Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Wicked Charleston, Volume 2: Prostitutes, Politics and Prohibition
    Wicked Charleston, Volume 2: Prostitutes, Politics and Prohibition
    Wicked Charleston, Volume 2: Prostitutes, Politics and Prohibition
    Ebook174 pages3 hours

    Wicked Charleston, Volume 2: Prostitutes, Politics and Prohibition

    By Mark R. Jones

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    In this follow-up volume, Mark R. Jones uncovers the seedy and wicked past of Charleston: Prostitutes, Politics and Prohibition.


    The city of Charleston, South Carolina, with its matchless Southern charm, has sparkled gem-like on the Carolina coast for more than three hundred years. The Holy City, as it is known, has been a cherished home to generations and an inviting destination for visitors from all over the world, who come to tour its celebrated historic sites and to bask in both the warm sun and the famous Southern hospitality. But below the gleaming surface of Charleston, there has always been a darker side--a second history that has been hidden and denied by those who retell the city's story, and by those who have lived it. Charleston has played host to a wide variety of unsavory characters, and has seen scores of sordid deeds played out on its cobbled streets, beneath flickering gaslights. Wicked Charleston, Volume 2: Prostitutes, Politics and Prohibition is a captivating companion to Mark Jones's hugely popular Wicked Charleston. In this new book, Jones reveals more of the city's seedy history--from drinking and prostitution to murder and crooked politics--offering a rarely seen glimpse of a sinister side of Charleston's past.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherThe History Press
    Release dateJun 1, 2006
    ISBN9781614230335
    Wicked Charleston, Volume 2: Prostitutes, Politics and Prohibition

    Read more from Mark R. Jones

    Related to Wicked Charleston, Volume 2

    Titles in the series (95)

    View More
    View More

    Related ebooks

    Photography For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Researchers Say The Wreckage Of Last Known Slave Ship To The U.S. Is Mostly Intact

      Dec 22, 2021

      Researchers studying the wreckage of the Clotilda, which has been buried in mud on the Alabama coast since 1860, say that most of the wooden schooner is still largely in one piece.

      2 min read

    • Article

      The Decline Of The English Ghost

      Nov 5, 2020

      A decline in the refinement and quality of the English ghost story has been observable for many years. In the early 1960s psychologist Nicholas Humphrey, then an undergraduate at Cambridge, heard distinguished philosopher Professor CD Broad complaini

      11 min read

    • Article

      Thomas Wolfe Memorial

      Aug 13, 2019

      Thomas Wolfe Memorial
      5 min read

    • Article

      Southern Secrets

      Jun 3, 2019

      Southern Secrets
      5 min read

    • Article

      Sanctuary City

      Sep 8, 2020

      Sanctuary City
      12 min read

    • Article

      Donut Dollies

      May 19, 2021

      Donut Dollies
      5 min read

    • Article

      Clearly Clotilda

      Feb 22, 2022

      Clearly Clotilda
      1 min read

    • Article

      These Honored Dead

      Apr 20, 2021

      These Honored Dead
      9 min read

    • Article

      Colfax Correction

      Aug 24, 2021

      Colfax Correction
      1 min read

    • Article

      10 Free Ancestry Collections

      Jan 12, 2021

      An index to mental-hospital registers held by Surrey History Centre, listing patients’ names, ages and dates of admission. Details of local militiamen and naval militia from records at Cornwall Record Office. An index to records, with some details of

      1 min read

    • Article

      Letters

      Jan 1, 2024

      Letters
      2 min read

    • Article

      Frontier dramatics

      Feb 22, 2022

      Frontier dramatics
      1 min read

    • Article

      West Virginia

      Apr 21, 2020

      West Virginia
      5 min read

    • Article

      19th Amendment: The Six-week 'Brawl' That Won Women The Vote

      Aug 3, 2020

      The final ratification battle over women’s right to vote, in Tennessee, was deeply fraught – and it holds lessons for today.

      15 min read

    • Article

      Remains

      Sep 1, 2017

      THIS IS what you think your mother’s remains will look like. The ash will be black, like all that soot in the fireplace. It will be heavy, like wet sand. There will not be too much of it. It will fit in a small urn with intricate designs on the borde

      6 min read

    • Article

      The Jeffersons of Madison

      Mar 1, 2019

      The Jeffersons of Madison
      20 min read

    • Article

      Deep Ellum Clues

      Nov 25, 2021

      Deep Ellum Clues
      8 min read

    • Article

      Editor’s Letter

      Jul 6, 2021

      The last of the Apache wars, the final surrender of the Chiricahuas in September 1886 and their long captivity—all these dramatic events remain as closely associated with Geronimo as his people once were with the rugged ranges of what became southeas

      3 min read

    • Article

      State Guide louisiana

      Oct 20, 2020

      State Guide louisiana
      4 min read

    • Article

      Following His Nose

      Feb 21, 2023

      Following His Nose
      3 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Wicked Charleston, Volume 2

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Wicked Charleston, Volume 2 - Mark R. Jones

      time…

      Chapter One

      POLITICS AND PROSTITUTES

      The city is full of three types of people, the first being soldiers, the other classes are politicians and prostitutes, both very numerous, and about equal in honesty and morality.

