Francis Marion Walked Where We Walk

Rebecca Dunahoe has collected stories about Francis Marion, the Swamp Fox of the American Revolution, all her life. Front-porch stories heard in her youth, spent a few miles from Marion's Snow's Island hideout, sparked an interest that remains alive today. Through the years she archived those stories in boxes, painstakingly finding at least three sources to back up each of them, always intending to put them into a book when she got old. Last year, she says, she realized, "I'm 89 years old. I don't think I'd better wait any longer." Francis Marion, The Swamp Fox of Snow's Island was published in October 2017. Last week, Becky Dunahoe talked a little about her research and signed copies of the book at the Kingstree branch of the Williamsburg County Library at an event co-sponsored by The Friends of the Library and the Williamsburgh Historical Society.

Rebecca Dunahoe at the Williamsburg County Library on April 17.

It's hard for us caught up in the electronic world of 2018 to imagine that people we study in history classes actually walked or rode their horses through the same streets we ride on today. But Gen. Francis Marion, Major John James, British Col. Banastre Tarleton, and General George Lord Cornwallis, knew intimately the area we now call home.

When Francis Marion took command of the militias in this area on August 17, 1780, there is no doubt that many of our ancestors were among the members of the Williamsburgh, or Kingstree, regiment, which became the nucleus of Marion's Brigade. You can find a detailed discussion of the evolution of Marion's Men in this area in a Francis Marion Symposium presentation by J.D. Lewis.

A marker on W. Academy Street in Kingstree commemorates the Battle of Kingstree

 fought in the vicinity on August 27, 1780.

Ten days after Marion took command, he sent Major John James on a reconnaissance mission to the King's Tree to determine the strength of British Major James Wemyss' troops, who were burning a path of destruction through the district. Although James' orders were to count troops, he could not resist engaging Wemyss in a rear-action skirmish just north of town. Wemyss' 300 men greatly outnumbered James' 150, but James moved quickly, killing or wounding 15 of Wemyss' troops and capturing another 15 before disappearing into the night. James lost 30 of his own troops, but he was able to give Marion enough information for the general to decide the British troops were too strong for him to engage them at that time.

A kiosk placed in Kellahan Park by the Francis Marion Trail Commission

explains Major James' methods of gathering intelligence.

In March 2012, the Williamsburgh Historical Society sponsored a

re-enactment of the Battle of Kingstree at the park.

On October 24, 1780, Marion spent some time in Kingstree on his way to engage the British at Tearcoat Swamp in Clarendon County. Later that year, from December 6-10, he was again at the King's Tree.

According to J.D. Lewis, on December 29, 1780, Cornet Thomas Merritt and a small group of the Queen's Rangers sacked the town of Kingstree, then quickly returned to Georgetown with no casualties. Although General Marion tried to capture Merritt once he heard of the raid, he did not succeed.

Just below Kingstree, at the Lower Bridge over Black River, Marion and his troops engaged the British for the final time in Williamsburg County in a battle that has over the last few years gained in significance in the eyes of revolutionary war historians. In the early days of March 1781, Marion and British Lt. Col. John Watson engaged in several battles. On March 14, it became evident to Marion that Watson was trying to lead him astray so that British troops could reach Kingstree, while other British troops raided Marion's Snow's Island hideout. Marion sent John James and 30 of McCottry's Riflemen ahead of the main body of his troops to ford the river near the bridge and dismantle the bridge by tearing up the boards and burning the stringers. 

In March 2010, Robert. C. Barrett, at that time Director of the Francis Marion Trail Commission,

unveiled the Battle of the Lower Bridge historic marker as it was re-erected and re-dedicated. 

It had been temporarily removed from its site on SC-377 while a new bridge was built.

At the rededication ceremony, the Williamsburgh Historical Society sponsored

a re-enactment of the Battle of the Lower Bridge. 

The riflemen then waited until Watson's men attempted to ford the river. McCottry's sharpshooters easily picked them off, as well as the men manning the two cannons the British had set up to cover their attempt to ford the river. The battle turned into a rout with the British fleeing down the road to a nearby plantation, where Marion's men continued to harass them. Watson was widely quoted as saying, "I have never seen such shooting in my life." There are no casualty figures for this battle. Tradition says the British dumped their dead, which were numerous, into the river at Robinson's Hole, one of three, deep, rock-lined holes in Black River between the Lower Bridge and the Main Street bridge in Kingstree.

