The First English Settlement of South Carolina

The History of the Americans

The first English settlers in today’s South Carolina departed England in August, 1669, but would not actually get to the coast of Carolina until April and May the next year. Along the way they would lose ships to hurricanes and incompetence, and get into a firefight with Spaniards and their Indian allies on an island off the coast of Georgia. An unknown number would die on an island in the Bahamas. And, yet, once on the banks of the Ashley River, the first English South Carolinians would lose only 12% of their population in their first 18 months, a record of survival in the first “seasoning” year matched only by Maryland in the 17th century.

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Selected references for this episode (Commission earned for Amazon purchases through the episode notes on our website – https://thehistoryoftheamericans.com/the-first-english-settlement-of-south-carolina/)

Edward McCrady, The History of South Carolina Under the Proprietary Government 1670-1719

L. H. Roper, Conceiving Carolina: Proprietors, Planters, and Plots 1662-1729

George Bancroft, History of the United States of America: From the Discovery of the Continent

Alexander S. Salley, Jr., Narratives of Early Carolina 1650-1708 (Includes narrative of Maurice Mathews)

Letter from Henry Woodward to Sir John Yeamans, September 10, 1670

J. Leitch Wright, Jr., “Spanish Reaction to Carolina,” The North Carolina Historical Review, October 1964.