      Charleston Mercury, December 19, 1860

      EAT, DRINK AND BE WITH MARY

      In 1692, William Penn, founder of Pennsylvania, wrote to the English Lords Proprietors that Charles Towne had become a hotbed of piracy. As a Quaker, Penn was also outraged by the behavior of the wayward women who frequented the taverns; he urged civic leaders to address the situation. The Carolina state assembly ignored Penn’s complaints. However, one year later there was an entry in the1693 Journal of the Commons House of Assembly that ordered three women who frequented a tap room on The Bay [East Bay Street] and infected a goodly number of the militia with the pox to be deported from the state. They were sent by boat to Philadelphia. Take that, you Quakers!

      Charles Town was one of the busiest port cities in the colonies by 1720. There were often more than 150 sailing vessels from Portugal, Spain, England, France, Italy and the Caribbean at dock in the Charles Town harbor. With an average of twenty sailors per ship, that translates to an influx of three thousand men in the city roaming the streets in search of one thing: entertainment, usually in the guise of wine, women and song. Soon a thriving hotbed of taverns, bordellos and gaming houses were catering to the needs of sailors, backwoods fur traders, militia and locals along Bay, Elliott, Union (State), Chalmers, Queen and Cumberland Streets. All these men were looking for a place to eat, drink and be with Mary.

      One of the earliest brothels was located on Union Alley (currently 17 Chalmers Street, the Pink House), which today is an art gallery. The small three-story Pink House was built by John Breton out of Bermuda stone before 1712. The building consists of one room per floor with the first floor used as a tavern and working girls on the second and third floors. When one walks up the narrow wooden staircase to the second and third floors today, it feels cramped and claustrophobic, due to the very low ceiling. Many people instinctively lower their heads and hunch their shoulders as they stand in the third floor room. Keep in mind that people were much shorter in the eighteenth century than they are today. Besides, how many times was a man actually standing up on the third floor?

      The Pink House later became a law office. What a perfect transition. Nothing changed except the hourly rates went up. The main difference between a lawyer and a prostitute is that the prostitute won’t charge you after you’re dead.

      The Charles Town nightlife brought so much increased rowdiness and violence that many citizens, led by cabinetmaker Thomas Elfe (whose workshop still stands at 54 Queen Street), wrote a letter to the city complaining that these Ladies of Eden were spreading disease and disrupting their commerce. It didn’t help matters that more than thirty members of the Night Watch sold Juggs of Liquor to Seamen & Negroes while on duty. By the 1760s there was a dramatic increase in the vagrants, drunkards…notorious bawds and strumpets and idle persons roaming the streets, swearing and talking obscenely. Mary MacDowell of Pinckney Street was cited for keeping a most notorious brothel and for harboring loose and idle women. Even the assembly criticized the superabundance of licensed Taverns and Tippling Houses, gaming houses and disorderly houses.

      Deitrick Olandt’s tavern was described as an improper and disorderly house because he maintained several females in the upper portion of his house. Cornel June’s brothel at the corner of State and Guignard Streets (near the current location of Palmetto Carriage’s Big Red Barn) was denounced for keeping between six and fifteen white women in service against their will.

      Many of the ship’s captains and factors tried to keep the sailors out of the brothels lest the ships would lack a full crew when the tide and wind were ready. Rarely did the law ever interfere with the operation of a brothel. One of the only recorded instances of police action against a brothel was when a patron was robbed of his wallet, which had been left on the floor in a pair of quickly discarded trousers.

      A DRINKING TOWN WITH A HISTORICAL PROBLEM

      In 1830, the average American man consumed fifty gallons of liquor per year. That number does not include beer. In Charleston, the rate was higher. Carl Bridenbaugh of Boston wrote, The importation of liquors at Charleston Town staggers the imagination—1500 dozen (18,000) bottles [of ale]…1219 hogshead [wine]…and 58 barrels of rum. This was a six-month supply for one modest tavern.

      Gentlemen were encouraged to drink; in fact, part of being a gentleman meant holding your liquor. Having the reputation of being a three-bottle man was a mark of excellence. A three-bottle man consumed at least three bottles of whiskey or wine per day. Again, that did not include beer, which was consumed in the same manner as modern soft drinks.

      Just before the outbreak of the Revolutionary War the assembly became concerned that the Night Watch could not contain the growing Vice and Immorality. The assembly, however, did little to solve the problem. They merely ordered the loose women to move from the waterfront district to an area four blocks west called Dutch Town, as it was settled mainly by Germans. Within the shadow of the St. John’s Lutheran and Unitarian church steeples, the six-block section of Clifford, West, Beaufain, Logan and Beresford (Fulton) Streets soon became a constant scene of nightly brawls and riots.

      In 1780, during the British occupation of Charles Town, orders were posted for soldiers to avoid bawdy houses. Several of the Ladies of Eden were shipped out of the city for health reasons but most of the houses did a booming business where the soldiers found willing female companionship. Soldiers were always good for the bordello business. Lucky for the madams, the men of Charleston started a war against Yankee aggression in 1861. More on that subject later.

