Page:South Carolina Historical and Genealogical Magazine, v6.djvu/64

THE TOWN OF DORCHESTER, IN SOUTH CARO- » LINA—A SKETCH OF ITS HISTORY. t BY Hmmv A. M. Surry.; About twenty—six miles from the city of Charleston; on the north bank of the Ashley River, and ahout·six miles in a southwestwardly direction from the railroad depot in the 3 present town of Summerville can be seen an old church tower with an overgrown disused- graveyard around it, and l 4 . some two hundred paces farther on-on the edge of the river—are the walls of an old fort, constructed of that mix- ture of shells in lime mortar formerly called "tapia" or l "tabby".l These two conspicuous ohjects, with some scattered and shapelessmasses of brick at irregular intervals, 1 marking the sites of former houses, are all that remains of j the town of Dorchester, once a comparatively flourishing i r hamlet in the Low-Country of South Carolina, but which l with the lesser hamlets of Jamestown, New London or Willtown, J acksonborough, Purrysburgh and Somerton,and the still lesser, or only projected, villages ofRadnor,Ashley Ferry, Ohildsbury a11d_Chatham, has so long been deserted that its story has been nearly forgotten, and its very site l V oearl y obliterated. In the case of Dorchester its frequent mention in histories j of the Revolution o{`1775-1783 in South Carolina; the fact ` that it gave its name to one of the ecclesiastical and political l divisions of the Province and State, viz: the parish of St. j George, Dorchester, joined to its vicinity to the town of Summerville have conspired to preserve its name, the tra- l dition of its former existence, and the place of its location, but beyond this practically nothing else is generally known concerning its history. It has cost no little time and labour · tovdig out of vanishing records the following account ofits l origin and nite. j ‘0ften spelled "tapis" in early records.-Editor. j _ l