in Beaufort, if the information matched then we knew that it was most likely the same person purchasing the property. We compared the tax sales to a Beaufort Tax map that sectioned downtown Beaufort into small bits of land/quadrants. With the tax map, we were able to compare it to a present-day map or look for other records pertaining to the soldier and if anything with the property.”
Mischke's and Farish’s research indicates that SCVAD 1st Color Sergeant Prince Rivers, future SC State Representative and Aiken County co-founder, purchased four different properties through direct tax sales held by US Tax Commissioners in Union-held Beaufort during the Civil War.
Providing photographs of the properties they discovered that were subsequently mapped helped identify which locations still had historic buildings. This provided the foundation for future land ownership research by ISRE staff as well as a starting point for research by other students in the University of South Carolina system.
- USCB -
LM 9/16/2023