According to old newspaper accounts, South Carolina furnished more men, more money and had more battles fought on its soil than any other colony in the American Revolution, and Francis Marion was one of the war's most popular participants. Many are the stories and poems written about him. William Cullen Bryant's Song of Marion's Men begins: 

Our band is few, but true and tried, 

Our leader frank and bold;

The British soldier trembles

When Marion's name is told...

Recently I found in an 1859 newspaper another poem, titled The Deeds of Marion's Men. Its author was identified only as J.G.C. The second stanza reads:

In the gloomiest strife of our country's life,

When her dawning was darkened by night;

When tyrants were found on her holiest ground,

And her friends were scattered in flight;

When the best of her children, unarmed and unfed,

Were hunted through cavern and glen–

The red ranks of Albion trembled with dread

At the deeds of Marion's men.

I've often thought that with all the stories, legends, and poetry surrounding Francis Marion and his exploits, someone more talented than I could pull them all together into a glorious outdoor drama that surely would rival The Lost Colony and Unto These Hills.

Becky Dunahoe speaks to the group gathered at the Williamsburg County Library April 17.

Francis Marion married late in life and had no children. However, descendants of his siblings were quick to point out their blood connection to the general. The great-grandmother of Julia Ward Howe, who wrote the lyrics to Battle Hymn of the Republic, was Marion's sister. Howe is quoted as saying at a meeting she attended on a blustery afternoon when she was well into her 80s, "General Marion was known in his generation as The Swamp Fox, and when I succeed in eluding the care of my guardians, children and grandchildren, and coming to a meeting like this, I think I may be said to have inherited some of his characteristics."

Last week, Becky Dunahoe smiled as she said, "You know, he (Francis Marion) won the war!" Many modern historians now believe that Marion's contributions to winning the war were considerably greater than once thought. Robert D. Bass notes in his book on the Swamp Fox, that from August 15, 1780, until September 8, 1781, Marion and his men alone held eastern South Carolina from the British. Had the British not had to fight these battles, they could have concentrated their military power in other areas, making it harder for the rag-tag American troops to win the war.

Becky Dunahoe signs a book for Harriet McIntosh as Teon Singletary looks on.

All photos by Linda Brown

And we should not ever forget that those who came before us in our little part of the world here in Kingstree also played their roles and played them well in helping the Swamp Fox outfox the British and in laying the groundwork for a republic that has now stood for 242 years.

Reading, 'Riting, 'Rithmetic in Kingstree

On April 11, State Superintendent of Education Molly Spearman declared a state of emergency in the Williamsburg County School District, paving the way for the State Department of Education to take over the day-to-day operation of the county's public schools.

The administrative offices of the Williamsburg County School District

on School Street in Kingstree.

Photo by Linda Brown

The current crisis, according to information provided at a public meeting held at Kingstree Senior High on April 10, developed over several years. It was brought into sharper focus several weeks ago when the D.P. Cooper Charter School filed suit against the district, prompting the county's legislative delegation to request a South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) investigation, as well as an audit from the department of education.

A functioning education system is among the most important parts of the underlying infrastructure of any community. Organized education came relatively early to the village at the King's Tree. According to a pamphlet prepared in the early part of the last century, the person whose suggestion prompted the first organized school in Kingstree was none other than General Francis Marion, the Swamp Fox of American Revolutionary War fame. This pamphlet served as the basis for the education portion of a full-page article that appeared in The State newspaper in 1910 touting Kingstree's rapid advances in the early years of the 20th century.

This print of Peggy McGill's painting of Francis Marion 

hangs in the office of the Williamsburgh Historical Museum.

Photo by Linda Brown

It stated, "During the Revolutionary War, when General Francis Marion and some of his men were concealed in the river swamps, he was visited by a party of citizens from the community. In the course of the conversation, someone asked, 'Why are there so many Tories in this county?' Marion replied, 'Because of the lack of education. Why don't you start a school up here near the King's Tree?' To hear was to heed, and in a few months the first school in this community was organized." We have no way of knowing if this conversation actually took place although we do know General Marion strongly supported public education during his years in the state legislature.

In the early 1800s, Col. John Wilson taught a school about one mile north of Kingstree. A bit later townspeople organized an academy at the head of the street we now know as Academy Street. Some references refer to it as Williamsburg Academy; others call it Kingstree Academy. This private school was co-educational although boys and girls were taught in separate classrooms. Dr. Samuel Davis McGill, known for his Narrative of Reminiscences of Williamsburg County, taught here in 1850. The school closed during the Civil War and did not re-open afterward.

The first Kingstree Academy was conducted on this property

until it closed during the Civil War.

