Clifton, A River Of Memories, A Companion Volume To A Place Called Clifton
by Michael Hembree and David Moore
Copyright@ 1988
Published by Michael Hembree and David Moore
Printed in the United States of America by Jacobs Press of Clinton, South Carolina
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 88-91200
Pages 168-173
Lost In The Sand
1903 Flood Left Area Mills, Homes, - And Lives - in Shambles
The days following the Pacolet River flood of June 6, 1903, were some of the most devastating in the history of the Clifton community. More than 50 people were killed in the river valley when flood waters roared through the area on that grim Saturday morning. The Converse mill was almost totally destroyed, the factories at N0. 1 and No.2 were heavily damaged, and many mill houses were washed downriver .
The tasks of locating and burying the dead were gruesome. Friends and relatives spent days digging in the riverside sand and searching locations downriver for the missing. Residents also searched the area for belongings, as described by J. C. Garlington of the Spartanburg Herald, who visited Clifton two days after the flood:
"In the midst of the white sand stretching out like a prairie, a dozen men were clustered. One was digging and we imagined that perhaps the body of some loved one was being unearthed. The men were silent and disconsolate. They did not seem to notice our approach, but kept on watching the man who was digging. Investigation showed that this old man was delving into the foundations of his former home. Two feet under the sand he found a wire bed spring and he was carefully pulling the mud out of the springs. He could have found a dozen springs in the debris on the hillsides, but it was the last remnant of his home, and he tugged away to reclaim it. He said he had found a monkey wrench and a hat pin, and he prized them highly ."
Similar scenes occurred up and down the river as the community tried to recover from its worst natural disaster. The flood was like nothing seen before or since in Clifton.
John Cantrell, who worked for Clifton Manufacturing Company and later owned a store in Clifton, was 21 years old and an employee of the No. 2 mill when the flood battered Clifton. In an interview with The Spartanburg Journal in 1957, he remembered some of the drama and tragedy:
"I shall never forget the day nor the terror of our people as long as I live," he said. "The river finally gave way to many days and nights of hard rains. It busted loose. Saturday morning, early, I was standing on a hillside in Clifton #2 mill village waiting for the streetcar which carried people to work. It was about 6 a.m. when suddenly a crowd came running up the car tracks. They said Clifton #3 (Converse) had been washed away and the others were going down. Immediately, we went by carriage to the scene of destruction. We arrived there about 7:30 a.m. The water was high at Clifton No. 1. It kept getting higher. Houses were washing away. At No. 2 mill, I saw people hanging in trees all around. They had climbed there in an effort to avoid destruction in the flood. A man named Ike Wilson was in a tree on the west side of the river. He stayed there from 6:30 in the morning until 4:30 in the afternoon until the water went down enough for him to be rescued."
Cantrell helped rebuild the No. 2 mill. The flood and its aftermath were stories of regional and national concern. Efforts to prevent a repeat of the tragedy began with studies of the nature of the flood and the storm that preceded it.
The United States Geological Survey of the Department of the Interior analyzed the Pacolet River Flood as part of it's report on "Destructive Floods in the United States in 1903" printed in 1904. Circumstances surrounding the flood are described in detail in the following edited excerpts from "Water Supply and Irrigation Paper No.96, Series M, General Hydrographic Investigations, 11 ":
"A destructive flood occurred in Spartanburg County, S. C., on June 6, 1903. Considering the small area affected by the storm, the precipitation was very large and the loss of life and property great.
"Character of country and streams-In the 24 hours of the storm there was a rainfall of from three and one-half to five inches in the counties of Cherokee, Spartanburg, Greenville, and the eastern half of Pickens, in South Carolina; and in the southern part of Rutherford, Polk, and Henderson counties in North Carolina-a total area of 2,300 to 2,500 square miles. This region is situated on the southern slope of the Saluda Mountains. It does not extend up into the mountains, but includes the foothills and rolling country. About half of it is covered with timber; the remainder is cultivated and pasture land. The surface slopes are such that the water runs off rapidly and there is very little storage.
"The streams that drain this area are Pacolet, North, South, and Middle Tyger, and Enoree rivers. These are tributaries of Broad River and enter it from the west. The upper tributaries of Saluda River, which flow to the west, rose to an unusual height. But little damage was done on them. Practically all the damage was confined to Spartanburg County, S. C.
"The streams mentioned rise within a comparatively short distance of each other. North Fork of the Pacolet heads in Polk County. N. C.; all the others head in Greenville County, S. C. They are characterized by deep, narrow channels with rapid fall. The Pacolet is said to have a fall of 500 feet from its head to Pacolet Mills, a distance of 35 miles. There are no ponds or wide bottom lands to hold back the water in time of flood. The ground was soaked almost to saturation just previous to the flood. So that there was very little ground storage.
"The storm-During the week preceding this flood there was rain over this area almost daily; not hard rains, but gentle, penetrating showers that nearly saturated the soil. On Friday. June 5, 1903 rains fell almost incessantly. In the evening the rain became more violent and continued until 4 a.m. without interruption.
"Weather Bureau reports show that the greatest precipitation in the area in the 24 hours was at Spartanburg, diminishing in amount in every direction from that place, rapidly to the northwest and southeast and gradually to the northeast and southwest.
"About one and one-half miles below was the original Clifton mill, known as No.1. It was built in 1880, and had 27,500 spindles. At this point the rise was not alarming at 2 o'clock a.m. The rapid rise began at some time between half past 4 and 5. After 5 the water rose 2 feet in 10 minutes according to the assistant superintendent. The first thing to be carried away was a large hall. This floated off about 5:45 and was hurled down into the upper corner of the mill, which stood out into the stream. The blow broke in part of the corner of the mill, but the destruction of the mill did not begin until the wreckage from above began to come down thickly, a little after 6 o'clock. Large timbers were then dashed into the projecting corner and the mill began to settle down gradually, little by little beginning at this end. Altogether about 110 feet of the main building and the wheelhouse were totally wrecked. The machinery on the two lower floors was severely damaged throughout the length of the mill by the water, mud, and drift. The dam was uninjured, except for the tearing off of the wooden apron. Fifteen cottages were carried away from this mill village. About 8 o'clock the water began very slowly to fall.
"Clifton mill No. 2, known as Dexter Mill, was a little over a mile from Clifton and was built in 1888, and had 30,500 spindles.
"This mill stood on a point on the left bank. Just opposite the mill the right bank is steep and high, while on the left bank a ridge extends out on the point almost to the mill. Above the mill, on either side of the river, the hills open out, and there the greater part of the mill village stood. Also on the point on the left bank below the mill were many cottages.
"The rise here began to alarm the watchman at 3 a.m., and at 3:30 it began to be rapid. One of the watchmen noticed that the rise was one foot in five minutes at about 4 o'clock. The alarm was sent out among the operatives at once. Most of them refused to realize that they were in any danger and would not make any effort to save themselves and their property until the water surrounded them. There were many narrow escapes, but at least 52 persons were lost here, most of them women and children. There was a deep deposit of sand and silt over the point below the mill where most of the lives were lost. Toward the end of the week following the disaster
this began to crack as it dried. Searching parties kept watch of these cracks, and wherever flies were seen to crawl down them they dug. Several human bodies were found in this way.
