Dorchester County’s history dates back to 1696, when Dorchester was settled by two distinct groups that set sail from England. The Puritans came seeking religious freedom and the Anglicans came with the crown’s blessing to seek land and wealth. The Puritans arrived in 1696 from Dorchester, Massachusetts, and were responsible for the name of the town, the fort and eventually the county.

The Anglicans had been around for some 20 years when the Puritans arrived but St. George’s, Dorchester was not built until 1719. Together, the Anglicans and the Puritans built Dorchester into the third largest town in the state and an important shipping center for rice planters sending their goods down the Ashley River to Charleston. The tabby fort built of mud, oyster shells and limestone, now known as Colonial Dorchester State Historic Site, was constructed prior to the Revolutionary War and was used to defend the area. Such famous generals as Moultrie, Francis Marion and Wade Hampton held off the British from the fort.

The birth of Summerville at war’s end spelled the demise of Dorchester. All that remains is the fort, St. George’s bell tower and foundations of some houses, which are being carefully excavated.
Summerville started as Pineland Village around 1785 when plantation owners came here to escape the swamp fevers and insects. Before Dorchester County was formed in 1897, Summerville was situated in Charleston, Berkeley and Colleton Counties.

Dorchester County was very much a part of America’s first railroad. In 1830, the rails started at Charleston and ran through Summerville to Hamburg, opening the upper part of the county above Cypress Swamp.

Ridgeville got its name about that time and began to grow. St. George was originally named for the first settler, James George, who leased the land to the railroad and it became an important station on the line. Reevesville was founded in or near Indian Trail, supposedly before 1793, and several hundred members of the Edisto Indian tribe live in Indiantown today. They were officially recognized by the U.S. Department of the Interior in the 1970s. The rural town of Givhans is home to a state park on the banks of the Edisto River.

With the Civil War came the end of the plantation system and thus the end of the economy and the only lifestyle known to most of Dorchester’s inhabitants. Not until after Reconstruction was there a beginning of recovery.

In 1899, a world congress of medical specialists in the field of respiratory disease gathered in Paris. The group, known as “the Tuberculosis Congress,” named Summerville one of the two best areas in the world for the cure of lung and throat disorders. The town was so named because of its situation on a dry, sandy ridge, amidst pine trees that charge the air with derivatives of turpentine. Their findings were widely publicized and a golden era began for the lower part of Dorchester County; and one inn after another sprang up as the town quickly became a favorite winter resort for Northern visitors who came to enjoy the mild climate and hunting season. The most famous, the Pine Forest Inn, sometimes served as the Winter White House for Presidents William Howard Taft and Theodore Roosevelt.

In 1976 a portion of the town, including 700 homes and buildings were listed in the National Register of Historic Places. Some residents may still come to Summerville for pulmonary relief, but most come for its mild climate, excellent schools and healthcare, a vibrant downtown, a variety of housing options, small-town friendliness and the proximity to historic Charleston and the beaches.

Summerville, Dorchester County’s largest community with a population at approximately 28,000, is recognized as the home of football’s winningest coach, Summerville High School’s John McKissick, and the annual YMCA Flowertown Festival, which draws over 250,000 people each spring. Other popular events include Sculpture in the South and theatrical performances by the Flowertown Players.

Summerville is growing and ever-changing, but it still holds on to its important role in history and the small-town values that make it a truly charming place to visit.