Photo Courtesy Williamsburgh Historical Museum

A private home now sits at the head of Academy Street.

Photo by Linda Brown

A number of small private schools sprang up during the years after the war. Edwin C. Epps in his typewritten memoir remembered the first school he attended was in an unoccupied building known as Ward's Old Hotel. Located where Anderson Brothers Bank stands today, it later became the home of Edwin Harper and was known for many years as the Harper House.

The Harper House, believed to have been built around 1840 was

apparently once known as The Old Ward's Hotel, according to Edwin C. Epps.

Photo courtesy Williamsburgh Historical Museum

Another school was located under the famous magnolia in Mrs. M.J. Porter's yard on Mill Street. Edwin Epps thought this small building had begun life as a law office but was used in the 1870s-1880s as a school. I speculate that perhaps Carrie Simons Heller, who boarded with Mrs. Porter when she first moved to Kingstree, taught at this school.

Epps also remembers a "miserable little hut" located where Jackson and Church streets now intersect. He stated that the yard of this school was always thick with broomstraw.

The lot on which the "miserable little hut" was located remains vacant today.

Photo by Linda Brown

According to the pamphlet on education in Kingstree, by 1895 there were three or more schools located in the town limits. At that time, the Rev. W.B. Duncan, pastor of Kingstree Methodist Church, suggested forming a high school. Those in favor of his suggestion appointed him principal; however, there was much opposition to the idea. To circumvent this opposition, the deed for the lot on the corner of Mill Street and Hampton Avenue was executed in the middle of the night, the pamphlet noted. This school, also known as Kingstree Academy, served the community for a number of years. For several years, the Academy, which was a private school, also allowed public school students to attend. However, in 1897, the public school separated from the Academy. Sallie Wilson taught the 25 students of the public school that year.

In 1898, Kingstree Academy's two teachers, T. Olin Epps and Eva Riser, taught in crowded conditions. Ann McIntosh, correspondent for the Florence Morning News, conducted interviews in 1960 with Epps and Eva Riser Lee, both still living in Kingstree. Mrs. Lee remembered that she gave Billy Britton his first spanking for pulling Marian Gilland's pigtails. She said that Britton, who went on to serve as Kingstree Police Chief for 25 years, never had the nerve to give her a traffic ticket, which is amusing because Mrs. Lee was a notoriously bad driver. Attorney Dessie O'Bryan, Marian Gilland O'Bryan's son, used to tell stories about his father cautioning him and his siblings to get far off the street if they spotted Mrs. Lee driving by. Perhaps' one of Mr. Epps' greatest legacies is that his daughter, Isabell Epps Tompkins, was a much-beloved first-grade teacher who taught many of us over the years.

Also by 1898, a school for black children was operating next door to the Odd Fellows Hall. Daisy Swails, daughter of Stephen A. Swails, served as director and teacher for this school. She directed several exhibitions at the courthouse each year, showcasing her students' abilities in recitation and singing. Large integrated audiences attended these evenings. On May 8, 1904, this school burned, along with the Odd Fellows Hall.

In 1900, William Willis Boddie, who would later write the History of Williamsburg, became principal of the Kingtsree Academy. He established it as a graded school and brought it into the state's public school system.

The Kingstree Academy located on the corner of Hampton Ave. and Mill St.

where the Williamsburgh Historical Museum is today.

Photo Courtesy Willaimsburgh Historical Museum

When the Carnegie Library was built in 1917, the main body of the Academy

which had been converted into a house was moved down Hampton Avenue.

Fittingly, it was for many years the residence of the Ernest Reeves family.

Mr. Reeves was a long-time administrator for the Williamsburg County School District.

Photo by Linda Brown

In the early 1900s, the Kingstree school was almost wholly supported by proceeds from the dispensary, South Carolina's state-run monopoly on liquor sales. When Williamsburg County embraced prohibition, there was real concern about how the schools would continue to operate. As the school grew, the primary department moved into a cottage on Mill Street owned by R.H. Kellahan on the lot where Personalize It is located today.

As the school continued to grow, Mayor John A. Kelley, Postmaster Louis Jacobs, and Dr. D.C. Scott began meeting nightly at the Kingstree Post Office to discuss the need for a new school building. Again certain parties vehemently opposed borrowing money to build a school, but voters approved a bond referendum, and the new school, built on the corner of Brooks and School streets, was ready in time to host commencement exercises in 1904. To build and furnish the school cost $15,000.