"At about 20 minutes past 4 the covered wooden highway bridge was washed down. The cotton warehouses and some of the cottages began to go about 6 o'clock, but the mill stood until 7. At that time the wreckage was coming down thickly from the upper mills. Exactly as at the Clifton mill above, the outer upstream corner was torn down. This mill was L-shaped, a wing extending shoreward from the lower end. When the mill was surrounded by the flood the heavy wreckage from above was hurled into this extension, tearing down the middle of it and practically filling the whole with driftwood. The machinery throughout the two lower floors of this mill was largely destroyed by the sand and drift thrown into it. All the cotton and cloth warehouses here were washed away, 42 of the company's cottages and six belonging to outsiders were wrecked and carried away.
"After bending to the left about the point on which the mill stands the river formerly bent to the right again around a low point on the right bank. During this flood the water overflowed this low point and cut a new channel over it, abandoning the old one. The crescent-shaped island left is about 400 yards long and 100 wide.
"The precipitation northwest of Spartanburg was considerably greater than five inches. The washouts, landslides, and gullies cut by the flowing water indicate that the precipitation over the rain area was probably from 7 to 11 inches in the 24 hours preceding the morning of June 6, 1903. This region is included in an area that Prof. A. J. Henry, of the United States Weather Bureau, states is second in precipitation in the United States. The people who live in that region are accustomed to very heavy rains...
"The flood-There are no gauging stations on the streams on which the damage was done by this flood... The flood of Catawba River of May 1901, which caused great destruction of farming land, had an estimated run off per square mile of 51.8 second feet at the Catawba, N. C. station, and of 44.4 second feet at the Rock Hill, S. C. station. The estimated run off at Pacolet during the 1903 flood exceeded that of 1901 at the Catawba by 70 per cent and at Rock Hill by 100 per cent. It is possible, however, that the estimated runoff at Pacolet is too great. The method of obtaining the mean velocity is not very reliable.
"Destruction wrought by the flood - There was some destruction of property on Tyger River, but the largest amount was on Pacolet River, at Clifton mills and Pacolet mills. The destruction of the Clifton mills is thus described in the report of Mr. B. S. Drane:
'Clifton Mill #3, known as Converse Mill, stood just above the bridge over which the main line of the Southern Railway crosses Pacolet River. It was built in 1890 and 1895, and as completed was a four story mill 496 feet long and 100 feet wide. It was valued at $1,000,000 and contained 50,100 spindles.'
"The river was noticed to be about eight feet above low water at midnight, but did not appear to be rising, and caused no anxiety. At 3:30 a.m., Mr. Kirby, master machinist of the mill, upon going down, saw that the water was beginning to rise into the wheelhouse. Getting assistance, he began to remove belts and ropes, but before any headway had been made, the water forced him to leave. By 4:30 the rise was beginning to be rapid and in a few minutes the water was flowing over the right end of the dam and breaking on the boiler houses and shops. These were wrecked before 5 o'clock. A little after 5 the brick stack, 137 feet high, was washed down with the part of the dam immediately behind it; it fell on the corner of the mill. The mill began to wash down immediately, and the wreck was completed by 6 o'clock. The mill was washed entirely away, except for the three-story picker room. Shops, boiler houses, wheelhouse and 16 cottages were also carried away.
"The dam here had a section of 27 feet height, 27 feet base, and 11 feet crest. The construction was said to have been hasty and of materials much inferior to those usual on this river. The crest was broken off irregularly to a depth averaging 10 feet for 100 feet from the right bank, and to a depth of seven feet for the next 40 feet. One footbridge and one county bridge, of wood, were carried away from just below the mill.
"Several lines of the Southern Railway were tied up for about a week. The main line from Charlotte, N. C., to Atlanta, Ga., passing through Spartanburg, was broken by the washing away of a bridge over Lawsons Fork of Pacolet River. The Charleston and Western Carolina Railway, also entering Spartanburg,lost its bridge over Tyger River.
"What purports to be a very conservative estimate of the financial loss due to the freshet is given as follows: Clifton mills 1, 2 and 3: $1, 750,000; Pacolet mills 1, 2 and 3: $1,250,000; Glendale mills: $30,000; Mary Louise mills: $18,000; Whitney mills: $5,000; Fingerville mills: $8,000; Tucapau mills: $10,000; Tyger mills: $8,000; two other mills: $20,000; bridges: $15,000; Converse Electric Railway Company: $30,000; Southern Railway Company: $300,000; lands and crops ruined, etc.: at least $6,000; total: $3,450,000.
"These figures do not include the loss due to the interruption of railway traffic, the stoppage of large industries throwing the thousands of operatives out of employment, the loss to the various trades and commercial enterprises, and worst of all, the loss of over 50 lives.
"Lessons taught by the flood - Very heavy storms, covering small or large areas, are to be expected on the southern and eastern slopes of the Appalachian Mountains. Floods much greater and more destructive than ordinary result from these storms.
"Ample unobstructed waterway must be provided for streams through towns. Usually the greater part of the destruction wrought is due to the failure of a temporary dam formed by drift in front of a bridge. Drift of all kinds collecting in front of a bridge forms a dam and raises the water several feet higher than it would have been without the obstruction. Finally the pressure on the obstruction becomes so great that it is swept away, and the resulting wave destroys other bridges and buildings that otherwise would not have been injured. The washing out of a dam by the water cutting a channel around one end of it is often the cause of a great wave that sweeps away bridges and buildings below that otherwise would not have been injured.
"Buildings that can be lifted from their foundations and swept away should not be allowed in the path of a possible flood.
"Mills, power stations, and other buildings on the banks of streams should be protected from the destructive action of drift during high water."
For more, check out my post on the Clifton Mills.
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Selasa, 26 Oktober 2010
Clifton Manufacturing, SC
In the early 1800's the SC Manufacturing Co. built and operated a mill to roll iron and a nail factory on the Hurrican Shoals of Pacolet River, at the site of where the Clifton cotton mills are now.
Dexter E. Converse was one of the investors who bought the Glendale Mill in 1856. He took over the management and moved into the old Bivings house in Glendale. In 1880 he began to acquire land on the Pacolet River not far from Glendale. As an outgrowth of the Glendale Mill, in 1881 the first Clifton Mill was built by D. E. Converse and Co. (Dexter E. Converse). In 1889, the second Clifton Mill was built. Dexter E. Converse introduced two new practices, the mill village and the marketing of the products through a New York broker.
Clifton Mill #2 in 1889
The worst recorded flood in South Carolina history took place on the Pacolet River and its tributary Lawson Fork Creek on June 6, 1903. It had rained of and on for five days. On June 6th it rained approximately 11". The water rose so rapidly that the land near the river was covered by 40 feet of water within one hour. Railway traffic was disrupted. There was complete loss of houses, churches, industrial plants and corn and flour mills along the river. The textile communities of Clifton and Pacolet were hit the hardest by the flood, but flood damage also occurred along other streams in northwest SC. The economy was devastated by $5 million (1903 dollars) in damage. Between 50-80 people died. Homes, churches and businesses, including 7 cotton mills, 13 railroad bridges, and 17 farm houses were destroyed. 4,300 people were put out of work due to the flood. Clifton Mill #2 was flooded up to the second floor. Clifton Mill #1 was partially destroyed and Converse Mill (aka Clifton Mill #3) was destroyed. Clifton Mill #2 was repaired, Clifton Mill #1 was rebuilt, Converse Mill was rebuilt on a higher level.
http://dept.wofford.edu/geology/pdfs/Pac1904.pdf
THE PACOLET FLOOD OF JUNE 6th,1903.
