Bonneau's Ferry

Ever since I heard the words “Tariff of Abominations” back in high school, I have been interested in the life, and the political thought, of John C. Calhoun. He was a remarkable man: a Yale graduate, member of Congress, Secretary of War and Secretary of State, U.S. Senator, and Vice President of the United States, twice, under two different presidents (John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson). Furthermore, he resigned as Vice President on a matter of principle.

How significant a figure in our history was John Caldwell Calhoun? Two tidbits of information help us to assess his public career. First, each state is allowed two statues in the Statuary Hall of the U.S. Congress. One of South Carolina's two statues is that of John C, Calhoun. Second, in 1957, a group of senators led by Senator John F. Kennedy were asked to pick five U.S. Senators for a newly created senatorial "hall of fame." Calhoun was one of the five. In fact, he is often listed as one of the "Great Triumvirate" of congressional leaders, along with Daniel Webster and Henry Clay.

He was a slaveholder, so he is in the process of being cancelled. Although he is still considered one of Yale's "Eight Worthies", his name has been removed from Calhoun College. A statue in his honor in Charleston was vandalized to the point that it was removed. Clemson University, about which more in a moment, renamed its Clemson University Calhoun Honors College as the Clemson University Honors College. Calhoun sent surveyors to the area that is now Minneapolis, Minnesota, and a variety of features there (a lake, a band, a town square, a road, and a beach club) were named for him. They have all undergone name changes. We suffer from what the Quaker theologian Elton Trueblood called the "sin of contemporaneity". We are a bit sanctimonious, in my opinion, when we judge those in the past by the standards of today. We will be judged tomorrow, and we will surely be found wanting.

What makes Calhoun a standout in my mind is that he is the only U.S. politician (as far as I am aware) who was also a political philosopher. If you are interested, I suggest you do a little research. Check out his summa, “A Disquisition on Government”. I may touch upon his work in later blogs, but for the moment, I am interested in two of his homes. I am interested because I have visited one, and I have visited the land on which the other once stood. In one case, I knew I was visiting a Calhoun home, and in the other case, I did not.

During the mid-eighties I spent a week at Clemson University, taking a short course. Wednesday afternoon was free, so I strolled around the campus, and was riveted when I saw a house on the campus with a sign outside announcing that this was "Fort Hill". I was riveted because I knew that, at least during his later life, Calhoun resided at a house he called Fort Hill. Could this be the same house? And if so, why was it in the middle of the Clemson campus?

I had both questions answered inside. There, a group of elderly (elderly, as in approximately my current age) ladies welcomed visitors and answered questions about Fort Hill, the home of John C. Calhoun. Calhoun's daughter Anna Maria, after considerable legal proceedings had resolved themselves, inherited the house and 814 acres in 1872, 22 years after Calhoun's death and 6 years after her mother's death. When Anna Maria died, her husband, Thomas Green Clemson, inherited the property. His 1888 will left the property, according to Wikipedia, "to the State of South Carolina for an agricultural college with a stipulation that the dwelling house 'shall never be torn down or altered; but shall be kept in repair with all articles of furniture and vesture...and shall always be open for inspection of visitors.'" The land is now Clemson University, and Fort Hill is still there.

At the beginning of the 1980s, I worked for a company named Westvaco, now MeadWestvaco, and Westvaco owned a plantation north of Charleston named Bonneau Ferry. The company used this as a place to entertain customers. I was working with a special projects group that included sales and marketing personnel from our New York office (I was the R&D guy), and we met quarterly to review our projects. We usually met at the New York office, but one quarter we met at the Bonneau Ferry plantation.

It was heavenly. Westvaco knew how to entertain key customers. The guest rooms were in the main house, while smaller outbuildings were meeting rooms fully stocked with the technology of the day: overhead projectors, slide projectors, and 16 mm movie projection equipment. When I came downstairs my first morning for breakfast, my waiter asked me just two questions: how would I like my eggs cooked, and how would I like my steak cooked. Steak and eggs for breakfast! Every day!

The plantation was on the Cooper River, and the company continued to grow rice near the river, primarily to attract game. It was a sanctuary for the red-cockaded woodpecker, but I gathered that, the woodpecker aside, there was an awful lot of hunting that took place on the grounds. I remember shooting clay pigeons in the back of the main house.

MeadWestvaco transferred the Bonneau Ferry acreage to the state of South Carolina in 2004, and it is now opened to the public, though I wouldn't go hiking there during hunting season, if I were you.

The buildings on the grounds are not the original buildings. They were built in the early 1900s, which is why one cannot find pictures of the buildings on the South Carolina historical websites. Still, it gave me a chill a little bit ago, while reading a 1950 biography of Calhoun, to learn that his mother-in-law (Floride Bonneau Colhoun) owned a plantation called Bonneau's Ferry, and that Calhoun and his wife were married there. Further, Calhoun's wife stayed at Bonneau's Ferry during Calhoun's early sojourns to Washington, DC, as a congressman.

The plantation was sold in 1838, after Calhoun's mother-in-law died. It exchanged hands a few times, and by the early 1900s the name had been shortened to Bonneau Ferry. Westvaco acquired it in the 1960s, and held it for about 40 years.

The biography, John C. Calhoun: American Portrait, by Margaret L. Coit, won a Pulitzer Prize. Although published 71 years ago, it still seems to be the definitive biography. I mentioned in an earlier blog how difficult it is for me to read histories of any sort, including biographies, as I get distracted and end up taking side trips to explore the places I read about. You will be pleased to know that I have not (yet) decided to return to Bonneau Ferry.

On the other hand, Calhoun was born near Abbeville, SC. That is less than a two hour drive from Madison. He practiced law and managed a plantation there. Most of his family is buried there.

Can you guess where Kathy, Lucy, and I visited last weekend?