Personal Injury Attorney in Georgetown, SC.

Originally designed as a ferry to commute passengers up and down the coast of Maine and once a week into Boston, the steamship Harvest Moon was acquired by the U.S. Navy in 1864. Assigned to the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, the USS Harvest Moon prevented Confederate vessels from delivering supplies to the ports of Savannah, Charleston and Georgetown.

Sabotage at Sea

According to historian Paige Sawyer, Admiral John Dahlgren was stationed on the Harvest Moon, which was in port when Charleston surrendered on Feb. 17, 1865. Upon hearing Georgetown was ready to capitulate as well, Dahlgren and his crew traveled on the Harvest Moon up the coast to the port city where they delivered surrender papers to town hall, declaring freedom for all enslaved people in Georgetown County. By the time the transaction was completed, it was too late in the day to return to home base in Charleston, so the ship anchored in nearby Winyah Bay off of Battery White, an abandoned Confederate fortification.

Sawyer said that same evening, upstairs in the old Kaminski Hardware shop on Front Street, two Confederate soldiers were busy packing several mines with gunpowder. Under the cloak of darkness, on an outgoing tide, they rowed out into the bay and weighted the torpedoes 2 feet under the water’s surface.

The next morning, on March 1, Dahlgren gave orders for the Harvest Moon to be dispatched to Charleston. Within minutes of embarkation, the ship hit one of the Confederate mines, which according to the admiral, as cited in George C. Rogers Jr.’s book, “The History of Georgetown County, South Carolina,” blew a 10-by-12-foot hole through the starboard quarter, sinking the ship in 5 minutes in 12 feet of water. The only fatality was a steward named John Hazard, 30, who Sawyer said was serving the admiral coffee when the floating torpedo struck. Dahlgren and the rest of his crew were transferred to the tug Clover without further injuries.

On April 21, 1865, according to the Naval History and Heritage Command, “Harvest Moon was stripped of her valuable machinery and abandoned.” Entombed in pluff mud, the Harvest Moon remains forever stuck in Winyah Bay, with the top of its smokestack protruding above the water. To catch a glimpse of the ship, visit lowcountrytours.com.

For more than 100 years, the identity of a ship wrecked off the coast of Cape Romain remained unknown and local divers referred to it simply as the “Anchor Wreck.” According to the curator of the South Carolina Maritime Museum Justin McIntyre, the mystery was solved in 2007 with the discovery of a New York Times article published in February 1905 regarding a boating incident in South Carolina on Feb. 4 of that year.

Everything But the Propeller

Due to a winter storm with strong gusts, visibility was limited and on its return to New York a whaleback called the City of Everett slammed into the Leif Eriksson, which was en route to Philadelphia to deliver sugar from Cuba. Within minutes the ship sank and its crew was welcomed aboard the City of Everett. Because intense winds had downed telegraph lines in Charleston, information about the wreck never reached South Carolina.

To preserve the vessel’s history, Lowcountry Marine Salvage rescued an iron propeller from the wreckage weighing over 22,000 pounds and measuring 14 feet in diameter and donated it to the South Carolina Maritime Museum, where it remains propped against the side of the building. To learn more about Georgetown’s shipwrecks, visit the museum, located at 729 Front St. or online at scmaritimemuseum.org and youtube.com/watch?v=59nWmLYz3cA.

Oldest Recovered Wooden Vessel in America

In 1970, divers discovered a sunken ship named the Brown’s Ferry Vessel after the location where it was found. After years of effort to recover the vessel, which was laden with 25 tons of bricks made on a plantation, the remains (circa 1730) were stored for 10 years at a preservation facility outside of Columbia. Although Brown’s Ferry is the oldest recovered wooden vessel in America, no one knows who owned the boat or where it came from, according to former member of South Carolina’s House of Representatives and chairman of the board of Georgetown’s Rice Museum, Vida Miller. Along with the Rice Museum’s executive director, Jim Fitch, Miller helped secure funding through the state’s budget and other fundraising endeavors to raise money for the recovery of Brown’s Ferry and its installation on the third floor of the museum.