      The governor and his council tried in vain to regulate the sale of liquor. The selling of intoxicants was observed to be mischievous and to impoverish the otherwise sober planters. The laws also tried to limit the amount of credit a tavern keeper could extend to customers. Ignoring the liquor laws became a long tradition in the Lowcountry.

      Taverns were much more than drinking establishments; they were prominent social institutions. Taverns hosted political functions. Men’s clubs and other charitable organizations held their meetings in the building.

      Up until the 1760s, most of the beer consumed in Charles Town was imported from Philadelphia, Liverpool, or Bristol, Connecticut. There was a real need for a local brewer, but few men in the city had the skills, until Edmund Egan arrived.

      Egan was born in England and was an apprentice under a London brew master before his arrival in Charles Town. He encountered trouble setting up business. First, he was a newcomer with no reputation or references, making it difficult to arrange the financial credit needed to procure brewing equipment. He supported himself for a few years as a fencing master and also went into a factoring partnership with Nathanael Greene and William Coates.

      In 1765, when the passage of the British Stamp Act ignited a passionate support of American manufacturing, Egan found a partner with John Calvert. They announced that a Charles Town brewery was now in production. They advertised the sale of Doubled brewed Spruce beer, table and small beer. They also offered to ship any quantity above five gallons.

      Two years later, Parliament passed the Townshend Acts, which forced another round of boycotts against England by the colonists. Egan had trouble getting quality hops and malt. In 1770, Egan was able to import his own barley seeds and convinced some local planters to lay in a crop, and one year later, Charles Town had their first constant supply of local brew. By 1775, Egan was outselling all import brews in Carolina. According to 1772 financial records Egan’s income was almost £20,000.

      His brew house had two brick vaults forty-one feet by thirteen feet. The malt house and kiln were one hundred feet by twenty-two feet. Egan employed eight Negroes: two coopers who built casks and kegs and six brewers. He also had two house wenches on the property.

      During the Revolution, Egan tried to expand his business by building a distillery on Coming Street, which failed and was abandoned. After the war, Egan borrowed money from William Gibbes to establish a new brewery, but he died before the venture could be completed.

      During the years preceding the Revolutionary War, Christopher Gadsden and the Sons of Liberty met at Shepheard’s Tavern. Charles Shepheard built his tavern at the corner of Broad and Church Streets in 1720 and it quickly became the most important public house in the city. In 1734, Shepheard’s hosted the first theatrical season in America in the Long Room upstairs. Two years later, on October 28, 1736, the first meeting of the Ancient and Honorable Society of Free and Accepted Masons took place in the tavern. And later, in 1801, the Supreme Council of the Thirty-third Degree of the United States of America was opened in the Long Room.

      One interesting club was called Club Fourty-Five. On November 21, 1772, a group of the Sons of Liberty met at the Liberty Tree at Mazyck’s pasture to swear their defense against the tyranny of the British. The tree was decorated with forty-five lights and forty-five skyrockets were fired. Forty-five men paraded down King Street to Broad Street to Dillon’s Tavern. Forty-five lights were placed upon the table, along with forty-five bowls of punch and forty-five bottles of wine, which were then consumed.

      Captain Thomas Coates purchased a row of waterfront structures in 1804 and persuaded his wife, Mrs. Catherine Coates, to open her establishment on the corner. Mr. Coates also purchased the Pink House on Chalmers Street. When Mrs. Coates’s By the Bay, as it was called, opened (at the current corner of East Bay Street and Exchange Street), it was considered to be one of the finest taverns in the city. The business exhibited what was considered to be the best collection of wax figurines in America, including replicas of George Washington, Dr. Ezra Stiles (late president of Yale College), David and Goliath and others. After Mrs. Coates’s death in 1824, the tavern was closed. At some point it was the Oceanic Cafe and was replaced with a liquor store in the late 1890s, which is currently still open for business.

      The location on which Coates’s Tavern stood currently houses a liquor store called The Tavern, complete with a subterranean basement. Archaeologists from Colonial Williamsburg, the Universities of South and North Carolina and from the Tower of London have examined the brickwork in the basement and they agree that the masonry work is common of southeastern England of 1550–1650, making it plausible that the current structure dates as early as 1710. There are remnants of a brick fireplace, which indicates that at one point the basement was used for cooking to serve the customers of the tavern on the upper floor. The archways in the basement at one time were the openings for doors that led to a tunnel beneath East Bay Street to the Cogswell, Walker and Evans building that sits directly across from the tavern. Due to the constant cool temperatures in the basement, through the years it has been used as a wine cellar and vegetable dry storage.

      During Prohibition, the building housed the offices of an insurance business, which was nothing more than a front for a bootlegging operation. It is entirely plausible that on this location alcohol has been served for almost three hundred years.

      Many taverns had colorful names. Some of the more colorful through the years included Old Slaughter, the Cock Tavern, the Cock Pitt, the Salutation and the Cat, the Mourning Bush, the Mitre and the Devil, the Crown and Anchor, the

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1