Daufuskie Island

Front: This 5,200-acre island lies between the Cooper and New Rivers. Spanish and English explorers saw it in 1521 and 1663; English arrivals received grants ca. 1700. Indigo was the main crop before the American Revolution, when most planters here were Loyalists. Sea island cotton was the main crop after 1790. In 1861, when Union forces captured the sea islands, planters abandoned Daufuskie Island. Reverse: Freedmen during and immediately after the Civil War, and then their descendants, made up almost all of the population here until near the end of the 20th century. Many owned small farms or worked in the oyster industry. The island, listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1982, is also part of the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor, designated by Congress in 2006.