Hampstead Village

Front: This site was the center of Hampstead Village, a suburb of Charleston laid out for Henry Laurens in 1769. The village’s approx. 100-acre plan included 140 lots bounded roughly by what became East Bay, South, Meeting, and Cooper Streets. Early homes were razed during the American Revolution. Fortifications and barracks were built during the War of 1812. The originally affluent village later developed into a working-class neighborhood, annexed in 1850. Reverse: The 1769 plan for Hampstead Village reserved a central mall at this site for public use. Originally a 4.5-acre square, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries the mall hosted celebrations, political rallies, music, religious services, and other community events. Though bisected in 1897 by a trolley line through Columbus St. and quartered in 1956 by the extension of America St., the mall’s quadrants remain among the oldest public greens in the City of Charleston.