Charleston Currents – Emancipation Day

Pictured above is a hand-colored 1863 image (Frank Leslie's illustrated newspaper) of the Emancipation Day celebration on Jan. 1, 1863, under a grove of oaks outside Camp Saxton along the Beaufort River. Columbia filmmaker and Charleston native Bud Ferillo, who provided the engraved image, tells us that celebration of the first Emancipation Day was the largest in the South of freedmen when sine 3,000 people attended. Today, the location is home to Naval Hospital Beaufort.

FOCUS: Morris Brown AME to host special Watch Night today at noon

By Herb Frazier | Today at noon, the Charleston community will gather at Morris Brown AME Church to celebrate a moment in history when enslaved people anticipated freedom.

This special event at Morris Brown will be an homage to services first held on Dec. 31, 1862. At that time, the enslaved met in praise houses and churches to await the end of slavery with the Emancipation Proclamation on Jan. 1, 1863.

Those first freedom’s eve services in 1862 have become an annual celebration called Watch Night held on New Year’s Eve in black churches across America. While many congregations, like Morris Brown, have held this service its original purpose had been lost in time. Last year, the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor Commission began an effort to preserve and sustain this cherished tradition.

by Andy Brack · 12/31/2018 · Comments are Disabled · Focus, Good news

12/31: Watch Night at noon; Cauliflower and more: USS Charleston

IN THIS ISSUE | Dec. 31, 2018

FOCUS: Morris Brown AME to host special Watch Night today at noon
COMMENTARY, Brack: There are so many things I don’t understand
IN THE SPOTLIGHT: Magnolia Plantation and Gardens
GOOD NEWS: USS Charleston to be commissioned March 2
FEEDBACK: Do you have any opinions? Send them to us
MYSTERY PHOTO: Is it a castle?
S.C. ENCYCLOPEDIA: Columbia College
CALENDAR: Restaurant Week is around the corner

by Charleston Currents · 12/31/2018 · Comments are Disabled · Full issue

HISTORY: Emancipation Day celebrations

S.C. Encyclopedia | The tradition of marking the end of slavery with Emancipation Day celebrations began in South Carolina on January 1, 1863—the day the Emancipation Proclamation of President Abraham Lincoln declared three million slaves in the Confederate states to be “thenceforward, and forever free.” Since then, African Americans in South Carolina have gathered annually on New Year’s Day to commemorate the “Day of Jubilee” with food, song, dance, and prayer.