Creative Books

The largest and most populous of these islands
is St. Helena, being fifteen miles long and six or seven broad,
containing fifty plantations and three thousand negroes, and perhaps
more since the evacuation of Edisto. Port Royal is two-thirds or
three-quarters the size of St. Helena, Ladies half as large, and Hilton
Head one-third as large. Paris, or Parry, has five plantations, and
Coosaw, Morgan, Cat, Cane, and Barnwell have each one or two. Beaufort
is the largest town in the district of that name, and the only one at
Port Royal in our possession. Its population, black and white, in time
of peace may have been between two and three thousand. The first lots
were granted in 1717. Its Episcopal church was built in 1720. Its
library was instituted in 1802, had increased in 1825 to six or eight
hundred volumes, and when our military occupation began contained about
thirty-five hundred.
The origin of the name Port Royal, given to a harbor at first and since
to an island, has already been noted.


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