Revolutionary War & Colonial History

The Huguenot heritage in the United States cannot be overstated. In the latter part of the sixteenth century, France was plunged into a series of religious wars. In 1589, Henry of Navarre became Henry IV of France, but peace was not achieved until he issued the Edict of Nantes in 1598, which recognized the Huguenots’ right to worship in the towns they controlled. While Henry IV lived, the financial and military security of the country was ensured. After his assassination in 1610, it ceased.

Religious persecution resumed, and in 1685, Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes, and many French Protestants fled. Of the estimated 180,000 Huguenot refugees, approximately 3,000 crossed the Atlantic. This book is about their descendants and their influence on the development of the American republic and the rights enshrined in the U.S. Constitution.

The Huguenot Church in Charleston, a national landmark, is the last Huguenot church in America.

Charleston, 1775–1783: where loyalty was as dangerous as rebellion.

Revisit the Revolutionary War through the eyes of Charleston’s most misunderstood figures, the Loyalists. Often erased from more traditional narratives, these men and women lived in the deadliest gray space of the war, where allegiance shifted by necessity, survival outweighed ideology, and every decision carried life-and-death consequences.

Featuring more than eighty rare and striking historic images, this book reconstructs Charleston as a high-stakes garrison town: a city of spies, secret networks, and double agents—one operating directly under General Nathanael Greene himself. Drawn from newly examined primary sources and firsthand accounts, the story exposes the covert war beneath the battlefield, where Patriots and Loyalists often moved indistinguishably through the same streets, salons, and homes.

Beyond the fighting, the narrative follows the war’s long shadow into post-Revolutionary South Carolina, where confiscation, exile, and political vengeance threatened to tear the region apart. Why did iconic Patriot leaders like Henry Laurens, Francis Marion, and Nathanael Greene intervene to restore seized Loyalist estates? And how did those decisions quietly shape the foundation of reconciliation in the new republic?

At the heart of the story are the women of Loyalist Charleston, forced out of the domestic sphere and into the raw machinery of power. Their petitions before the state legislature—pleas for property, protection, and survival.

Authors Kathy Roe Coker and Jason Wetzel detail the these stories and more in a riveting account of loyalty and struggle.

A vivid portrait of power, privilege, and peril in colonial Charleston.

Eighteenth Century Charleston was a city built on water, wealth, and whispers—where the harbor brimmed with merchant ships and war vessels, and status was measured in wharves, wine cellars, imported porcelain, and family names that could open every door. This is colonial Charleston at its peak: a thriving Atlantic port fueled by rice and indigo, shaped by transatlantic trade, and held together by tightly woven kinship networks that blurred the line between commerce and political power.

At the center is Rebecca Brewton Motte—born into privilege, married into influence, and forced by fire, disease, and revolution to become far more than a genteel figure in a drawing room. Through the interconnected worlds of the Brewtons, Mottes, Pinckneys, and their allies, the story reveals how South Carolina’s elite built fortunes, constructed iconic townhouses, navigated epidemics and natural disasters, and managed sprawling plantations with enslaved labor powering every “luxury” detail.

But this is not a postcard version of the past. Alongside elegant architecture and consumer culture sits the raw reality of colonial life: malaria, yellow fever, smallpox, hurricanes, legal constraints on women, and the destabilizing pressure of war and British occupation. Moving from Charleston’s grand streets to backcountry plantations, this biography-driven history shows how one woman’s life illuminates the larger machinery of colonial South Carolina, the American Revolution, and the fragile world that made—and nearly unmade—an Atlantic empire. Historian and author Alexia Helsley details this remarkable history. 

A vivid portrait of power, privilege, and peril in colonial Charleston.

Eighteenth-century Charleston was a city built on water, wealth, and whispers—where the harbor brimmed with merchant ships and war vessels and status was measured in wharves, wine cellars, imported porcelain, and family names that could open every door. This is colonial Charleston at its peak: a thriving Atlantic port fueled by rice and indigo, shaped by transatlantic trade, and held together by tightly woven kinship networks that blurred the line between commerce and political power.

At the center is Rebecca Brewton Motte—born into privilege, married into influence, and forced by fire, disease, and revolution to become far more than a genteel figure in a drawing room. Through the interconnected worlds of the Brewtons, Mottes, Pinckneys, and their allies, the story reveals how South Carolina’s elite built fortunes, constructed iconic townhouses, navigated epidemics and natural disasters, and managed sprawling plantations with enslaved labor powering every “luxury” detail.

But this is not a postcard version of the past. Alongside elegant architecture and consumer culture sits the raw reality of colonial life: malaria, yellow fever, smallpox, hurricanes, legal constraints on women, and the destabilizing pressure of war and British occupation. Moving from Charleston’s grand streets to backcountry plantations, this biography-driven history shows how one woman’s life illuminates the larger machinery of colonial South Carolina, the American Revolution, and the fragile world that made—and nearly unmade—an Atlantic empire. Historian and author Alexia Helsley details this remarkable history. 

Charleston, 1775–1783: where loyalty was as dangerous as rebellion.

Revisit the Revolutionary War through the eyes of Charleston’s most misunderstood figures, the Loyalists. Often erased from more traditional narratives, these men and women lived in the deadliest gray space of the war, where allegiance shifted by necessity, survival outweighed ideology, and every decision carried life-and-death consequences.

Featuring more than eighty rare and striking historic images, this book reconstructs Charleston as a high-stakes garrison town: a city of spies, secret networks, and double agents—one operating directly under General Nathanael Greene himself. Drawn from newly examined primary sources and firsthand accounts, the story exposes the covert war beneath the battlefield, where Patriots and Loyalists often moved indistinguishably through the same streets, salons, and homes.

