The Orphan-house is a brick building, three stories high, erected by voluntary contributions, and in it, one hundred and thirty-six children of both sexes are supported. I was surprized at the exceeding cleanliness pervading the whole establishment. The children sleep upon the floor, and the girls and sick only are allowed mattresses; the boys have a woollen coverlet, in which they wrap themselves. I was informed that this was done from fear of vermin. A very nourishing diet, and a truly maternal care, preserve the children healthy. At their twelfth year, they are provided for abroad to enable them to earn their own subsistence. Many of the boys enter into the United States navy, and it has been reported to me that two of the pupils of this institution have attained the rank of officers. Behind the house is a moderately large chapel, in the midst of the garden. The clergy of all Christian professions can hold divine service here every Sunday afternoon; in the mornings, the service in turn is taken charge of by a superintendent. In front of the building is a large open square. In it stands an ill-preserved statue of Lord Chatham, which was erected by the then colony of South Carolina, before the breaking out of the American revolution, in memory of that great man, in gratitude for the opposition he maintained against colonial taxation. An inscription on the statue mentions this. During the siege, it stood at the corner of the street, near the City Hall. There it lost an arm by one of the first English balls that struck the city.
The state prison is a small building. The prisoners are too much crowded together, and have no employment. The atrocious criminals live in the upper story, and are immured two together in a cell, without ever being permitted to come into the open air. This is allowed only to those dwelling in the first story, consisting of debtors, and persons who are imprisoned for breaches of the peace. The walls within, as well as the flooring, are of strong oak wood. In each apartment is an iron ring in the floor, for the purpose of securing dangerous prisoners. In the upper story there is a negro confined, who, implicated in one of the late conspiracies, had not committed himself so far as to allow of his being hung; nevertheless, his presence appeared so dangerous to the public tranquillity, that he is detained in prison till his master can find some opportunity to ship him to the West Indies, and there sell him. In another room was a white prisoner, and it is not known whether he be an American or Scotchman, who involved himself by his writings deeply in the last negro conspiracy. The prisoners received their food while we were present: it consisted of very good soup, and three-quarters of a pound of beef. Upon the ground floor is the dwelling of the keeper, who was an Amsterdam Jew, and the state-rooms in which gentlemen, who are lodged here, receive accommodation for money and fair words. The cleanliness of the house was not very great; upon the whole it left an unfavourable impression upon me.
I found the other prison, destined for the punishment of minor offences of the negro slaves, in a better condition. In it there were about forty individuals of both sexes. These slaves are either such as have been arrested during the night by the police, or such as have been sent here by their masters for punishment. The house displays throughout a remarkable neatness; black overseers go about every where armed with cow-hides. In the basement story there is an apparatus upon which the negroes, by order of the police, or at the request of their masters, are flogged. The latter can have nineteen lashes inflicted on them according to the existing law. The machine consists of a sort of crane, on which a cord with two nooses runs over pullies; the nooses are made fast to the hands of the slave and drawn up, while the feet are bound tight to a plank. The body is stretched out as much as possible, and thus the miserable creature receives the exact number of lashes as counted off! Within a year, flogging occurs less frequently: that is to say, a tread-mill has been erected in a back building of the prison, in which there are two tread-wheels in operation. Each employs twelve prisoners, who work a mill for grinding corn, and thereby contribute to the support of the prison. Six tread at once upon each wheel, while six rest upon a bench placed behind the wheel. Every half minute the left hand man steps off the tread-wheel, while the five others move to the left to fill up the vacant place; at the same time the right hand man sitting on the bench, steps on the wheel, and begins his movement, while the rest, sitting on the bench, uniformly recede. Thus, even three minutes sitting, allows the unhappy being no repose. The signal for changing is given by a small bell attached to the wheel. The prisoners are compelled to labour eight hours a day in this manner. Order is preserved by a person, who, armed with a cow-hide, stands by the wheel. Both sexes tread promiscuously upon the wheel. Since, however, only twenty-four prisoners find employment at once on both wheels, the idle are obliged in the interval to sit upon the floor in the upper chambers, and observe a strict silence. One who had eloped several times from a plantation, was fastened by a heavy iron ring, that passed over his leg to the floor. To provide against this state of idleness, there should be another pair of tread-wheels erected. The negroes entertain a strong fear of the tread-mills, and regard flogging as the lighter evil! Of about three hundred and sixty, who, since the erection of these tread-mills, have been employed upon them, only six have been sent back a second time.