To learn more about the Brown’s Ferry wreck, visit the Rice Museum, located at 633 Front St. in Georgetown, or explore ricemuseum.org.

Sharing is Caring

Generational Gem: A Tribute to Georgetown’s Iconic International Paper Mill Tailgate Heroes: Must-eat Game Day Dishes Revolutionized: Georgetown’s Downtown Makeover History of Pawleys Island Chapel: Sermons by the Sea

International Paper’s announcement of the impending closure of the Georgetown paper mill follows on the heels of the closure of the WestRock paper mill in North Charleston as well as other shutdowns and reductions in paper manufacturing across the Southeast. While some may celebrate fewer trucks on the road or the fading of a mill's distinct odor, a healthy forest products industry is imperative for the conservation of special places, a hallmark of South Carolina’s values and culture.

In short, if you find the green spaces made possible by our state's forests important, it’s time to listen.

More than half of South Carolina’s forests are owned and managed by families. The revenue generated by timber harvests helps them cover their many costs: taxes, insurance, site preparation before tree planting, planting of native grasses in forest stands, maintenance of roads for recreational purposes and more. Land ownership is an investment, one that requires considerable resources at the time of tree planting and throughout the lifecycle of the trees.

That investment is recouped when the trees are thinned or harvested. These family forest owners are some of the most patient, optimistic people you’ll meet. They are truly investing in the future.

The closure of these two major mills on the coast means that landowners will continue to experience a crippling financial loss. Coastal landowners no longer have access to a market for small trees, which are turned into pulpwood. Landowners harvest the small trees when they thin their forests to improve forest health or to improve the quality of timber that is necessary for lumber. Coastal owners who can secure a market are likely to experience drastic price reductions due to the glut of pulpwood across the state. Just as row crop farmers depend on their ability to sell their corn or soybeans at maturity, so do tree farmers.

When landowners of forests and farms suffer financially, conservation suffers. South Carolina land trusts have worked with families to protect more than 1 million acres through conservation easements. These voluntary legal agreements limit some uses of the property, such as development, to promote conservation values on natural forests as well as working farms and timberlands.

In doing so, landowners make a permanent decision to chart a land legacy that does not include revenue from development. While many owners also receive grant funding or tax incentives that cover part of their loss of property value, timber revenue is a significant contributor to ongoing property management.

When faced with uncertain markets, landowners are less likely to commit to the permanent land protection that protects the quality of water in our rivers, provides diverse wildlife habitat and serves as stunning backdrops in our beautiful state. We soon will see landowners forced to make difficult decisions with family land; we all lose when we lose the public benefits of private landownership and land conservation.

We’re blessed to live in a state led by a conservation-focused, pro-business governor and like-minded elected leaders. If special places matter to you, if you appreciate rural places, then our state’s landowners — those who already have protected their land and others still considering it — need you to advocate in support of the forestry industry. This is a clarion call: Send an email, write a letter, share Post and Courier stories on your social feeds, but don’t sit idly by and wonder what happened after it’s too late.

Jennifer Howard is executive director of the South Carolina Land Trust Network.

PAWLEYS ISLAND — A new Pawleys Island restaurant is serving up classic Southern comfort foods with a hint of creative flair.

Brandon Wallace, head chef and co-owner of Pawleys Fish Camp, is a Georgetown County native. He said he wanted to create a place with an authentic Lowcountry menu — something that would remind locals of the food they ate growing up.

“I try to put a little twist on it, you know, to bring it up to speed, but still keep those traditional roots from a long time ago,” Wallace said.

Pawleys Fish Camp is located along U.S. Highway 17 in the building that once housed Tuscany Bistro.

Myrtle Beach News

Its menu includes such dishes as lobster mac and cheese, oysters Rockefeller with smoked collard greens, and 12-hour braised beef brisket, plus traditional samplers featuring hushpuppies and honey butter.

Wallace has over 20 years of experience in the restaurant industry. He’s worked in several other Pawleys restaurants, including Frank's, Bistro 217 and The Chive Blossom Restaurant and Bar. He also spent time working at a Connecticut restaurant and at a country club in Blythewood.

