Ruth Miller's Charleston Chat

"Presbyterians brought golf to North America," explained Ruth Miller when she took over our Charleston Beyond the Grave course as a guest speaker on Monday, February 3, 2020. Miller kept the class interesting by telling us a lot of surprising facts about Charleston's rich history that seems like it could be uncommon knowledge. For example, "every rock in Charleston comes from somewhere else. Cobblestones are from England, Slate is from Wales..." (Miller). Her interest in graveyards and the window to history they provide began when Ruth Miller was a tour guide, which she has been for forty years, and she was giving a bus load of morticians a tour when they taught her about graveyards which made her realize she wanted to learn more about graveyards, churches and the history that can be learned through them.

Miller taught our class about how the "Carolina colony stretched from Virginia all the way to St. Augustine, Florida" and how Charleston was the first permanent settlement south of Virginia. Also,
Charleston got its name because "Charleston" is Latin for "Charles Town" after King Charles I. Charleston has an extremely diverse religious history consisting of dissenters (people who do not follow the Church), Puritans, Baptists, Lutherans, Presbyterians, and more. "Charleston is also the only state with Huguenot churches," said Miller. I hadn't even heard of a Huguenot church before this lesson.

Churches in the 1680's were called "meeting houses". I learned this from Miller and also this information was restated on a horse carriage tour of Charleston that I went on last weekend. Charleston has had a lot of religious feuds and drama; however, it was also a safe place for some religious groups. For example, Jewish people migrated to Charleston from Spain because they were being killed by Christians. Charleston can also be described as a "revolutionary city" because many important historical figures were rooted in Charleston.

The wealthier people of Charleston would go up north to Boston, Massachusetts to avoid the summer heat and the mosquitos it brought. Since there were no rocks in Charleston, people made friends in Boston, New England, London, etc. where carvers were. This is why most tombstones in Charleston are from these northern places. Each carver had their own design which is why older cemeteries are interesting because no two tombstones are exactly the same.

Sketch of ledger tomb

Sketch of headstone

Ruth Miller