Beyond the fighting, the narrative follows the war’s long shadow into post-Revolutionary South Carolina, where confiscation, exile, and political vengeance threatened to tear the region apart. Why did iconic Patriot leaders like Henry Laurens, Francis Marion, and Nathanael Greene intervene to restore seized Loyalist estates? And how did those decisions quietly shape the foundation of reconciliation in the new republic?

At the heart of the story are the women of Loyalist Charleston, forced out of the domestic sphere and into the raw machinery of power. Their petitions before the state legislature were pleas for property, protection, and survival.

Authors Kathy Roe Coker and Jason Wetzel detail the these stories and more in a riveting account of loyalty and struggle.

Those Who Fought for Liberty On Both Sides

In 1775, the people of Charleston were on the verge of eight years of revolution and war. They were bitterly divided. For Charlestonians, the War for Independence was a civil war, as some favored independence and some were Loyalists. Many on both sides contributed greatly to the war effort. They were famous and obscure, rich and poor, women and men, Black and white. Contrary to popular opinion, people on both sides appealed to patriotism and fought for liberty. For the enslaved majority, the war represented an opportunity to gain their freedom—by siding with the British. In telling the stories of a spectrum of participants, Peter McCandless recovers a history at odds with public memory, encrusted with layers of forgetfulness and myths.

Those Who Fought for Liberty On Both Sides

In 1775, the people of Charleston were on the verge of eight years of revolution and war. They were bitterly divided. For Charlestonians, the War for Independence was a civil war, as some favored independence and some were Loyalists. Many on both sides contributed greatly to the war effort. They were famous and obscure, rich and poor, women and men, Black and white. Contrary to popular opinion, people on both sides appealed to patriotism and fought for liberty. For the enslaved majority, the war represented an opportunity to gain their freedom—by siding with the British. In telling the stories of a spectrum of participants, Peter McCandless recovers a history at odds with public memory, encrusted with layers of forgetfulness and myths.

Those who Saved South Carolina

In May 1780, Charlestown surrendered to the British army, and an ominous, dark cloud descended over the spirit of independence in South Carolina. More than five thousand Patriots of the Continental army and militias conceded their arms and declared an oath as true and faithful subjects to His Majesty, the king of Great Britain, or otherwise faced prison or exile. That left the volunteers of the state’s militia as the best line of defense for the state. More than two hundred skirmishes and battles in the state provide testament to the passion and dedication with which South Carolinians defended their state. Brian Eleazer details the behind-the-scenes story of how South Carolina survived.

Discover how Huck's Defeat spurred on the South Carolina militiamen to future victories during the Revolutionary War.

In July of 1780, when the Revolutionary War in the Southern states seemed doomed to failure, a small but important battle took place on James Williamson's plantation in what is now York County, South Carolina. The Battle of Williamson's Plantation, or Huck's Defeat as it later came to be known, laid the groundwork for the vicious partisan warfare waged by the militiamen on the Carolina frontier against the superior forces of the British Army, and it paved the way for the calamitous defeats that the British suffered at Hanging Rock, Musgrove's Mill, Kings Mountain, Blackstock's Plantation and Cowpens, all in the South Carolina backcountry. In this groundbreaking new study, historian Michael C. Scoggins provides an in-depth account of the events that unfolded in the Broad and Catawba River valleys of upper South Carolina during the critical summer of 1780. Drawing extensively on first-person accounts and military correspondence, much of which has never been published before, Scoggins tells a dramatic story that begins with the capture of an entire American army at Charleston in May and ends with a resounding series of Patriot victories in the Carolina Piedmont during the late summer of 1780-—victories that set Lord Cornwallis and the British Army irrevocably on the road to defeat and to surrender at Yorktown in October 1781.

A pivotal moment in American history, as told by our forefathers

On October 7, 1780, American Patriot and Loyalist soldiers battled each other at Kings Mountain, near the border of North and South Carolina. With over one hundred eyewitness accounts, this collection of participant statements from men of both sides includes letters and statements in their original form - the soldiers' own words - unedited and unabridged. Rife with previously unpublished details of this historic turning point in the American Revolution, described as the war's largest all-American fight, these accounts expose the dramatic happenings of the battle, including new perspectives on the debate over Patriot Colonel William Campbell's bravery during the fight. Robert M. Dunkerley's work is an invaluable resource to historians studying the flow of combat, genealogists tracing their ancestors and anyone interested in Kings Mountain and the Southern Campaign.

From the rocky slopes of Kings Mountain to the plains of Hannah's Cowpens, the Carolina backcountry hosted two of the Revolutionary War's most critical battles

On October 7, 1780, the Battle of Kings Mountain utilized guerilla techniques - American Over Mountain Men wearing buckskin and hunting shirts and armed with hunting rifles attacked Loyalist troops from behind trees, resulting in an overwhelming Patriot victory. In January of the next year, the Battle of Cowpens saw a different strategy but a similar outcome: with brilliant military precision, Continental Regulars, dragoons, and Patriot militia executed the war's only successful double envelopment maneuver to defeat the British. Using firsthand accounts and careful analysis of the best classic and modern scholarship on the subject, historian Robert Brown demonstrates how the combination of both battles facilitated the downfall of General Charles Cornwallis and led to the Patriot victory in America.

As the most significant eighteenth-century estate assembled in the British American colonies still in existence, Drayton Hall is an icon of American history, design and preservation.

Its story is told through archaeological artifacts, architectural research and documentary investigations, with a focus on the inhabitants and their connections to the wider Atlantic world. A multitude of scholars contributed to our understanding of Drayton Hall as the first complete example of Palladian architecture in North America, its placement at the intersection of the European Enlightenment and America's slave society and as a family home where extraordinary events became landmark historic moments. Today, Drayton Hall is valued as the most authentic pre-Revolutionary southern plantation that helps examine the creation of American identity.