For a number of days preceding the disaster there had been unusual rainfall. Shortly after midnight on the night of June 5-6 a terrific downpour deluged the whole Piedmont region, and on the upper waters of the Pacolet must have Amounted to a cloudburst; for reliable men who were in the storm 'where it was not at its worst' testify that the waters fell in a mass in which drops were not distinguishable. The huge volume was greater than the narrow valley of the Pacolet conld carry of. The watchman at Clifton No. 3, the mill highest up stream on the Pacolet, says that at 4 o'clock on the fatal morning of June 6, the water was 20 feet above normal, and at 4 :30 the destruction of the mill was begun by a large tree plunging through the roof of the boiler room. Towards 6 o'clock the chimney of No. 3 fell with a crash towards the western shore, just after the dam had broken, and almost immediately the body of the great mill, embracing four-fifths of a plant worth upwards of $500,000, sank into the water. At the lower end of Converse, as the village at Clifton No.3 is called, stood a number of houses upon a flat plane of an elevation of from six to twenty feet above the river. Sixteen of these were swept away and ten of their occupants were drowned and one killed by exhaustion and exposure. The river turns sharply to the left at this point, presenting in its narrow course between it's precipitous banks one of the grandest stretches of scenery to be viewed in South Carolina. So violent was the rush of water this narrow that some fifteen feet of mingled earth and rock was washed away on the left bank
and some forty feet on the rightbank, against whose almost perpendicular side over a hundred feet in height the main fury of the fioodrushed point blank.
The mass of water rushing against this high hill, on which stands the Methodist church, could not escape at once through the passage of about 200 feet in width, and surged backwards so furiously on the right as to wash down large trees and leave them heading directly upstream.
The greatest displays of force, were the tearing away of the hillsides at this point and the marvelous power of transporting of machinery from Clifton No.3. For weeks after the flood there might have been observed on the right bank about a hundred yards above the dam at Noal, a card machine weighing 7,000 pounds which had been swept three-quarters of a mile downstream. Two others are known to have passed over the dam at No. 1 and one reached a point far below the dam at No. 2, having traveled about two and a half miles. These huge machines must have floated upon the floor of the mill as upon a raft. Out of 194 of them in No. 3, only six have been discovered. The loss of this item alone exceeds $180,000.
At Clifton No. 1, the broad, long river front on the right bank; formerly one of the most beautiful and populous sections of the town, was left strewn with the remnants of hideous ruin i but no lives were lost.
At Clifton No. 2 a large number of houses were built upon a beautiful plane on the right bank from ten to fifteen feet above the water and seventy-five yards in width. 400 yards lower down on the opposite side was another level plane that encircled by a sharp curve of the stream, where lay the section of the town known as Santuc. From these two flat places 60 houses were swept, and here occurred the great bulk of the fatalities. The drowned reaching the number of fifty. Here occurred some of the most pathetic scenes and some of the most thrilling escapes. Julius A. Biggerstuff, who loved Lola Hall, the daughter of his next neighbor above, had called upon his sweetheart Friday night; they were to be married, it is said, on Sunday morning. But before Saturday's sun had farly risen Biggerstaff and all six members of the Hall family had been swept into eternity. Here Mrs. Emory was washed ashore with a child of three years and another a few months old, all three of them almost stripped of clothing by the fury of the waters, while the husband perished. Here, too, Rev. W. J. Snyder, P. C. Hundley and Will Wilkins effected the most dramatic rescue during the disaster in saving, by means of two cotton bales lashed together and moored to a rope, Mrs. Landrum Williamand her two children and Mr. Hickman Stribling from a tree in which they had remained eight and a half hours, after having floated or swam to its branches. Here, too, lived B. S. Johnson, who escaped from the raging flood after having been borne for several miles upon its bosom, but whose wife and flve children were drowned. It was his little boy who floated on a piece of timber eight miles to Pacolet and disappeared in the waves flfteen feet high plunging over the dam and Shoals. Nor can we forget the pathetic case of Samuel Swearingen and his bride at Clifton No. 3, whom the onlookers from the bank saw sink in each others arms.
At Clifton No. 2 the operatives, thinking the river would soon fall, were working as usual in their places; the authorities marched them out before the disaster to the building, having almost to drive some to safety. The upper and riverside projections of this mill and of No. 1 were butted off, the shafting throughout was sprung and the first and second floors were covered with trash,
trees, mud and sand.
At Pacolet the great double mill Nos. 1 and 2, 600 feet in length, was more nearly completely demolished even than Clifton No. 3; for more of its foundation was carried off and only a mere cottaged sized remnant of the slasher and cloth rooms, based well upon the high bank, was left standing. No 1 went down about 8 in the murning and No. 2 about an hour later, in full view of
the whole mill population, whom the rising waters had prevented from begining work. At Pacolet No.3, the new five story mill half mile below the engine, boiler and picker rooms were wrecked and almost completely swept away; the upper corner of the main building next to the river was carried away and the first floor was filled with sand twelve to fifteen feet in depth. The river filled it's bed below the dam with huge rooks torn from their primeval resting places along its sides and changed it's course so as to wash directly against the foundation of the mill. One of the first tasks after the flood subsided was to excevate the old channel and turn the river back into it.
The Presbyterian church located just below Pacolet Nos. l and 2 and on the opposite or Eastern side, in that most fatal of situations a flat place circled by a sharp bend of the river opposite a precipice, was lifted bodily from its foundations and set down wrenched but entire 35 miles down the stream. No residence was destroyed at Pacolet and only one life was lost, that of a negro man who ventured too far in attempting to save cotton bales.
The water at Pacolet was twenty feet higher than ever before recorded.
On June 5th, Clifton stock was selling at from $175 to $180 and Pacolet could not be bought for less than $190. A month after the unparralleled disaster, Clifton was at par and Pacolet about $110.
Only one wagon bridge was left over either Pacolet or its tributary Lawson's Fork, that being a private one on Dr. Boyd's plantation three miles above the city of Spartanburg. Railway and mail communication were completely cut off by the destruction of trestles and high bridges, The steel bridge 150 feet long and weighing 2,509,956 pounds over Lawson's Fork a mile from Spartanburg was washed from its piers and carried 150 yards down the current, having, been forced from its piers 80 feet above low water presumably by the pressure of the rapid mass of water rushing against the houses and debris banked upon its upper side. Every line of communication by rail between up country and low country route from the North to the South through the Piedmont belt was broken on the morning of June 6 except that over the bridge of the Columbia, Newberry and Laurens railroad over the Congaree two miles above Columbia and on June the 8th, this gave away. The Southern railway completed a trestle across the great chasm at Lawson's Fork in a little over seventy hours and resumed it's tram service over the stream at a quarter passed three o 'clock Tuesday afternoon the 9th. The trolley from Spartanburg to Clifton crossed Lawson's Fork on a new trestle June 12.
Sunday afternoon, the day after the flood, a.full mass meeting was held in the opera house in Spartanburg and a subscription of $3,355 was raised in a few minutes which was later increased to $26,000. Hundreds if not thousands of dollars worth of food and clothing was collected by the wagons sent through town by the relief committee. The whole State and many friends beyond rallied to the occasion and supplied an amount greater than was needed. No more admirable traits were called out by the terrible crisis than the dauntless courage, the sane optimism and the splendid faith exhibited by mill authorities and citizens. And no better proof could be g~iven of the stamina of the expanding industries of the Piedmont section the fact that not an operative of the 2, 000 thrown out of work needed to remain idle longer than was required to place himself in anyone of the score or more of factories which sought his labor. And no higher tribute is needed to their law abiding, steady character than the good order prevailing throughout the villages between the disaster and migration to other mills, which in a few weeks left the populous hills of Pacolet and Clifton almost deserted.
