2020 Georgia - part 6: coastal towns of Port Royal, Beaufort, and Tybee Island - Travel With Us

Unlike our other Georgia trips this spring when we’re in rural areas with little to do besides enjoy our state parks, this trip to Skidaway Island State Park near Savannah lets us enjoy other coastal towns. As we’ve found elsewhere along the Atlantic Coast, little coastal towns were the first to be established before other towns more inland could be built. First we had lunch in Port Royal, South Carolina, a fishing town on the Intercoastal Waterway.

A couple we met on a hike at George L. Smith State Park were from Port Royal and recommended that we have lunch at *Fishcamp on 11th Street*. Our GPS took us on back streets as we wound around old neighborhoods. As the road ended, we saw the docks and our destination! Thank you GPS!

I love reading about the history of restaurants we find. Shrimp fishing, a family tradition, and changing industries describe this port and this restaurant.

Industries here have ranged from railroads, military battles, oystering, and shrimping. Today these docks provide a safe port for local shrimpers and swordfish boat captains.

We were able to sit outside (safely) on a screened porch looking out on the fishing boats. We started with our favorite *hush puppies*, a coastal treat all along the Atlantic Coast! I still remember Barney getting me to try them.

The restaurant overlooks a river that runs into the Atlantic Ocean and looks out on Parris Island, the Marine Corps training grounds for new recruits.

One of the other reasons that we wanted to come to this area was to check out nearby Huntington Beach State Park, but we would have had to pay for a day pass just to drive around so we declined. But . . . we did come across this historical sign about Penn School. Of course the grounds and buildings were closed because of Covid-19, but we did start reading about these wonderful women from the North who wanted to help out the freed black children in this area before the Civil War was even over. More about this later.

In 1861 after Union occupied the Sea Islands, Laura Towne and Ellen Murray came from the North to assist the freed blacks in this area, establishing this school here in 1862. The earliest known black teacher was Charlotte Forten who came here from Massachusetts to help her people.

Today the Penn Center is on the site of the former Penn School, one of the country’s first schools for formerly enslaved individuals. It is one of the most significant African American historical and cultural institutions in existence today. Located on St. Helena Island, it is one of the most beautiful and historically distinct of the South Carolina Sea Islands, and at the heart of Gullah culture.

We’d love to come back when we can investigate more.

Beaufort, SC

We’ve been to Beaufort a number of times when we’ve been in the Savannah/Hilton Head area. This town is not to be confused with Beaufort, North Carolina, where we’ve also visited since it’s close to where Barney and the family lived in his Marine Corps days. Besides, while the names of the 2 towns are spelled the same, they are pronounced differently. South Carolina has a U vowel sound, and North Carolina has an O vowel sound—in case you wanted to know.

As we drove across this bridge with the town’s waterfront on the left, we saw this cruise ship docked there. This was a new sight for us. The Beaufort River is fairly wide at this point but up stream it wouldn’t be wide enough for such ships.

After parking, we started walking along the water toward the ship. The park was constructed along the Beaufort River/Intracoastal Waterway in the mid-1970s and was renovated in 2006 to 2008.

The multi-acre park provides a breathtaking view of the Beaufort River, the Woods Memorial Bridge that we just crossed, the western tip of Lady’s Island, the eastern side of Port Royal Island (where we had lunch), and the northern tip of Parris Island, home to the Marine Corps Recruiting Depot.

It’s the American Star, an East Coast cruise ship, that’s berthed here.

And it’s docked because of Covid-19! All of the passengers disembarked in Charleston, SC, on Saturday, March 14, prior to the ship arriving in Beauford. No passenger or crew member ever had symptoms, and the ship has been thoroughly cleaned, so the cruise line is just waiting for the word that they can start cruising again.

This lovely park setting along the waterfront is my most favorite of any we have ever visited. The swings just invite sitting and watching. We enjoyed ice cream cones while watching the scenes in the next pictures.

The bridge we drove across to enter Beaufort was low enough that it has to move to accommodate boats on the river. In this case, a sailboat stopped traffic on the bridge so it could move safely toward the coast.

Here’s another view of the park area along the waterfront.

And a closeup of the circular oasis that houses these brass plaques describing the history of Beauford. We didn’t remember seeing these when we were here before.

Beaufort history

I’m going to leave these pictures full-size so you can read as much of the history as you want to and just highlight what I found interesting. These plaques tell the story of the South.

Before Beaufort was founded, the Spanish, French, and English explored this coast.

Conflict with Spanish Florida resulted in the founding of Beaufort, South Carolina, in 1702.

Conflict with the local Indians destroyed the early settlement in 1715, and the Yemassee War from 1715-1729 depopulated the frontier. The Cherokee joined the colonists in this conflict to defeat the Yemassee. This tribe then went to Florida where they merged with the Seminoles. The plantation era was then free to start, and cattle thrived on the Sea Islands on the mainland. Rice was introduced from West Africa in the 1730s, and indigo was introduced to the Sea Islands. Both crops prompted the importation of tens of thousands of African slaves.

Life was prosperous for some during the decade before the Revolutionary War. England’s forceful moving of the colony’s capital was one of the grievances in the Declaration of Independence. During the war, the loyalty of the citizens of Beauford was divided between the 2 countries, and neighbors and family members fought against each other. Battles all over the area forced Beaufort to rebuild after 8 years of war. While indigo and rice disappeared as industries, cotton became the main commercial crop, and the cotton revolution in the old south began.

The wealth from Sea Island cotton and Carolina Gold rice made Beaufort one of he wealthiest towns in America before the Civil War. South Carolina led the South out of the Union, and the Civil War began (or “The War Between the States” or “The Unpleasantaries” as we heard one South Carolina woman say at a visitors center).

Early in the Civil War (1861), a huge Union fleet steamed into the Sea Islands and stayed in control of this area throughout the war. The wealthy planter families evacuated, leaving behind nearly 10,000 slaves. Penn School was started to prepare them for emancipation. The Sea Island slaves because among the first freedmen in America through President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation in 1863. After the war ended, Beauford and the Sea Islands had become a colony of African American freedmen and northern merchants.

Beaufort’s African American majority controlled politics for 3 decades. Reconstruction transformed Beaufort from a plantation economy to a commercial and industrial economy. The railroad delivered coal, and steamships frequently came to Port Royal.

Phosphate rock was discovered on the river bottom, and from 1870-1893, this county was the leading domestic source of phosphates, creating 3000 local jobs. Per Wikipedia, pure phosphorus is used to make chemicals for use in industry. The most important use of phosphate rock, though, is in the production of phosphate fertilizers for agriculture.

In 1893 a deadly hurricane struck Beauford and completely destroyed the phosphate industry. The railroad company went bankrupt, and the U.S. Navy abandoned their coaling station and dry dock in 1901. By 1920, cotton growing was over because of the boll weevil. The principal pillars of the reconstruction economy disappeared by the 1920s. The port of Beauford was officially closed in 1933.

The “Jim Crow” laws establishing segregation hit Beaufort county during this time, and white Democratic political rule replaced the African American Republicans. Over half of the African American population moved away by 1940. The majority of the citizens were white for the first time in Beaufort’s history. By the 1990s, this county was one of the poorest places in America.