Charleston Through Ruth Miller's Eyes

Did you know Charleston's graveyards have more 18th Century graves then anywhere else in the country? I learned that from Ruth Miller, a Charleston tour guide for forty years, when she talked to my "Beyond the Grave" class. Ruth Miller is very educated on the history of Charleston and on Charleston graves. She has written many books about Charleston and its different churchyards. Miller became interested in grave sites during a tour she was doing with morticians. When she was showing them a church, they went in the graveyard and started telling her facts about the different graves. From then on Miller was fascinated with learning about Charleston's grave sites.

Ruth Miller posing with one of her etchings.

Miller said, "The Circular Congregational Church has more portrait tombstones than any other church in the United States." The Circular Congregational Church is located in Charleston and was established in 1680. If someone had a portrait on their tombstone, it meant that they were rich. Charleston did not have stone carvers at this time, so people would have to have their tombstones carved somewhere else. Boston, Massachusetts is where most of the stone carvers were, and in the Circular Church graveyard, all of the tombstones were carved by carvers in Boston. 

An etching that Miller brought to the class.

Charleston was the center of the slave trade. "Forty percent of all Africans sold, were in the city of Charleston," according to Miller. In 1776, Charleston was the number one export for rice and all of that rice was grown by slaves. Charleston was also the number two export for indigo. Charleston was the fourth largest city in the world in 1776, and African Americans were the majority of people living there. However, African Americans were not allowed to be buried in the churchyards, even if they attended that church. 

This is an etching that Miller brought in to show the class.
She thinks that this one is very interesting because it has
such detailed art and symbolic meaning to it.

The reason why there are so many churches and churchyards in Charleston is that there were so many different religions in Charleston, more than any other place for the time period. Freedom of religion was one of the main reasons people went there. Miller said, "All it took to have a religion in Charleston was seven people." People came to Charleston from all over the world, bringing their religion to the United States and making Charleston's history truly unique.