The following is the list of dead, numbering 66. The Mr. Grier mentioned died from twelve hours of exhaustion and exposure in a tree which saved him from drowning:
At Clifton No. 2, 53: Julius A. Biggerstaff; Augustus Calvert, his wife and two children, Felix and Lou; Bud Emory; Mrs. J. R. Finley; JoelH. Hall, his wife, mother, and Ella, Jimmie and Lola, his children, and five other children; Mrs. Henderson; Mrs. B. S. Johnson and her five children; Oliver Johnson; Roscoe Johnson; the Loqin family of eleven; Mrs. Mossey and four children; Ed Robbs; Mrs. Robbs and two children; Genoble Sims; Novie D. Sims; Landrum Waddell; Martha Waddell; Dock Williams; Mrs. Jane William's baby.
At Clifton No. 3, 12:
Miss Fleetia Gosa; Mr. Grier; Mrs. Henson; Miss Maggie Kirby; Mrs. William Kirby; Garland Long and wife; Mrs. John Owens and child; Roy Owens; Samuel Swearingen and his bride; William Wood
At Pacolet, one:
Quay Worthy, colored.
The total loss of property, as nearly as can be estimated, aggregated $3,800,000
Loss to Spartanburg County in bridges alone was $50,000.
'l'he following is the report of the Central Relief Committee:
Mr. R. H. F. Chapman, Chairman Central Relief Committee;
Dear Sir: I hereby submit my report as treasurer of your relief committee:
Receipts
Subscriptions from out of town $21,454.98
Subscriptions from Spartanburg $4,543.29
Total $25,998.27
Disbursements
Relief committee at Clifton $10,500.00
Relief committee at Pacolet $ 2,890.00
Relief committee at Glendale $ 1,000.00
Relief committee at Whitney $ 500.00
Relief committee at Mary
Louise Mill $ 100.00
Orders for household goods,
sent operatives who moved away$ 3,022.68
Burial of dead (balance) $ 46.00
Sufferers at Upper Pacolet
Valley $ 7,406.24
Postage $ 14.00
Livery $ 13.00
Printing, etc $ 6.35
Total $24,998.27
Respectfully Submitted,
E.S. Tennent, Treasurer
The auditing committee have examined the books and vouchers of the treasurer of the relief committee and hereby certify they are correct.
W. E. Burnett,
A L. White,
Jno A. L.aw
Committee.
The New York Times New York 1903-06-07
Clifton and Pacolet, SC Cloudburst Causes Flooding, June 1903
CLOUDBURST SWEEPS TOWNS; THIRTY KILLED
PACOLET AND CLIFTON, S. C., CARRIED AWAY IN TORRENT
WATERS RUSH DOWN VALLEY, CARRYING AWAY MILLS, BRIDGES, AND COTTON OPERATIVES' DWELLINGS
Spartanburg, S. C., June 6. -- Pacolet and Clifton, in this county, where are located some of the greatest manufacturing plants in the Southern States, have been swept away, at least thirty persons have been drowned, and tremendous damage has been done to manufacturing establishments as a result of a terrific cloudburst that broke over this section between midnight and dawn today.
The storm settled over Spartanburg late last night, and the flood swept away the dams, causing the whole valley to be submerged by a whirling stream of water. The great overflow from river and creek is still rising, in many cases the water in Pacolet having reached a height above the roofs of the houses, only a chimney here and there being left to show where once stood a prosperous milling village.
Mill No. 1 has been washed away, Mill No. 2 is destroyed, while the third is in imminent danger of going at any moment. The dams of all three mills have been swept away, and through the great gaps in them the water is rushing into the valley beyond.
At Clifton, also in this county, where the great Clifton Mills Nos. 1, 2, and 3 are situated, great damage has been wrought, and further reports may show that the loss there is just as great, if not greater, than at Pacolet.
President TWICHELL of the Clifton Mills says that the reports received by him indicate that No. 3 has been wrecked and that the other two mills are greatly damaged. He also says that he understands there has been great loss of life and that several of the giant warehouses near the mills have been swept away. The exact number of the dead it is impossible to ascertain. First reports were that fifty persons were lost at Clifton and twenty-five at Pacolet. Six bodies were seen floating near each other in the stream at one time, and others are being reported at short intervals.
What the property loss will reach it is impossible to say, but that it will be a figure considerably in excess of $2,000,000 is conceded.
A partial list of the victims at Clifton is as follows:
AUGUSTUS CALVERT.
MRS. AUGUSTUS CALVERT.
MISS LIZZIE CALVERT.
M. FELIX.
MRS. W. B. TINSLEY.
MORLAY SIMS.
MRS. B. J. JOHNSON and Four Children.
MRS. MAGGIE KIRBY.
MRS. JOHN OWENS.
ROY OWENS.
GARLAND LONG.
MRS. LONG.
MISS FLETIA GOSIA.
ROBERT FINLEY.
The ill-fated Pacolet cotton mills were the heaviest property losers, President VICTOR MONTGOMERY estimating the damage to the plant at $1,250,000.
About 1,200 operatives in the mills are thrown out of work there, and within a few days will be in need of daily bread.
At 6 o'clock this morning it was noticed that the water was rising rapidly in the Pacolet River, but no special importance was attached to it by the mill operatives, who began to form in line to enter the mills.
At Mills Nos. 1 and 2 the water pressure soon became dangerous, the boiler rooms were submerged, and the workmen were ordered back.
A little later the fury of the raging river struck Mill No. 1, sweeping the plant entirely away. The strong current then swept against No. 2, demolishing that mill and leaving only the cloth room standing.
The big bridge over the Pacolet River, a steel structure, was then carried away by the flood, which had burst through the dams.
The warehouse, with nearly 3,500 bales of cotton and 4,000 bales of domestic cloth followed, all the cotton being carried down stream.
At Pacolet Mill No. 3, one half the picker room and five stories on the left side of the long building were washed away. The main building, supported by a thick brick wall, is still standing, but is very shaky and may collapse at any time. The boiler room is gone, but the smokestack is yet standing. The dam at No. 3 is intact. All the machinery in this mill is ruined.
At Glendale, four warehouses filled with cotton and cotton products were swept away, along with the dam across Lawson's Fork and the trestle of the City Electric Railway. The mill at Glendale was not materially damaged.
At Converse, the main building of the Clifton factory collapsed, and the matter[sic] rose till the second floor of the mill was four feet deep -- forty or fifty feet above the ordinary water mark. The Converse Mill is utterly demolished, nothing standing except the picker room building, which is badly wrecked. The Clifton Mill No. 3 also lost its boiler room, machine shop, engine room, and smokestack.
The Whitney mills on Lawson's Fork were damaged by the heavy rise of the water, and some houses and a steel bridge at that point were swept away.
At the Tueapau Mills the water rose to the second floor of the building and considerably damaged the machinery.
One of the great mills at Clifton, the Converse, founded by and named in honor of the founder of Converse College for Women of this city, which is a 51,000 spindle concern, capitalized at more than $1,000,000, was reported destroyed at one time, but a telegram from MR. TWICHELL to F. J. PELZER of Charleston, the head of the great cotton milling corporations at Pelzer, S. C., says that the main structure is still intact.
Scores of homes at Clifton have been wrecked, and at least 4,000 persons who worked in the mills are in a pitiable condition, with all their household effects either completely ruined or rendered almost valueless, and a long period of idleness before them.
Pacolet and Clifton are situated in the defiles of two valleys, and most of the homes of the operators were located near the mills, where the destructive power of the flood was greatest. These people are in dire need of assistance now, and a relief committee, of which the Rev. W. J. SNYDER is at the head, has been appointed to receive and turn over money, food, or clothing sent for the sufferers.