Enrollment increased rapidly as families who lived in the country sent their children to board in town in order to attend the new school. A number of families bought property and built homes in Kingstree. The school became a victim of its own success as it quickly outgrew the building. Work began on an annex in 1907, which included a 700-seat auditorium with a frescoed ceiling. By 1910, enrollment reached 250 students, and the school boasted a faculty of eight. For the 1910-11 school year, Superintendent J.W. Swittenberg and the board of trustees appointed Irene Robinson principal for the high school, the first woman to hold the position of principal at the school.

The Kingstree Graded and High School on the corner of Brooks and School streets

as it looked in 1911.

Photo from The County Record, May 1911

Despite the school's success there was also a number of problems and concerns. One was that far too many young men failed to complete high school, most of them dropping out before graduation to farm or enter the workforce. On a more physical plane, the roof of the original part of the building was ripped off during the hurricane of 1906, which damaged almost every building in Kingstree.

The school on Brooks Street continued as an elementary school until the mid-1950s when the district undertook a major building initiative. The high school moved to Third Avenue in 1924. The graded school building was demolished in 1960.

This building on Academy Street, completed during the 1950s, served as the elementary school

until a few years ago when a new one was built on another site.

Education in Kingstree has experienced periods of great success as well as periods of crisis throughout its long existence. State Representative Cezar McKnight stated at the recent public meeting, "You cannot fix what you will not face." As the school district faces the current crisis, it's good to remember that it has weathered quite a few in its long past.

Depot Was Once Busy Commercial Hub

On Thanksgiving Day, 1905, the citizens of Kingstree, South Carolina, had something special for which to give thanks. That afternoon, passenger train No. 50 made its inaugural stop at the brand new Atlantic Coast Line (ACL) Depot, located at the Main Street Crossing.

The Kingstree Train Depot as it looked shortly after its completion.

Photo courtesy Williamsburgh Historical Museum

Trains had come through Kingstree since the railroad opened in 1856, providing village residents with a lifeline to the outside world as goods came to town on the train, local farmers shipped their produce to northern markets, and everyone who could afford a ticket was able to travel to nearby towns or even farther away for shopping or for visiting friends and relatives.

Capt. Conrad Constine told the story that when the very first train was scheduled to come through town, a large crowd gathered on Main Street to watch it. Capt. Isaac Nelson reportedly joined the throng which had, as it was raining, gathered under several umbrellas. Capt. Nelson "cautioned" the group to put the umbrellas down as they "might frighten the engine." Several people immediately complied while others snickered at their gullible neighbors.

An unidentified gentlemen poses with his horse in front of the depot.

Photo courtesy Williamsburgh Historical Museum

The Kingstree Depot at that time was located in a rough, wooden building about a mile north of the one opened in 1905. It was on the east side of the tracks just north of today's Brooks Street. However, as Kingstree's commercial district developed, businessmen found that the depot was not  easily accessible, and its location at the edge of town made it an easy target for burglars. In December 1896, the safe in the Southern Freight Office's section of the depot was blown open with dynamite, and the building was broken into on numerous occasions in the late 1890s, early 1900s. In 1901, burglars made off with a crate of oranges and took the time to open a box of cheese and chisel out a portion, presumably for a snack.

By the early 1900s, residents began circulating a petition to encourage the ACL to move the depot to the Main Street crossing. There were, however, others who did not look kindly on a move, and for a time those in favor of and those against moving the depot lobbied their fellow townspeople to sign their respective petitions.

Construction of the 144.2'-by-40' building began in the spring of 1905 and was completed by early summer. However, as a long freight track and an even longer pass track were also under construction, the ACL didn't move depot operations to the new location until November, causing County Record editor C.W. Wolfe to comment on October 5, "The new depot is quite satisfactory to the town from an architectural standpoint, but for all practical purposes, we are no better off than before it was built." During this time, a 40-foot cotton platform was added to the south end of the building.

The cotton platform was well-used during the early days of the depot.

Wagons loaded with cotton wait in line to unload at the depot.

Photos courtesy Williamsburgh Historical Museum

Local citizens narrowly averted disaster when, on October 10, 1905, sparks from a passing locomotive ignited a pile of shavings beneath the newly-constructed wooden platform. If these observant citizens had not noticed the blaze and extinguished it, there was little doubt that serious damage to the cotton platform would have resulted before the depot even opened.

The original wooden platform on the south end of the depot has been

replaced by a deck that provides outdoor seating for The Front Porch restaurant.

