Wreck of the Celt, 1865.  This image is sometimes misidentified as  the Ruby.
-From the Library of Congress

The Celt (also called the Sylph and the Colt) was built in Charleston, and launched from her wharves in 1862-63.  This was at a time when it seemed to many that the Confederacy’s independence was still a possible outcome of the Civil War.   Even though the South won signal victories on land during that period, they continued to lose the war at sea. This was especially true when it came to breaking the blockade; a fleet of Union ships that bottled up the major Southern ports. As the blockades effectiveness grew, less and less of the desperately needed food, munitions’ and medicine managed to reach the interior.   The Confederate Navy was severely under manned and under equipped, and could do little to break the stranglehold.

  A class of entrepreneurs called Blockade Runners would try to alleviate these mounting shortages.     These Rhett Butler types, some motivated by patriotism, others by profit, would try to slip past the blockade at night in sleek specially crafted boats.  Their goal was to reach a foreign port such as Nassau, exchange their cargo of cotton for necessities and slip back through the net once more.  Dozens of these vessels ran, or attempted to run, the blockade through the Civil War, and The Celt was one of these.

The Celt’s success as a blockade runner is difficult to gauge.  Another larger British ship bore the same name, and over the years the history of the two has become intertwined.  There is no record of the Charleston-based Celt clearing or returning the port before February of 1865.  Likely the ship tried to run the blockade several times, but was turned away by weather or circumstance.  It seems the first documented run of the Celt was also its’ last.  Late on the evening of Feb 14, the Celt, loaded with 190 bales of cotton, attempted the blockade.  In the process of hugging the coast to escape detection it ground ashore near the rocks of Sullivan’s Island.  The surviving crew went their separate ways, one group would brave the water and try to go ashore in the dark, and another seven would row out to the blockading fleet in a small boat and surrender.        

 Days later, the city of Charleston and all the batteries and forts in the harbor would be abandoned as the Confederates evacuated.   The incoming Union navy scoured the coastline and examined the wrecked corpses of the numerous failed blockade runners, including the Celt, that littered the seaboard.  According to one Union officer “The Celt lies stranded on the beach at Sullivan’s Island back broken, full of water and decks ripped up.  The machinery is in irreparable condition, some few pieces might be removed and be of service.  Boilers are mostly below water, but judging from the condition of those parts visible, we are of the opinion they are not worth the expense of removing.”

 Over the years, the waves carried away much of the stranded ship, erasing it from memory.  Yet, even in the late 20th century, wreckage from the Celt could still be seen off Sullivan’s at low-tide, although this debris was so covered with marine growth that it appeared to be simply part of the rocky shore.  Few who passed by, or fished in the surrounding waters, realized that a relic from the War Between the States was in their midst.



 

Call on thy children of the hill,
Wake swamp and river,
 coast and rill,
Rouse all thy strength and all thy skill,
Carolina! Carolina!
 
This stirring summons forms the opening stanza of Henry Timrod’s epic poem, Carolina.  Predestined to a literary life, Henry was born in 1828 to William Timrod, a published poet, and bookbindery proprietor. His father’s shop was a gathering place for aspiring Charleston writers: luminaries such as William Gilmore Simms, James Louis Petigru, and Rev. Samuel Gilman.

Although not wealthy, the Timrods managed to send Henry to a elite private school in Charleston, and with financial assistance from a wealthy friend, Timrod attended the University of Georgia in 1845.  He withdrew, unsatisfied with the school, after less than two years.  In 1849, The Southern Literary Messenger launched his professional career by publishing his works.  Supplementing his income, Timrod tutored prominent planters’ children, until, in 1860, a small volume of Timrod’s poems was published to critical, if not financial, acclaim.

Preceding the Civil War, Timrod was employed at Orange Grove Plantation near Florence.  After the first shots were fired on Fort Sumter, Timrod turned his pen to extolling the virtues of the Southern cause.  Enlisting for military service, his poor health prevented his service on Confederate front lines.  Discontent at home, Timrod worked as a war correspondent in the Western theater.  Life in the field further deteriorated his health, forcing him to return home, where he continued writing prolifically.  His patriotically inspired verse earning him the sobriquet “The Poet Laureate of the Confederacy.”
 
