Something's Afoot in the South Carolina Lowcountry: Exploring Beaufort County's Fort Fremont
Journalist, author and historian Michael DeWitt Jr. will be hiking the highways, byways, and waterways of lower South Carolina for his new health, travel and lifestyle column.
- Destination: Fort Fremont Preserve and History Center, Beaufort County, S.C.
- Distance: .98 miles
- Steps: 1,977
I walk where American soldiers once marched, waiting for a war that never came to our shores, and I can feel the Southern military history all around me like the warm, salty breezes coming off the nearby Atlantic.
I am exploring the Fort Fremont Preserve and History Center in the Lands End area of St. Helena Island, in coastal Beaufort County, just over an hour away from my landlocked home in Hampton County.
I know this general area well, often taking my family to enjoy the beaches of Hunting Island State Park (an area we will explore for this column later this summer.) But today our family mission is not fun in the sun amid the waves and waters, but exercise and education. We had journeyed here once before, years ago when my oldest son was in grade school, and I figured it was time to share a little history with our youngest child.
If you thought this was an old Civil War fort, like I once did, you were mistaken. But follow me, let's go inside!
Welcome to your military adventure - on an island!
What is so special about Fort Fremont, considering it wasn't around when General Sherman torched the South, and no battles were ever fought here?
"For 350 years, starting with the French in 1562, Europeans and their descendants built fortifications to defend the great harbor provided by Port Royal Sound. Fort Fremont was the last fort in this long local history of coastal forts and the sole remnant that we still have available" to see and study, says the official historical preserve website. Fort Fremont serves as a historical snapshot of military defense technology at the dawn of the 20th century as the U.S. became a major world power.
While no combat was ever waged here, the fort, active from 1899 to 1911, played a vital role in protecting the U.S. Naval Station at Parris Island, which was critical to the Atlantic naval fleet during the Spanish-American War.
After arriving at the paved parking area, we walked the 15-acre park that is now managed and preserved by Beaufort County and the Friends of Fort Fremont. We were immediately drawn to the most obvious, oldest, and most haunting attractions — the ruins of the fort itself — before we checked out the picnic pavilion, the handicap-accessible pathways through the forested habitat, the water fountains and restrooms of the air-conditioned history center, and, of course, the beach.
The historic concrete batteries, with their stone steps and towering form rising to almost treetop level yet surrounded by mounds of dirt embankments, reminded me of an ancient, vine-covered tomb or pyramid in the favorite Indiana Jones movies of my youth.
But the really spooky vibes came from deep within the almost crypt-like interior of the fort. Dark, covered with cobwebs and graffiti, the inner sanctums of these ruins would have been a great place for a serial killer to take his victims in a Hollywood movie, or for a Satanic cult to hold some otherworldly, occult blood rituals.
My apologies: I am a writer, and that's just how my overactive imagination works. But you don't have to use your imagination here: there is a real life ghost story attached to this place, but I'll keep you waiting in suspense for just a few more paragraphs.
The wooded site has a gated access to Lands End Beach along the Port Royal Sound. Here we walked, collected shells, lumps of coal dropped from military shipments decades ago, and searched for shark's teeth. My mind's eye could almost see the naval vessels steaming by, and hear the soldiers marching in cadence or enjoying leisure time in the salty, Southern waters.
Our outdoor adventure complete, we stepped into the restored comforts of the history center and were treated with displays of hospitality and history, and a really Southern Gothic ghost story.
The Legend of The Lands End Light
The Land’s End Light is often described as a yellowish, almost pale orange oval orb that usually appears at night about 10 to 12 feet above the ground along a roughly three-mile stretch of Land’s End Road, just a few miles past the Chapel of Ease. Some say this is the most haunted road in South Carolina and it’s also been called the state’s very own Sleepy Hollow, says explorebeaufortsc.com.
Sound like a kid's campfire story? Well it's all fun and games and roasted marshmallows until the light grows larger and closer, then zooms right up to you and then abruptly disappears in a blink, or hovers next to your car before chasing you down the dark, tree-shrouded road.
Locals whisper that the light is known to haunt a certain tree, and this haunting became a local attraction for adventurous youth looking for a thrill. About 30 years ago Beaufort County sheriff’s deputies reportedly counted as many as a hundred cars parked along the road on a single night, all waiting to catch a glimpse of this eerie light.
Of course, there are a lot of origin stories surrounding The Lands End Light. Some say it is the ghost of a decapitated Confederate soldier, wandering Lands End Road with a lantern in hand, searching for his head.
