19 February 2010

Mitchelville in Book, Dance, Song, and Drama

We humans tend to think that the way places appear today are the way places have always been. How very untrue that perception can be. Take for example, the Mitchelville site on Hilton Head Island. Archaeological studies began in 1986 of the first freedmen's village in the United States. Yet, if you visit the site today, there is little evidence of the the thriving and historically important village.

A group of native islanders and Hilton Head town staff are developing a plan to turn a tiny sliver of town-owned land on the northern end of the island into a living history museum to commemorate Mitchelville with replicas of the freed slaves' 12-by-12-foot wooden tract houses and general stores.

You can read more about the archaeological site from Chicora Foundation in Research Series 7, Indian and Freedmen Occupation at the Fish Haul Site (38BU805), Beaufort County, South Carolina, edited by Michael Trinkley. We have a copy in the BDC and one at our Hilton Head Branch Library but you can read it online, too. (Read down to #7 and then pick the section you'd like tor read online.)

Another archaeological report, Archaeological Manifestations of the "Port Royal Experiment" at Mitchelville, Hilton Head Island, South Carolina is also available online as well as in the BDC Research Room at call number SC 975.799 TRI.

For a more complete list of resources about the historic African-American Mitchelville site, check out the "Recommended Reading" section of the Library's website under the "Local Treasures Brought to You by the Beaufort District Collection."

In case you are south of the Broad, you may want to consider attending the performance of “Mitchelville,” a play depicting the lifestyle of the Gullah people around the turn of the 20th century. Youngsters from the Native Island Community will express this story through music, singing, dialogue, dancing and acting. 7 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 21, at the Visual & Performing Arts Center, Hilton Head Island High School, 70 Wilborn Road. Tickets are $10 for adults, $5 (with student ID), Free 4 & Under.

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