Photo by Linda Brown

The depot brought more people to Main Street, some to do business, some to watch the trains. In late 1906, two tragic accidents happened within weeks of each other. On Sunday afternoon, December 9, nine-year-old Courtney Kirk, son of local attorney Robert Kirk, was standing on the main line watching a freight train come into the pass track as passenger train No. 51 came into the station behind him. The passenger train, although moving slowly, hit him, knocking him from the track. His head hit a cross-tie on the pass track as he fell, killing him. Courtney, who was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, while his father served as U.S. Counsul to that country, is buried at the Baptist Cemetery at the other end of Main Street. As the town mourned this loss, on December 31, the No. 50 passenger train struck Austin Hines several hundred feet below the station, fatally injuring him. Hines, 55, a former ACL cook on the work train, had lived in Kingstree about two years.

The Kingstree sign on the depot.

There were comic moments associated with the depot, as well. In September 1907, ticket agent, J.P. Taylor, was surprised when he heard a commotion in the ticket office and came out of a back room to find a cow standing at the ticket window. The owners of the People's Market were driving a herd of  30 beef cattle through town when this maverick broke away and wandered in through the open ticket office door. Taylor kept his cool, and after securing a length of rope was able to lasso the errant cow. How he managed to get it turned around and out of the office was not reported in the newspaper. The paper did report that the incident attracted a large crowd of laughing people to the depot.

The depot was a busy place in the early part of the 20th century. In addition to passenger arrivals and departures, much freight was shipped and received. In 1909, over 3,000 bales of cotton grown by local farmers were shipped from Kingstree. That same year a number of farmers experimented with truck crops to see what would bring in more cash. This experiment resulted in 20-freight car loads of green beans shipped from Kingstree that summer.

The Kingstree Depot in summer and winter.

Photos by Linda Brown

But times change, and as road conditions improved, and trucking became more prevalent, the depot ceased to be the town's main shipping hub. Eventually, the Town of Kingstree acquired the building from CSX, and while AMTRAK still stops in Kingstree four times a day, the depot itself, aside from a passenger waiting room, was converted to other uses.

Various restaurants have occupied the southern end of the station since the 1980s. In August 2017, Tonya Moore opened The Front Porch restaurant in the space. She named it The Front Porch in tribute to her late father who spent many hours sitting on the front porch of his home, and her memories of him are centered on the porch. Currently the restaurant is open Tuesday through Friday from 11-2 for lunch and 5-9 for supper. It is also open on Sundays for lunch from 11:30-2. It is available for special events on Saturdays.

The Front Porch restaurant offers Southern cooking at the Kingstree depot.

For a number of years, the Williamsburg County Chamber of Commerce, later re-named the Williamsburg HomeTown Chamber, maintained offices in the depot. The chamber moved to Academy Street during the depot's last renovation, and on January 1, 2018, the depot became the official home of the Main Street, Kingstree program. It seems particularly fitting that this 113-year-old building, once the town's commercial hub, now houses the office of an organization charged with finding ways to bring new life and businesses to downtown Kingstree.

Tales of Three Barbers

The recent post on Kingstree's bygone gardens noted that we don't know the names of the black male gardeners and yardmen who spent many hours keeping those gardens beautiful. There is, however, a group of black men who also worked hard at their profession and whose names we do know. They are the barbers, and today we'll look at three of them and their lives.

John D. Mouzon was a very young man when he took over the barbershop at the Coleman Hotel on Main Street, on the site where Williamsburg County Water & Sewer and the Development Board are now located. From the 1900 census, we can deduce that he was 25 years old when he ran a notice in the March 1903 issue of The County Record, announcing that he would close the barbershop at the hotel promptly at 11 a.m. on Sunday mornings.

The Hotel Van Keuren, built on the site of the old Coleman Hotel in 1907.

John Mouzon's barbershop was probably at the far right of the photo.

Courtesy Williamsburgh Historical Museum

John Mouzon came from a well-known family as Edwin Epps noted in his memoir that in the 1880s, the Mouzons lived in the only two houses in the open fields on Brooks Street between the Baptist Church and the railroad. John's father, Benjamin, was a farmer; his mother, Harriet Niles Mouzon, was a laundress. His grandmother Nancy Mouzon also lived with his family, which included 13 children.

When the Coleman House ceased operation, Mouzon moved his barbershop to the small space at the rear of the archway in the three-story Gourdin building on Main Street, close to the old hotel. In 1907, when R.H. Kellahan built a new hotel, the Hotel Van Keuren, on the site of the old Coleman House, Mouzon moved back to the hotel. The County Record noted that his new quarters provided more room and natural light. At hotel manager Herbert Van Keuren's death, the hotel was renamed the Kellahan Hotel, but John Mouzon's barbershop remained a fixture there. 