The damage in other parts of the county will also reach a great figure. Every bridge on the main line of the Southern Railway in this couty is reported washed away, telegraph and telephone wires are down, while the bridge over the Enoree River, along the banks of which, near the station of Enoree, and situated the Enoree cotton mills, has been carried away. That stream has also overflown its banks, and it is feared great damage will be done.
It was hardly more than a decade ago that Spartanburg was simply one of the smaller townships of upper South Carolina. Then came the great cotton milling movement, and the county, owing to its magnificent natural water power, secured the very cream of the investments. Mill after mill was built along the banks of its rivers until to-day millions of dollars are invested.
Fire insurance was carried on the ruined mills, but whether they were insured against loss by flood is not known. That every one of the mills will be rebuilt at once is the general belief in the city tonight.
(For more about the 1903 Flood.)
Clifton Mill #1 after the flood.
Clifton Mill #1 about 1910
Annual Report By South Carolina Dept. of Agriculture
Annual Report By South Carolina Dept. of Agriculture
Spartanburg Herald Journal
By Jason Spencer
Published: Monday, March 10, 2008 at 3:15 a.m.
The owner of the surviving Clifton mill has big plans — he wants to mine for sand along a small beach area just across the Pacolet River, eventually turning it into a park, and put loft apartments, maybe condos, in the sturdy old building.
Restarting the hydroelectric plant is part of his vision, too.
But David Sawyer’s plans are mired in financial problems, and some people in the community are leery of a mining operation coming into their quiet village.
Still, he remains optimistic about the future of Clifton Mill No. 2, and his role in it.
“When the textile industry went offshore, we lost the means to help these people maintain their lives. We’ve done very little to help little communities like Clifton. Clifton Mill No. 1 should have never been torn down. It’s a sad commentary when we lose gorgeous old buildings,” said Sawyer, who turned 65 Sunday.
“There’s so many neat things you can do with them. All you have to do is open your mind.”
Sawyer bought Clifton Mill No. 2 from Best Machinery Movers & Erectors — a small company headed by Dennis Goode and Ron Davis — on June 15, 2004, for $535,000.
Goode and Davis financed the deal.
But as of May 2007, Sawyer still owed the entire principal and, along with interest, taxes and attorney fees, a judge ordered him to pay Best Machinery $684,901.41 in October, according to court documents.
The property was put up for auction on Nov. 5, and Goode and Davis thought they had it back.
But Sawyer had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in Georgia (where he is from) three days beforehand.
The sale was set aside.
Sawyer was then doing business as a limited liability company called Habersham Mill, which is now called Clifton Mill Lofts.
Habersham’s bankruptcy filing was dismissed in February, as the company’s sole asset was the Spartanburg property and there was no record of that company being authorized to do business in Georgia.
Foreclosure proceedings on the Clifton mill have resumed, and a hearing will be held Thursday in Spartanburg.
The property once again could go up on the auction block.
But at the first of the week, Sawyer plans to file for Chapter 11 protection again, he said — this time in South Carolina. He said he hopes it will buy him time to come up with a plan that will help out his cash flow and allow him to keep the property.
Mining the beach and a sandbar in the Pacolet is a large part of that plan.
“It’s an asset of the property, and sand is a marketable commodity,” Sawyer said. “We do two things by doing this. We improve the river by deepening it, and second, we’ll increase the amount of water available to us when we restart our hydroelectric plant.”
Sawyer said he has a partner in Atlanta, a veterinarian, but would not name him, and that person’s name hasn’t appeared on any documents obtained by the Herald-Journal.
At least one other man has been involved in the project, but he dissolved his relationship with Sawyer — which Sawyer said set things back.
Best for the community?
The land that would be affected by the mining operation is about 8.6 acres, according to the application Sawyer filed with the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control.
He plans to replant vegetation over one acre in increments between 2013 and 2017.
The actual operation would be about 800 feet southeast of the intersection of Clifton-Glendale and Goldmine roads.
The state is accepting comments on the project through 5 p.m. March 18.
People who own property adjacent to the mill, such as Kevin Lee, have already been contacted.
“I’m totally against it — just the mess, and I don’t know if these small roads around here can handle it. The tanker trucks that come through seem to keep the road pretty broken up, anyway,” said Lee, 38. “I think this guy is trying to come up with any way possible to stay around. His intentions are not for the betterment of the community or anything. It’s just to try to stay put where he’s at.”
Goode and Davis are against the plan, too. “We don’t like the idea whatsoever. It really does not belong to him until he pays us, since he is in default. So, if there’s anything we could do to stop it, we would,” Goode said.
Davis added: “You can’t come in and do it in six months’ time. You’re looking at three to five, maybe even seven years, and you’re going to have those trucks, the mining operation, the danger of children being around it. It’s just not a good place to set up a mining operation.”
‘A great old elephant’
The one thing everyone has in common is they say they want what’s best for Clifton. They just have different ideas as to what that is.
“I think it could turn around down here and be a real nice area,” said Lee, who grew up in Clifton and recently moved back. “It’s a beautiful area. It’s just a matter of somebody spending some money and doing the right things to make it happen. And I don’t think this cat here is the guy to do that.”
Don Bramblett, a community activist, hopes to see the small beach once again become a hot spot for the community to fish, swim or rest in the sun. Crime got out of control a few years ago, and the beach has largely been closed off, although it’s still easy enough to get to.
“People out here can’t afford to pay dues at a neighborhood pool or Spartanburg Country Club. They’ve got to have access to a place to recreate. I know Spartanburg County is trying to build more parks, but we have nothing out here. We have nothing. If we could — and this is private property, I know — but there is a lot of interest in people kayaking and canoeing that’s just been generated over the last couple of years. So, I’d like to see that nurtured and grow into something nicer,” Bramblett said. “Mr. Sawyer … had good intentions originally, but I think they’ve kind of gone sour. And for him to venture out into some long-term project, with a huge investment of money, when on the surface it looks like there’s a lot of other problems, it’s somewhat distressing to me as a resident. I’d hate for him to come in here and start doing things and leave it in a mess.”
Goode said if he and Davis do get the mill property back, “We really don’t know what we’d do with it.”
And so, Sawyer is pressing forward. He can tell you the history of the mills along the Pacolet back to the disastrous flood of 1903, and then some.
“This is a great old elephant, and we want to keep it alive,” Sawyer said. “Our dream is to make residences there. I want to save the building. It’s a beautiful, historic building. I still think this is the prettiest industrial building in the South. We have had no help from local lenders on this project. The people who we felt would benefit the most from it have all turned us down. You don’t have to have a whole lot of imagination to see that lofts and adaptive re-use of a historic building could work. It’s worked everywhere in the country. But these folks are so near-sighted that they won’t help it come true.”
Sources:
http://www.slobotabouttown.com/clifton_mill_one.html
Clifton: A River of Memories and Herald Journal
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9E05E2DA1639E433A25754C0A9609C946297D6CF
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9E05E2DA1639E433A25754C0A9609C946297D6CF
http://www3.gendisasters.com/south-carolina/6367/clifton-pacolet-sc-cloudburst-causes-flooding-june-1903
http://sciway2.net/2001/clifton-glendale-sc/Index.htm
http://books.google.com/books?id=Ibd1u3CgOHMC&pg=PA94&lpg=PA94&dq=clifton+manufacturing+company,+SC&source=web&ots=lJYvd4lXbm&sig=iz5ZP6EGfN6cPiAjWtPvpNwtIHY&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=6&ct=result
These are the photos I made of Clifton Mill #2 on 12/13/2008.