The poor-house, an old building raised by subscription, contains one hundred and sixty-six paupers. It will only admit such poor persons as are completely disabled. Those who can labour a little can obtain the employment they desire, and then receive good attendance and proper support. The sick were taken care of in a distinct infirmary, where each had a separate bed. The healthy slept upon the floor. I enquired why the sick were not provided with iron bedsteads in place of the wooden ones they occupied? and was informed that it was from apprehension of the prevailing severe thunder-storms.
Connected with the Poor-house is a Magdalen Asylum, which provides shelter and care for thirty unfortunate beings. It struck me forcibly, as I saw under an open shed in the yard where the poor walked about, the dead cart, and close by it numbers of empty coffins piled up together, that the scene might be very well introduced in a monastery of the order of La Trappe.
A medical school is to be built not far from the poor-house. Until the completion of this structure, the students, one hundred and twenty in number, receive their instruction in a wooden building, in which there are arranged an amphitheatre, and a chemical laboratory.
Dr. Tidyman and Mr. Lowndes had the politeness to show me a rice mill established a few years ago. This mill is the property of Mr. Lucas, who has fixed a similar one in the neighbourhood of London. Rice is known as the staple article of produce of the lowlands in South Carolina, and yet there was no mill hitherto to free the rice from its husk, and to prepare it for use or export. This mill is situated near the river Ashley. The schooner that conveys the rice from the plantation, lies directly before it, a cart is taken on board the vessel filled with rice, and by means of an inclined plane drawn into the mill, where it is deposited. Hence the rice is drawn to the upper story, in which it is cleared of dust by a fan, and passed between two large mill-stones which frees the hull from the grain. It is then placed in a cylinder of bolting cloth. By this it is further cleaned from all the hull. Now it comes into the trough, where it is beaten by heavy hammers faced with tin, and by that means is completely cleaned. It is once more conveyed into a bolting cylinder, where, by another series of revolutions, it is freed from the slightest dust, and shook through a tube into the tierces placed for packing. The tierces stand upon a trunnel, which whirls round while a hammer continually strikes upon it. Such a tierce in this way receives six hundred pounds of rice. The machinery is to be set in motion in future by a steam-machine of twenty-four horse-power. It is wonderful, however, that the best steam-engines must be made in England to supply a country that has numbered Robert Fulton among her citizens!
Dr. Tidyman honoured me with a dinner, at which I met several of the distinguished inhabitants of the place, as Mr. Lowndes, Major Garden, son of that Scotch physician to whose honour Linnæus has given the name of Gardenia to a class of plants; Mr. J. Allen Smith, who passed seventeen years of his life in Europe, principally in Russia, and enjoyed the especial favour of the Emperor Alexander; he was present at my brother’s marriage, and enquired after him in the most ardent manner. This extremely amiable and interesting man has lost the greater part of his property. Here also I met with the Marquis de Fougères, Mr. Viel, and the English Consul, Mr. Newman. After dinner was over, a numerous company of gentlemen and ladies assembled, who remained in society through the evening. We had music, some of which was very good.
In one of my strolls through the city, I talked with a person from Erfurt, Mr. Siegling, who had established a music store here, and appeared to do very good business. I saw at his residence several handsome English harps and piano fortes; also several wind instruments of different kinds. He pricks the notes himself on tin, and has a press with which he prints them.
In Charleston there exists among the Germans, and their descendants, who for the most part are tradesmen of small capital, but persons of great respectability, a Friendly German Society.