PERFORMANCE DESCRIPTION
Some of Charleston’s most stately antebellum residences can be found along East Battery and South Battery. The first houses here were built as the city began expanding beyond its original walls to reach its height as a major world port. Some of the southernmost houses of East Battery were built just a few years before the start of the Civil War giving them front row seats to the action on the harbor. From the rooftops and piazzas of these grand houses, Charlestonians watched the firing on Fort Sumter that began the Civil War in 1861. These residences have withstood nearly two centuries of artillery strikes, great hurricanes, fires, and military occupation to remain among the city’s most beautiful monuments to its history.