This is a bar located on Goldmine Rd and it's in this dirt parking lot that you park. You cross the street to the "No Trespassing" sign and you can see the path to the Clifton Beach on the Pacolet River. Crime used to be pretty high in this area so I don't recommend it.
Clifton Beach
The Pacolet River downstream from Clifton Mill #2
Pacolet River looking upstream from the Clifton Beach at Clifton Mill #2
Clifton Mill #2, front with bell tower (all the cotton mills had bell towers to ring the beginning and end of the shifts)
The road in front of the Clifton Mill #2. You can see the old iron bridge buttresses just beside the newer bridge. Also, notice the turnstile.
Great brickwork!
This is the field behind the Clifton cotton factory. The mill village climbs up the hill and looks down over the mill.
Here is a short video
Dexter E. Converse was one of the investors who bought the Glendale Mill in 1856. He took over the management and moved into the old Bivings house in Glendale. In 1880 he began to acquire land on the Pacolet River not far from Glendale. As an outgrowth of the Glendale Mill, in 1881 the first Clifton Mill was built by D. E. Converse and Co. (Dexter E. Converse). In 1889, the second Clifton Mill was built. Dexter E. Converse introduced two new practices, the mill village and the marketing of the products through a New York broker.
Clifton Mill #2 in 1889
The worst recorded flood in South Carolina history took place on the Pacolet River and its tributary Lawson Fork Creek on June 6, 1903. It had rained of and on for five days. On June 6th it rained approximately 11". The water rose so rapidly that the land near the river was covered by 40 feet of water within one hour. Railway traffic was disrupted. There was complete loss of houses, churches, industrial plants and corn and flour mills along the river. The textile communities of Clifton and Pacolet were hit the hardest by the flood, but flood damage also occurred along other streams in northwest SC. The economy was devastated by $5 million (1903 dollars) in damage. Between 50-80 people died. Homes, churches and businesses, including 7 cotton mills, 13 railroad bridges, and 17 farm houses were destroyed. 4,300 people were put out of work due to the flood. Clifton Mill #2 was flooded up to the second floor. Clifton Mill #1 was partially destroyed and Converse Mill (aka Clifton Mill #3) was destroyed. Clifton Mill #2 was repaired, Clifton Mill #1 was rebuilt, Converse Mill was rebuilt on a higher level.
http://dept.wofford.edu/geology/pdfs/Pac1904.pdf
THE PACOLET FLOOD OF JUNE 6th,1903.
For a number of days preceding the disaster there had been unusual rainfall. Shortly after midnight on the night of June 5-6 a terrific downpour deluged the whole Piedmont region, and on the upper waters of the Pacolet must have Amounted to a cloudburst; for reliable men who were in the storm 'where it was not at its worst' testify that the waters fell in a mass in which drops were not distinguishable. The huge volume was greater than the narrow valley of the Pacolet conld carry of. The watchman at Clifton No. 3, the mill highest up stream on the Pacolet, says that at 4 o'clock on the fatal morning of June 6, the water was 20 feet above normal, and at 4 :30 the destruction of the mill was begun by a large tree plunging through the roof of the boiler room. Towards 6 o'clock the chimney of No. 3 fell with a crash towards the western shore, just after the dam had broken, and almost immediately the body of the great mill, embracing four-fifths of a plant worth upwards of $500,000, sank into the water. At the lower end of Converse, as the village at Clifton No.3 is called, stood a number of houses upon a flat plane of an elevation of from six to twenty feet above the river. Sixteen of these were swept away and ten of their occupants were drowned and one killed by exhaustion and exposure. The river turns sharply to the left at this point, presenting in its narrow course between it's precipitous banks one of the grandest stretches of scenery to be viewed in South Carolina. So violent was the rush of water this narrow that some fifteen feet of mingled earth and rock was washed away on the left bank
and some forty feet on the rightbank, against whose almost perpendicular side over a hundred feet in height the main fury of the fioodrushed point blank.
The mass of water rushing against this high hill, on which stands the Methodist church, could not escape at once through the passage of about 200 feet in width, and surged backwards so furiously on the right as to wash down large trees and leave them heading directly upstream.
The greatest displays of force, were the tearing away of the hillsides at this point and the marvelous power of transporting of machinery from Clifton No.3. For weeks after the flood there might have been observed on the right bank about a hundred yards above the dam at Noal, a card machine weighing 7,000 pounds which had been swept three-quarters of a mile downstream. Two others are known to have passed over the dam at No. 1 and one reached a point far below the dam at No. 2, having traveled about two and a half miles. These huge machines must have floated upon the floor of the mill as upon a raft. Out of 194 of them in No. 3, only six have been discovered. The loss of this item alone exceeds $180,000.
At Clifton No. 1, the broad, long river front on the right bank; formerly one of the most beautiful and populous sections of the town, was left strewn with the remnants of hideous ruin i but no lives were lost.
At Clifton No. 2 a large number of houses were built upon a beautiful plane on the right bank from ten to fifteen feet above the water and seventy-five yards in width. 400 yards lower down on the opposite side was another level plane that encircled by a sharp curve of the stream, where lay the section of the town known as Santuc. From these two flat places 60 houses were swept, and here occurred the great bulk of the fatalities. The drowned reaching the number of fifty. Here occurred some of the most pathetic scenes and some of the most thrilling escapes. Julius A. Biggerstuff, who loved Lola Hall, the daughter of his next neighbor above, had called upon his sweetheart Friday night; they were to be married, it is said, on Sunday morning. But before Saturday's sun had farly risen Biggerstaff and all six members of the Hall family had been swept into eternity. Here Mrs. Emory was washed ashore with a child of three years and another a few months old, all three of them almost stripped of clothing by the fury of the waters, while the husband perished. Here, too, Rev. W. J. Snyder, P. C. Hundley and Will Wilkins effected the most dramatic rescue during the disaster in saving, by means of two cotton bales lashed together and moored to a rope, Mrs. Landrum Williamand her two children and Mr. Hickman Stribling from a tree in which they had remained eight and a half hours, after having floated or swam to its branches. Here, too, lived B. S. Johnson, who escaped from the raging flood after having been borne for several miles upon its bosom, but whose wife and flve children were drowned. It was his little boy who floated on a piece of timber eight miles to Pacolet and disappeared in the waves flfteen feet high plunging over the dam and Shoals. Nor can we forget the pathetic case of Samuel Swearingen and his bride at Clifton No. 3, whom the onlookers from the bank saw sink in each others arms.
At Clifton No. 2 the operatives, thinking the river would soon fall, were working as usual in their places; the authorities marched them out before the disaster to the building, having almost to drive some to safety. The upper and riverside projections of this mill and of No. 1 were butted off, the shafting throughout was sprung and the first and second floors were covered with trash,
trees, mud and sand.
At Pacolet the great double mill Nos. 1 and 2, 600 feet in length, was more nearly completely demolished even than Clifton No. 3; for more of its foundation was carried off and only a mere cottaged sized remnant of the slasher and cloth rooms, based well upon the high bank, was left standing. No 1 went down about 8 in the murning and No. 2 about an hour later, in full view of
the whole mill population, whom the rising waters had prevented from begining work. At Pacolet No.3, the new five story mill half mile below the engine, boiler and picker rooms were wrecked and almost completely swept away; the upper corner of the main building next to the river was carried away and the first floor was filled with sand twelve to fifteen feet in depth. The river filled it's bed below the dam with huge rooks torn from their primeval resting places along its sides and changed it's course so as to wash directly against the foundation of the mill. One of the first tasks after the flood subsided was to excevate the old channel and turn the river back into it.
