Curt boosting Eric over a fence at the Miles Brewton House. Curt was trying to save money on the entrance fee. Note the spikes on the fence. Actually, Brewton was a slave merchant. The spikes were added (in 1822, 50 years after his death) for protection after a threatened slave revolt.	Missy, outside the Charleston Museum, standing next to a replica of the Hunley, the first submarine that successfully sank an enemy vessel. In 1864, during the U.S. Civil War, the Hunley rammed a black powder charge into the hull of the Union blockade frigate Housatonic. The explosion sank the Housatonic and it is believed the backwash caused the Hunley to leak, then sink. Its nine man crew was lost.
Eric and Curt outside the old slave mart at 6 Chalmers Street in downtown Charleston. From the start of the slave trade until 1856, slaves were sold in the streets. Due to traffic congestion, a city ordinance was passed forbidding street sales; so the seling of slaves was moved to marts and yards.	Eric on Chalmers Street. The stones in the road were formerly ballast used in ships arriving from Europe.
Eric and Curt at Patriots Point preparing to board the aircraft carrier Yorktown. Patriots Point bills itself as the world's largest Naval and Maritime Museum. It includes five ships and two aircraft.	The aircraft carrier Yorktown, the "Fighting Lady" of World War II, as seen from Charleston Harbor. She also patrolled the western Pacific during the Cold War and Vietnam War. In December 1968, the Yorktown recovered the crew of Apollo 8.
The destroyer Laffey and submarine Clamagore, two more vessels we boarded and explored. The Laffey participated in D-Day landings, was crashed by five Japanese Kamikazes in the Pacific, and later served during the Korean War. The WWII submarine Clamagore operated in the Atlantic and Mediterranean throughout her career.	Fort Sumter, where Civil War fighting first broke out after the North occupied the fort under the cover of night. Southern forces attacked and the North withdrew. After the North surrendered Fort Sumter, Confederate forces held it for nearly four years. During that time Sumter experienced one of the longest sieges in modern warfare. 46,000 shells, 7 million pounds of metal, were fired at the fort.
A shell lodged in the wall at Fort Sumter.	Fort Moultrie served as a seacoast defense of Charleston from the Revolutionary War through WWII. It also served as a place for Eric and Missy to share breastnurturing.
Moultrie's large cannons that protected Charleston.	Eric and a cannon in Fort Moultrie's museum.

Missy and Eric strolling on the grounds of the Magnolia Plantation.

© 1999 frantzs@geocities.com