In 1864, Timrod secured an associate editor position at the Columbia newspaper, South Carolinian, but an 1865 fire destroyed much of the city, claiming Timrod’s job at the newspaper.  Desperate for work, he sent submissions to Northern papers, without success.  Absent the assistance of friends, Timrod would have been destitute.  His final years a financial and physical struggle, tuberculosis claimed the gifted poet’s life in 1867.  He was laid to rest at Trinity Church graveyard in Columbia.    

In 1901, the Timrod Memorial Association of South Carolina raised funds by selling Timrod’s poems, and erected a bronze bust in Washington Square Park, behind City Hall.  The image below  taken after its unveiling, pictures the  bust, alongside the Washington Light Infantry Monument and the Fireproof Building.

Interestingly enough Timrod would garner national attention once again in 2006.    An article in the New York Times brought to light similarities between Bob Dylan's lyrics on his Modern Times Album and the poetry of Timrod  (This article on the Poetry Foundation's website covers this debate pretty thoroughly).

  In 1911, at the urging of the Daughters of the American Revolution, Timrod’s poem, Carolina was set to music by Miss Anne Custis Burgess, and honored as the state song of South Carolina.  The closing lines of the song are a fitting tribute to the valor of the state and to the life of Timrod himself.
 
Girt with such wills to do and bear,
Assured in right,
 and mailed in prayer,
Thou wilt not bow thee to despair,
Carolina! Carolina!
__________________

Top Image- Making of America-Cornell
Bottom Image- Library of Congress

On Nov. 2, 1853 Otis Mills opened the doors of his grand hotel.  For almost a year workers had been toiling on the corner of Meeting and Queen Street, laboring to erect the five-story structure that would carry his name. No expense had been spared.  Outside of the hotel ran a beautiful wrought-iron balcony imported from Philadelphia, the terra cotta window cornices selected from New England.   Inside were 125 rooms, besides lodging the Mills House could also offer the luxury of piping in steam heat, and a even rarer commodity in the 19th century; running water.  Architect John E. Earle had designed the building, but it was Mills who dreamed of the venture.  It is claimed that he envisioned a respectable hotel for those who could not afford to pay the high prices being charged by the leading hotels in Charleston at this time.

Mills gambled a lot on the success of his hotel.  As the chief financier he contributed almost $200,000 dollars (several million by modern standard) to this project.  With so much invested, Mills hoped that the guests would be numerous, all pleased enough with their stay to spread the word.  

He need not to have worried.  The Mills House quickly became a Charleston institution.  Travelers to the busy port city could always rely on the hotel for accommodations.  When Charleston was selected to host the Democratic National Convention in 1860, it was quickly jammed with delegates.  Diarist Mary Boykin Chestnut, whose wartime memoirs have garnered numerous awards, also stayed in the Mills House.   General Robert E. Lee, during his tenure as commander of the Department, which encompassed S.C., had quarters in the hotel.  As the carriage drivers passing it today will tell you, he was there when the great fire of 1861 burned through the city.  Luckily, the Mills House escaped destruction in 1861, and was available for the dashing Creole General P.G.T Beauregard to use as his headquarters later in the Civil War.    

After the Civil War, the hotel struggled, closing for a period, then reopening in 1870, and continuing until 1897 (This 1865 image shows the Meeting Street front of the then war ravaged hotel with several African American men out front).

 Mrs. Lawton purchased the property, changed its name to St John Hotel, and went back into business.   In 1901-1902 Charleston hosted the South Carolina and Interstate and West Indian Exposition, bringing many visitors into the city.  One of them was none other than President Theodore Roosevelt, who was entertained at the St. John.  It passed hands through the 1900’s several times, barley surviving a 1939 fire, and wound up nearly derelict in by the 1960’s.  Unable to salvage the old structure, the building was razed.   In 1970 the hotel reopened, under its first name, the Mills House.  Besides using the original name, the developers enlarged the hotel, but managed to take it back to its antebellum appearance.  In 2009, the Mills House still offers comfortable lodging in the heart of Charleston, serving as a base of operations for visitors from all over the world.     
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Mills House, ca. 1865. Images From Library of Congress.