Pawleys Fish Camp celebrated its soft opening on Jan. 14. Wallace said the restaurant received rave reviews from its first customers.

“It wasn’t soft, I’ll tell you that. Right at four o’clock, they (the customers) piled in. It was beautiful,” Wallace said. He added that the fried deviled eggs, in particular, were a huge hit.

Andrea Brunson attended the soft opening. She ordered the fried shrimp and dirty grits. She enjoyed the entree, but like many other customers, her favorite dish of the night was the fried deviled eggs.

Wallace said Pawleys Fish Camp already has plans to expand its offerings to include live entertainment and Sunday brunches. At the moment, the restaurant is only open for dinner, but it will start serving lunch in the coming months.

"We're just kind of taking our time right now with the winter and everything, getting acclimated with the menu that we have," he said. "And before we rush into something else, we want to do it right."

The community responded to the restaurant’s opening with a surge of support.

Brunson said she's been eating Wallace's food for years, having hired him to cater private events. She also went to school with Alfonzo Allen, who co-owns the restaurant with Wallace. She said she’s excited for them to be embarking on this new venture and is confident the restaurant will be a welcome addition to Pawleys Island.

"It's going to be great for the community," she said. "I think everybody's going to love it.”

Correction: Pawleys Fish Camp opened this week. An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated the name of the restaurant. It has been updated to include the correct name.

The exit to historic Georgetown is easy to miss, due in part to the smog created by the International Paper mill that looms over the port city. As a result, many travelers are unaware of the magical experiences Georgetown has to offer.

Brimming with stylish cafes, coffee shops, boutiques, art galleries and five cultural museums along Front Street, Georgetown also boasts tree-lined streets set against a backdrop of stately pre-colonial homes and gardens with exquisite views of the Sampit River.

Despite this juxtaposition of beast and beauty, Georgetown has embraced the International Paper company since it opened nearly 88 years ago. Without the paper mill, the county would most likely not have recovered from an economy that was on the verge of collapse, having lost its wealth-producing rice crops after the Civil War and the Great Depression that followed.

According to George C. Rogers, Jr.’s book “The History of Georgetown County, South Carolina,” construction of the International Paper plant began on the 525-acre site in October 1936 and was completed in nine months. Between June and July 1937, the No. 1 and No. 2 machines rolled off the first reels of paper. By 1942, the No. 3 machine began production of container boxes used by the armed services for shipping supplies overseas during the war. Consuming 2,100 cords of wood per day, mostly pine from surrounding forests, the International Paper mill became the largest kraft paper manufacturer in the world.

The presence of the International Paper company transformed the county, Rogers said, citing that by July 1962 the plant employed 1,700 persons in the mill, 400 in the container plant and 250 in its Woodlands Division — a total of 2,350 employees. As there were only 34,798 residents in the county in 1960, the mill’s importance to the local economy was significant.

For example, through its Woodlands Division, which helped farmers with scientific resources, the mill created a revolution in the region’s agricultural production. With the exportation of its goods, the mill also revived the port where for 30 years the International Paper mill had a marine terminal. While Georgetown’s main import was fuel oil, her exports were paper and paper board, and many of these products were transported by the one railroad and the 20 trucking firms that served Georgetown.

According to Rogers, the primary source of income for the residents of Andrews came from working at the International Paper mill or from the local dealers who contributed parts and services to the manufacturing plant. Because of its higher wages and fringe benefits, International Paper became a model for other employers, he said.

Consequently, over the decades, working at the mill became a family tradition that in some cases was handed down for four generations. That is, until Oct. 31, 2024, when International Paper announced the closure of Georgetown’s mill, laying off 700 employees and 200 contractors.

Citing lower sales volumes over the last two years, CEO Andy Silvernail said the facility was “underutilized” and by slashing expenses the company would be able to “optimize their footprint.” An International Paper press release further stated that the company is focused on increasing profits from its global cellulose fibers business, which generated $2.9 billion in 2023. “The International Paper Mill is committed to maximizing value for our shareholders,” Silvernail added. According to 102.1 The City’s Raymond Owens, company officials expressed that closing the Georgetown factory will help with that strategy.

