I don’t think I have ever seen one before.
If the light is right you can’t miss it. Beautiful bird.
It is close to a Grackle, in size and look.
They breed in Canada, the northern boreal forests, and winter in the Lowcountry.
Once a very common bird the numbers have plummeted recent. The usual man made reasons, and a new twist added. In some areas Cow Birds, and Grackles are poisoned as pests.
Now that I know they like our swamps in the winter I’ll certainly be looking for them.
During this uncertain time, dealing with a pandemic, we have chosen to stay at a distance as much as possible. Like a ‘lock down’.
It seems prudent and responsible (good grief when did I become responsible).
The large number of photographs I shot, and made joking comments about, will pay off now. I have literally thousands of images never published. There are times we have 2,000 photos a week!
It should be interesting working backwards through my hard drives. I might even open the back gate and wander the pine woods behind the house.
Of course, stay safe and sane. Thanks for visiting.
In archiving some images from a few months ago I came across these. The old Charleston Jail. A horrid place now being renovated.
In its time it was home, and execution place to pirates, enslaved people, and prisoners of war. Even women highwaymen.
The building will be renovated for offices… really !!! Who wants to work here ???
The old Charleston Jail is in it’s final days. This is the last in a series of articles taken during a session to document what was about to be lost.
This will be a recap of the building, and it’s dark past.
The jail was built in 1803 and finally closed, for ‘inhumanity’, in 1939. During that time sections were added, removed due to an earthquake, and new designs created by Charleston architect Robert Mills (Washington Monument).
The jail was part of a public section of land set aside in 1680. The notorious runaway slave workhouse also here was demolished. The workhouse was known as the Sugar House.
Perhaps the most vivid and harrowing stories of the Sugar House were told in an unsigned document entitled “Recollections of a Runaway Slave” that appeared in an anti-slavery newspaper called The Emancipator on September 30, 1838. It reads as follows;
“I have heard a great deal said about hell, and wicked places, but I don’t think there is any worse hell than that Sugar House. It’s as bad a place as can be. In getting to it you have to go through a gate, in a very high brick wall. On the top of the wall, both sides of the gate, there are sharp pointed iron bars sticking up, and all along the rest of the wall are broken glass bottles. These are to keep us from climbing over. After you get into the yard, you go through a gate into the entry, then through a door of wood and an iron door, chained and locked together, so as both to open at the same time. The lower story is built of stone of great thickness,–and above, brick. The building is sealed inside with plank. Away down in the ground, under the house is a dungeon, very cold and so dark you can’t tell the difference between day and night. There are six or seven long rooms, and six little cells above and six below. The room to do the whipping in is by itself. When you get in there, every way you look you can see paddles, and whips, and cowskins, and bluejays, and cat-o’-nine tails. The bluejay has two lashes, very heavy and full of knots. It is the worst thing to whip with of anything they have. It makes a hole where it strikes, and when they have done it will be all bloody.
In the middle of the floor are two big sills, with rings in them, fastened to staples. There are ropes tied to the rings to bind your feet. Over the sills is a windlass, with a rope coming down to fasten your hands to. This rope leads off to the corner of the room, and there are pegs there to tie it to, after they have got you stretched. Slaves are carried there to be whipped by the people in the country four or five miles round, and by all the people in the city, and the guard men carry there all the runaways they take up.”
The first floor in the jail housed special prisoners, and rooms for the condemned.
People of means and wealth were not mixed with the general population. The duration’s were short and money bought privileges.
The exact opposite prisoners were kept on this floor also. Condemned inmates were kept in locked rooms, in that same room were locked the pastor and executioner until the prisoner was hanged.
General population prisoners were kept in large cells on the higher floors. The current building is three stories high, it was four stories and a tower. The top floor and tower were removed after the erathquake of 1886.
Large cells could hold perhaps a dozen prisoners. Men, women, and children were locked together. A single small fireplace might provide heat if needed. Oddly the warden and his family had quarters here also.
Now, in 2019, the Old Charleston Jail will be gutted, all history removed, and become a commercial office building. I can’t wait for the stories from people who work late at night in this building.
It was an honor to be included in the group documenting the last days of the Old Charleston Jail.
Note; To read all the articles in this series select the category “Charleston Jail’ from the side menu drop down box.
While I’m not sure the exact day they will nail the doors shut (or send in a wrecking crew) it is certainly just days away.
My last article for the final documentation needs to be finished, it’s just hard to write and be out shooting too.
It was an honor to be included in the project, but now the pressure is on to finish the images.
Above is from the ‘famous’ third floor.
The Old Jail housed a great variety of inmates. John and Lavinia Fisher, and other members of their gang, convicted of highway robbery in the Charleston Neck region were imprisoned here in 1819 to 1820. They were said to be the first known serial killers (this was wrong, they were highway men).
Some of the last 19th-century high-sea pirates were jailed here in 1822 while they awaited hanging.
The Jail was active after the discovery of Denmark Vesey’s planned slave revolt. Although the main trials were held in the Workhouse, some slaves were briefly held in both the Jail and the Poor House, and four white men convicted of supporting the 1822 plot were imprisoned here. (Wikipedia)
Note; The old Charleston Jail is being renovated to be used for commercial purposes. A few historians and photographers were invited to document the historical site before it is gone. This is a part of the project.
The jail, built in 1802 was part of Charleston set aside for public use in 1680. The use was this jail, a poor house, hospital, and work house for run away slaves. The jail was used for many different things including an asylum.
These are photographs from the third floor where previously I was told an asylum was added to the prison. It might have been the fourth floor, the top of this building, which was removed after the great Charleston earthquake.
A terrible place for anyone in general, if they were actually ill locking them in a brutal prison was a really bad idea.
Like many buildings of it’s time an air shaft, in the center, provided circulation (I was raised in NYC in a small 1800’s apartment. My bedroom window was exactly this view…without bars).
Large open rooms covered much of this floor.
Above is what you see as you climb the stairs to the top floor. There is a lot of old furniture and woodwork in the basement. Perhaps the antique wheelchair came from there. I do know it’s the perfect prop for the asylum.
Above is one of the series of doors leading to the various rooms. The first door was wood, when opened you find the second of steel bars. A guard could look on both sides of the door through steel bars using the slightly curved center seen here. There were to be no surprises opening doors in the jail.
Note; The old Charleston Jail is being renovated to be used for commercial purposes. A small group was invited to visit and photograph the historical site before it is gone. This is part of that project.
The old jail was built in 1802 and finally closed in 1939. During that time thousands of prisoners were locked here. The was also a work house for people considered to be runaway slaves on the property. Hard to imagine but the work house was much more brutal than the jail itself.
Though the last prisoners here were in 1939 there are still reminders people lived here. In the cells and barred rooms the walls have signs of the past.
Lines and symbols, perhaps marking time are here.
We also found names and dates etched into the old cement and plaster.
Even near the high air vents were scratched symbol, and names.
All of this will be gone in a few short months which was why we were here, to document history before another piece is gone.
Note; The old Charleston Jail is being renovated to be used for commercial purposes. A small group was invited to visit and photograph the historical site before it is gone. This is part of that project.