The archway in the Gourdin Building as it looks today. 

When the building was under construction in 1904, it was referred to as

the "Gourdin Skyscraper" as it was the first three-story building in Kingstree.

Photo by Linda Brown

The Kellahan Hotel.

Courtesy Williamsburgh Historical Museum

In 1909, Mouzon was written up in the newspaper as something of a hero. On Saturday, July 24, he was walking down the sidewalk toward his barbershop when he passed his old place of business in the Gourdin building and noticed flames shooting up toward the ceiling. At the time, Jeff Fulton operated a pressing club where men could take their suits and shirts to be pressed in the building and had gone home to dinner, leaving a small boy in charge of the shop. According to the newspaper, "somehow the stove came into contact with gasoline and the resulting explosion sent flames to the ceiling." John Mouzon calmly put out the fire and was credited with saving the building and possibly the entire block, as the fire would have spread quickly.

Published in The County Record, March 23, 1911

John's father Benjamin was not listed in the 1910 census. John, however, still lived with his mother Harriet and several of his siblings, but they now lived on Hampton Avenue. Joe Alston, another barber, boarded with the family.

Yet another barber who plied his trade in Kingstree a little earlier than John Mouzon was Evans J. Aoston. Evans Aoston was from Wilimington, NC, where he married Nellie Gibson on July 5, 1887. They came to Kingstree not long thereafter, and by 1900, he, Nellie, their one-year-old adopted daughter Mabell, and his 13-year-old nephew, George Clayton, were living on Mill Street. Aoston ran a barbershop, fruit stand and bicycle repair shop on Academy Street, next door to Dr. D.C. Scott's drugstore. In 1897 E. J. Aoston ran a notice on the front page of The County Record which said, "Having placed my wife behind the counter of my fruit stand adjacent to my barber shop, patrons of the shop are requested to bear in mind this fact and refrain from using profane or obscene language while in the building. This rule is absolute and violators of it will be refused admittance. E.J. AOSTON.

Ad published September 22, 1898. 

Notice that Academy Street was sometimes called Wall Street in those days.

In April 1898, he ran two more notices. The first said, "The patrons of my barbershop are requested to send their children to me during the week and not on SATURDAYS when they want their hair cut. I am always crowded with gentlemen wanting shaves on Saturday, and it would be a great accommodation if they boys would come during the week."

The other said, "All patrons of my barbershop will please take notice that it will be closed next Sunday, owing to other matters requiring my attention. This is absolute, as I will not be in the shop at all that day."

Published March 6, 1902.

In early 1903, the Aostons moved to Society Hill, leaving behind the irate members of the Odd Fellows, a fraternal organization for which E.J. Aoston had served as treasurer. The Odd Fellows maintained that the barber had absconded with $80 of their money and wrote him that he needed to return it. Aoston responded and arrived in Kingstree on the train, only to be met by Sheriff George Graham who escorted him to jail where he spent the night and somehow came up with the money. The next morning Graham released him, and he went on his way. By 1910, he, Nellie, and Mabell lived in Red Springs, NC.

Cohen Isaac Whitehead worked as a barber in Kingstree during Reconstruction. He was, however, better known as postmaster for the the town of Kingstreee, a job to which he was appointed on July 26, 1877, and in which he served until October 25, 1886. In 1881, his compensation was $484.81, making him one of the more highly paid postmasters in South Carolina. He ran the post office from his barbershop, located on W. Main Street not far from the river. His wife Elizabeth Plumeau Whitehead managed a dress-making shop in the same little, one-story, frame building. We don't know much more about them, but we can tell from their daughter Tressie's delayed birth certificate that both Cohen and Elizabeth Whitehead died at age 70.

The Whiteheads were apparently well-thought of in Kingstree. In 1898, Joel Brunson wrote an article about the horrific assassination of Frazier Baker,  postmaster at Lake City, and his infant daughter by a mob of angry white men. In contrast, Brunson noted that Cohen Whitehead, a black man, had served as postmaster here years before and "gave the most efficient, polite service and received nothing save kindness at the hands of the entire community."

These were not the only black barbers in Kingstree. The City Barber Shop, over the years, employed Joe Alston, B.O. Blakely, Abraham Wheeler, George McKnight, and possibly others. It never fails to amaze how much history can be gleaned from old census, marriage, and death records, as well as from old newspapers.