Former mayor and resident of Georgetown Jack Scoville said that following the termination of the port authority and steel mill, the shutdown of International Paper marks the end of an era. He added that in the short-term, this offset will see a major economic impact across the county, but the bigger picture projects great opportunities for jobs and expansion.

Since announcing its closure, International Paper has offered terminated workers severance packages and services, including a job fair, to assist with the next chapter. However, the wages most local companies offered weren’t competitive with International Paper’s. Now, many laid-off workers are looking for jobs in the greater Charleston and Myrtle Beach areas, preferring the commute over having to relocate.

Although the clouds of smoke no longer billow from the manufacturing plant, its iconic facade continues to punctuate the skyline as a reminder of Georgetown’s stimulating history and hope for a fulfilling future.

Sharing is Caring

Winter Recipes: Cozy Flavors To Fend Off The Cold Voices of Our Ancestors Guide to Lowcountry Plantations Tailgate Heroes: Must-eat Game Day Dishes Revolutionized: Georgetown’s Downtown Makeover

GEORGETOWN — Georgetown County wants to purchase three pieces of land owned by International Paper as part of its effort to redevelop waterfront property in the longtime industrial hub, local officials said.

No specific plans for the property have been presented, but County Administrator Angela Christian said the county would like to pursue a large-scale redevelopment that includes the nearby county-owned port.

The county intends to quickly make an offer on the properties, Christian said. The land would have to be appraised, so she’s not sure how much the county would offer yet.

"That’s part of the process of where we are … exploring what those price points would be," she said.

The properties are not part of the main paper mill site, Georgetown County Councilman Raymond Newton said. He said they are located on the east side of U.S. Highway 17, next to the Georgetown port. IP hasn't used this land in many years, he said.

IP announced in October that it would close its 87-year-old Georgetown mill, eliminating the jobs of roughly 700 workers and some 200 contractors. The mill ceased operations at the end of 2024 and is expected to be decommissioned by the summer, local officials said.

For weeks, local leaders have explored potential options for the mill site and surrounding properties.

State Sen. Stephen Goldfinch, R-Murrells Inlet, said several developers are interested in Georgetown's waterfront, and he would like to see the port, defunct paper mill and idled steel mill rolled into the same redevelopment package.

Goldfinch said he hadn't heard anything about the county's interest in IP properties until after Christian discussed the idea at the county's Feb. 6 budget retreat. He hopes to see "some commercial, industrial-type stuff up on the hill," but he'd like much of the port and steel mill land converted into a mixed-use development with restaurants, shops and second-story apartments above commercial spaces.

"Just an extension of Front Street," he said. "Obviously the steel mill's got to come down for that to happen. So (it's) a waterfront that Georgetown can be proud of that's aesthetically pleasing but also produces some jobs and some taxes."

Goldfinch doesn't see the main IP site as ever being suitable for housing, but he wants the redevelopment effort to factor that entire area into any long-term plans.

The steel mill land is still owned by Liberty Steel, but that facility has been idle since Oct. 11. Shortly after it halted production, it was announced that the mill had sold some of its equipment and assets to Insteel Industries Inc., a North Carolina company that makes wire-reinforcing products.

The steel mill has also stopped receiving power from Santee Cooper because its electric furnace and rolling mill aren't being used, according to a statement from a Liberty Steel spokesperson. If the mill remains idle for 365 days in a two-year period, it could be forced to close.

The hope for a mixed-use development on the waterfront coincides with recommendations from a 2016 Urban Land institute study commissioned by Georgetown government and business leaders. The study identified potential uses for the steel mill and port properties.

The report suggested mixed development that would encourage recreation along the waterfront while saving space for traditional maritime businesses.

Newton said the IP properties beside the port could work well for that vision.

"The bigger, the better when it comes to that waterfront right there," he said.

Charles Perry contributed to this report.