The Presbyterian church located just below Pacolet Nos. l and 2 and on the opposite or Eastern side, in that most fatal of situations a flat place circled by a sharp bend of the river opposite a precipice, was lifted bodily from its foundations and set down wrenched but entire 35 miles down the stream. No residence was destroyed at Pacolet and only one life was lost, that of a negro man who ventured too far in attempting to save cotton bales.
The water at Pacolet was twenty feet higher than ever before recorded.
On June 5th, Clifton stock was selling at from $175 to $180 and Pacolet could not be bought for less than $190. A month after the unparralleled disaster, Clifton was at par and Pacolet about $110.
Only one wagon bridge was left over either Pacolet or its tributary Lawson's Fork, that being a private one on Dr. Boyd's plantation three miles above the city of Spartanburg. Railway and mail communication were completely cut off by the destruction of trestles and high bridges, The steel bridge 150 feet long and weighing 2,509,956 pounds over Lawson's Fork a mile from Spartanburg was washed from its piers and carried 150 yards down the current, having, been forced from its piers 80 feet above low water presumably by the pressure of the rapid mass of water rushing against the houses and debris banked upon its upper side. Every line of communication by rail between up country and low country route from the North to the South through the Piedmont belt was broken on the morning of June 6 except that over the bridge of the Columbia, Newberry and Laurens railroad over the Congaree two miles above Columbia and on June the 8th, this gave away. The Southern railway completed a trestle across the great chasm at Lawson's Fork in a little over seventy hours and resumed it's tram service over the stream at a quarter passed three o 'clock Tuesday afternoon the 9th. The trolley from Spartanburg to Clifton crossed Lawson's Fork on a new trestle June 12.
Sunday afternoon, the day after the flood, a.full mass meeting was held in the opera house in Spartanburg and a subscription of $3,355 was raised in a few minutes which was later increased to $26,000. Hundreds if not thousands of dollars worth of food and clothing was collected by the wagons sent through town by the relief committee. The whole State and many friends beyond rallied to the occasion and supplied an amount greater than was needed. No more admirable traits were called out by the terrible crisis than the dauntless courage, the sane optimism and the splendid faith exhibited by mill authorities and citizens. And no better proof could be g~iven of the stamina of the expanding industries of the Piedmont section the fact that not an operative of the 2, 000 thrown out of work needed to remain idle longer than was required to place himself in anyone of the score or more of factories which sought his labor. And no higher tribute is needed to their law abiding, steady character than the good order prevailing throughout the villages between the disaster and migration to other mills, which in a few weeks left the populous hills of Pacolet and Clifton almost deserted.
The following is the list of dead, numbering 66. The Mr. Grier mentioned died from twelve hours of exhaustion and exposure in a tree which saved him from drowning:
At Clifton No. 2, 53: Julius A. Biggerstaff; Augustus Calvert, his wife and two children, Felix and Lou; Bud Emory; Mrs. J. R. Finley; JoelH. Hall, his wife, mother, and Ella, Jimmie and Lola, his children, and five other children; Mrs. Henderson; Mrs. B. S. Johnson and her five children; Oliver Johnson; Roscoe Johnson; the Loqin family of eleven; Mrs. Mossey and four children; Ed Robbs; Mrs. Robbs and two children; Genoble Sims; Novie D. Sims; Landrum Waddell; Martha Waddell; Dock Williams; Mrs. Jane William's baby.
At Clifton No. 3, 12:
Miss Fleetia Gosa; Mr. Grier; Mrs. Henson; Miss Maggie Kirby; Mrs. William Kirby; Garland Long and wife; Mrs. John Owens and child; Roy Owens; Samuel Swearingen and his bride; William Wood
At Pacolet, one:
Quay Worthy, colored.
The total loss of property, as nearly as can be estimated, aggregated $3,800,000
Loss to Spartanburg County in bridges alone was $50,000.
'l'he following is the report of the Central Relief Committee:
Mr. R. H. F. Chapman, Chairman Central Relief Committee;
Dear Sir: I hereby submit my report as treasurer of your relief committee:
Receipts
Subscriptions from out of town $21,454.98
Subscriptions from Spartanburg $4,543.29
Total $25,998.27
Disbursements
Relief committee at Clifton $10,500.00
Relief committee at Pacolet $ 2,890.00
Relief committee at Glendale $ 1,000.00
Relief committee at Whitney $ 500.00
Relief committee at Mary
Louise Mill $ 100.00
Orders for household goods,
sent operatives who moved away$ 3,022.68
Burial of dead (balance) $ 46.00
Sufferers at Upper Pacolet
Valley $ 7,406.24
Postage $ 14.00
Livery $ 13.00
Printing, etc $ 6.35
Total $24,998.27
Respectfully Submitted,
E.S. Tennent, Treasurer
The auditing committee have examined the books and vouchers of the treasurer of the relief committee and hereby certify they are correct.
W. E. Burnett,
A L. White,
Jno A. L.aw
Committee.
The New York Times New York 1903-06-07
Clifton and Pacolet, SC Cloudburst Causes Flooding, June 1903
CLOUDBURST SWEEPS TOWNS; THIRTY KILLED
PACOLET AND CLIFTON, S. C., CARRIED AWAY IN TORRENT
WATERS RUSH DOWN VALLEY, CARRYING AWAY MILLS, BRIDGES, AND COTTON OPERATIVES' DWELLINGS
Spartanburg, S. C., June 6. -- Pacolet and Clifton, in this county, where are located some of the greatest manufacturing plants in the Southern States, have been swept away, at least thirty persons have been drowned, and tremendous damage has been done to manufacturing establishments as a result of a terrific cloudburst that broke over this section between midnight and dawn today.
The storm settled over Spartanburg late last night, and the flood swept away the dams, causing the whole valley to be submerged by a whirling stream of water. The great overflow from river and creek is still rising, in many cases the water in Pacolet having reached a height above the roofs of the houses, only a chimney here and there being left to show where once stood a prosperous milling village.
Mill No. 1 has been washed away, Mill No. 2 is destroyed, while the third is in imminent danger of going at any moment. The dams of all three mills have been swept away, and through the great gaps in them the water is rushing into the valley beyond.
At Clifton, also in this county, where the great Clifton Mills Nos. 1, 2, and 3 are situated, great damage has been wrought, and further reports may show that the loss there is just as great, if not greater, than at Pacolet.
President TWICHELL of the Clifton Mills says that the reports received by him indicate that No. 3 has been wrecked and that the other two mills are greatly damaged. He also says that he understands there has been great loss of life and that several of the giant warehouses near the mills have been swept away. The exact number of the dead it is impossible to ascertain. First reports were that fifty persons were lost at Clifton and twenty-five at Pacolet. Six bodies were seen floating near each other in the stream at one time, and others are being reported at short intervals.
What the property loss will reach it is impossible to say, but that it will be a figure considerably in excess of $2,000,000 is conceded.
A partial list of the victims at Clifton is as follows:
AUGUSTUS CALVERT.
MRS. AUGUSTUS CALVERT.
MISS LIZZIE CALVERT.
M. FELIX.
MRS. W. B. TINSLEY.
MORLAY SIMS.
MRS. B. J. JOHNSON and Four Children.
MRS. MAGGIE KIRBY.
MRS. JOHN OWENS.
ROY OWENS.
GARLAND LONG.
MRS. LONG.
MISS FLETIA GOSIA.
ROBERT FINLEY.