Others say the light is the ghost of a runaway slave who was hanged on the island, or perhaps the specter of a heartbroken enslaved man who was sold away from his wife and family and left to search endlessly for them through the infinite mists of time. How horrible!
But the Friends of Fort Fremont have their own story, a tale that has all the sordid, gothic elements a Southern storyteller like yours truly loves:
"In June 1910, violence erupted between artillerymen at the fort and African-American civilians involving the sale of moonshine by the locals. Following several fights, six soldiers were wounded and one killed. Isaiah Potter, arrested for the fatal shooting, claimed that the trouble [really] began with what The Beaufort Gazette called 'intimacy between his wife and a private soldier' who was identified as Pvt. Frank J. Quigley. A local legend identifies Quigley as the ghostly Land's End Light."
A Brief History of Fort Fremont
In 1885, President Grover Cleveland and Secretary of War, William Crowninshield Endicott established a Board of Fortifications to review coastal defenses, which led to a large scale modernization program.
When war with Spain loomed in 1898, construction of coastal batteries was authorized by Congress under the $50 million Harbor Fortification Defense Act. The historic significance of Fort Fremont is that it is representative of the new coastal defenses built during this period, with its upgraded design and new weapons systems, including new "disappearing cannons."
Fort Fremont was built in 1899 by the Army Corps of Engineers on Saint Helena Island across the Beaufort River from the Naval Station. Port Royal Sound is one of the largest natural deepwater harbors on the Atlantic Coast and had been a strategic waterway during the Civil War. It was designed to play a vital role in the protection of the strategic dry dock and coaling station which remained critical to the Atlantic Fleet during the Spanish-American War period.
Fort Fremont was one of six fortifications designed to protect the southeastern coast. The fort site eventually consisted of 170 acres with numerous outbuildings, including an administration building, guard house, barracks, hospital, stable, mess hall, bakery, commissary, post exchange, lavatory, and water tower. It was manned by a force of up to 110 personnel.
The main weapon systems consisted of Battery Jesup, which included three 10-inch breech-loaded disappearing cannons, and Battery Fornance, which had two 4.7-inch rapid fire guns. These five-gun emplacements, built behind bastions of earth, logs and concrete, became some of the highest ground on the coastal islands.
But as early as 1906, the War Department gave serious consideration to the closing of Fort Fremont due to budgetary constraints. By 1911, only a small detachment of the 116th Company Coastal Artillery from Fort Screven, GA, remained at the post. The guns at Fort Fremont stayed on the fort until World War I.
Fort Fremont was officially deactivated in 1912 and the land was put on the market in 1921 to be acquired and divided by various private individuals.
In May of 1989, the batteries and the hospital building (then a private residence) were both listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
The future of Fort Fremont
Over time, the area became overgrown with maritime forest and the ruins of the fort became little more than an interesting nuisance. In October 2004, The Trust for Public Land and the Beaufort County Council paid $5.4 million to two landowners in order to transform the remnants of Fort Fremont into a beachfront park.
Minor improvements, cleanup, a sign and fencing were installed. The Beaufort County Council allocated funds to improve the preserve, The Friends of Fort Fremont installed temporary interpretive signage, stairs and railings, and cleaned the external graffiti. Final design plans for major park improvements have since been approved by Beaufort County and the Friends.
Construction of the History Center at Fort Fremont was completed in November 2021 with a grand opening celebration. You can check out photos and a video of the opening gala at the History Center Page.
If you decide to visit Fort Fremont with your family
The Fort Fremont Preserve grounds are open Monday through Sunday from dawn to dusk.
The Fort Fremont History Center's new hours of operation (April - July) are: open on Thursdays, Fridays, and Sundays, 1 p.m. to 4 p.m., and on Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission is always free, and docent-led tours are available by request on Saturdays.
To schedule a docent-led tour, Email Friends of Fort Fremont to arrange to meet your guide(s) at the History Center during the open hours of 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
What's next for Something's Afoot in coastal Beaufort County?
In addition to visiting Hunting Island State Park this summer, Something's Afoot in the Lowcountry will also take us to another attraction on St. Helena Island, not far from Fort Fremont.
We will visit the Penn Center, a landmark of the Reconstruction and Civil Rights Movement eras and a site Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. visited several times in the 1960s — a quiet spot where he reportedly drafted parts of his "I Have A Dream" speech.
It is the site of the former Penn School, one of the nation’s first schools for formerly enslaved people, and is one of the most significant African American institutions in existence today. This historic and cultural institution, a 50-acre campus that includes a welcome center, museum, and other attractions, is a National Historic Landmark District and comprises two of the four sites in Reconstruction Era National Park.
Won't you come walk with me?