Ninety Six is the name of the site we visited today. This Revolutionary War era National Historic Site is steeped in pretty a violent and bitter history. The place is basically just a bunch of earthen mounds (the remnants of a star shaped fort and attached town) with a visitor center at this point, but the story that they contain is pretty intense!
It was decently warm, but raining this afternoon, and there weren’t really any other visitors to the site. We checked out the little museum, watched a very well put together video, and went out to the site.
Ninety Six started as a popular Cherokee trading route. Some early pioneers built a trade post, and a town eventually formed. Then everything fell apart. The gist of the story pits one group of Americans (the Loyalists) vs. their former friends and neighbors (the Patriots) in a strikingly similar, mini precursor to the later Civil War. It’s a story about people fighting each other over a site that very soon afterwards lost any real significance, and is now essentially non-existent.
We felt the graveness of the battlefield, we imagined the struggles of the people that used to live there… then we found ourselves down the road shoving our faces full of greasy fried chicken and sweet tea. Such is life on the road in South Carolina!
We’re staying in the Greenwood State Rec area, and got a sweet site on the shores of Lake Greenwood.