The ill-fated Pacolet cotton mills were the heaviest property losers, President VICTOR MONTGOMERY estimating the damage to the plant at $1,250,000.
About 1,200 operatives in the mills are thrown out of work there, and within a few days will be in need of daily bread.
At 6 o'clock this morning it was noticed that the water was rising rapidly in the Pacolet River, but no special importance was attached to it by the mill operatives, who began to form in line to enter the mills.
At Mills Nos. 1 and 2 the water pressure soon became dangerous, the boiler rooms were submerged, and the workmen were ordered back.
A little later the fury of the raging river struck Mill No. 1, sweeping the plant entirely away. The strong current then swept against No. 2, demolishing that mill and leaving only the cloth room standing.
The big bridge over the Pacolet River, a steel structure, was then carried away by the flood, which had burst through the dams.
The warehouse, with nearly 3,500 bales of cotton and 4,000 bales of domestic cloth followed, all the cotton being carried down stream.
At Pacolet Mill No. 3, one half the picker room and five stories on the left side of the long building were washed away. The main building, supported by a thick brick wall, is still standing, but is very shaky and may collapse at any time. The boiler room is gone, but the smokestack is yet standing. The dam at No. 3 is intact. All the machinery in this mill is ruined.
At Glendale, four warehouses filled with cotton and cotton products were swept away, along with the dam across Lawson's Fork and the trestle of the City Electric Railway. The mill at Glendale was not materially damaged.
At Converse, the main building of the Clifton factory collapsed, and the matter[sic] rose till the second floor of the mill was four feet deep -- forty or fifty feet above the ordinary water mark. The Converse Mill is utterly demolished, nothing standing except the picker room building, which is badly wrecked. The Clifton Mill No. 3 also lost its boiler room, machine shop, engine room, and smokestack.
The Whitney mills on Lawson's Fork were damaged by the heavy rise of the water, and some houses and a steel bridge at that point were swept away.
At the Tueapau Mills the water rose to the second floor of the building and considerably damaged the machinery.
One of the great mills at Clifton, the Converse, founded by and named in honor of the founder of Converse College for Women of this city, which is a 51,000 spindle concern, capitalized at more than $1,000,000, was reported destroyed at one time, but a telegram from MR. TWICHELL to F. J. PELZER of Charleston, the head of the great cotton milling corporations at Pelzer, S. C., says that the main structure is still intact.
Scores of homes at Clifton have been wrecked, and at least 4,000 persons who worked in the mills are in a pitiable condition, with all their household effects either completely ruined or rendered almost valueless, and a long period of idleness before them.
Pacolet and Clifton are situated in the defiles of two valleys, and most of the homes of the operators were located near the mills, where the destructive power of the flood was greatest. These people are in dire need of assistance now, and a relief committee, of which the Rev. W. J. SNYDER is at the head, has been appointed to receive and turn over money, food, or clothing sent for the sufferers.
The damage in other parts of the county will also reach a great figure. Every bridge on the main line of the Southern Railway in this couty is reported washed away, telegraph and telephone wires are down, while the bridge over the Enoree River, along the banks of which, near the station of Enoree, and situated the Enoree cotton mills, has been carried away. That stream has also overflown its banks, and it is feared great damage will be done.
It was hardly more than a decade ago that Spartanburg was simply one of the smaller townships of upper South Carolina. Then came the great cotton milling movement, and the county, owing to its magnificent natural water power, secured the very cream of the investments. Mill after mill was built along the banks of its rivers until to-day millions of dollars are invested.
Fire insurance was carried on the ruined mills, but whether they were insured against loss by flood is not known. That every one of the mills will be rebuilt at once is the general belief in the city tonight.
(For more about the 1903 Flood.)
Clifton Mill #1 after the flood.
Clifton Mill #1 about 1910
Annual Report By South Carolina Dept. of Agriculture
Annual Report By South Carolina Dept. of Agriculture
Spartanburg Herald Journal
By Jason Spencer
Published: Monday, March 10, 2008 at 3:15 a.m.
The owner of the surviving Clifton mill has big plans — he wants to mine for sand along a small beach area just across the Pacolet River, eventually turning it into a park, and put loft apartments, maybe condos, in the sturdy old building.
Restarting the hydroelectric plant is part of his vision, too.
But David Sawyer’s plans are mired in financial problems, and some people in the community are leery of a mining operation coming into their quiet village.
Still, he remains optimistic about the future of Clifton Mill No. 2, and his role in it.
“When the textile industry went offshore, we lost the means to help these people maintain their lives. We’ve done very little to help little communities like Clifton. Clifton Mill No. 1 should have never been torn down. It’s a sad commentary when we lose gorgeous old buildings,” said Sawyer, who turned 65 Sunday.
“There’s so many neat things you can do with them. All you have to do is open your mind.”
Sawyer bought Clifton Mill No. 2 from Best Machinery Movers & Erectors — a small company headed by Dennis Goode and Ron Davis — on June 15, 2004, for $535,000.
Goode and Davis financed the deal.
But as of May 2007, Sawyer still owed the entire principal and, along with interest, taxes and attorney fees, a judge ordered him to pay Best Machinery $684,901.41 in October, according to court documents.
The property was put up for auction on Nov. 5, and Goode and Davis thought they had it back.
But Sawyer had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in Georgia (where he is from) three days beforehand.
The sale was set aside.
Sawyer was then doing business as a limited liability company called Habersham Mill, which is now called Clifton Mill Lofts.
Habersham’s bankruptcy filing was dismissed in February, as the company’s sole asset was the Spartanburg property and there was no record of that company being authorized to do business in Georgia.
Foreclosure proceedings on the Clifton mill have resumed, and a hearing will be held Thursday in Spartanburg.
The property once again could go up on the auction block.
But at the first of the week, Sawyer plans to file for Chapter 11 protection again, he said — this time in South Carolina. He said he hopes it will buy him time to come up with a plan that will help out his cash flow and allow him to keep the property.
Mining the beach and a sandbar in the Pacolet is a large part of that plan.
“It’s an asset of the property, and sand is a marketable commodity,” Sawyer said. “We do two things by doing this. We improve the river by deepening it, and second, we’ll increase the amount of water available to us when we restart our hydroelectric plant.”
Sawyer said he has a partner in Atlanta, a veterinarian, but would not name him, and that person’s name hasn’t appeared on any documents obtained by the Herald-Journal.
At least one other man has been involved in the project, but he dissolved his relationship with Sawyer — which Sawyer said set things back.
Best for the community?
The land that would be affected by the mining operation is about 8.6 acres, according to the application Sawyer filed with the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control.
He plans to replant vegetation over one acre in increments between 2013 and 2017.
The actual operation would be about 800 feet southeast of the intersection of Clifton-Glendale and Goldmine roads.
The state is accepting comments on the project through 5 p.m. March 18.
People who own property adjacent to the mill, such as Kevin Lee, have already been contacted.
“I’m totally against it — just the mess, and I don’t know if these small roads around here can handle it. The tanker trucks that come through seem to keep the road pretty broken up, anyway,” said Lee, 38. “I think this guy is trying to come up with any way possible to stay around. His intentions are not for the betterment of the community or anything. It’s just to try to stay put where he’s at.”
Goode and Davis are against the plan, too. “We don’t like the idea whatsoever. It really does not belong to him until he pays us, since he is in default. So, if there’s anything we could do to stop it, we would,” Goode said.
Davis added: “You can’t come in and do it in six months’ time. You’re looking at three to five, maybe even seven years, and you’re going to have those trucks, the mining operation, the danger of children being around it. It’s just not a good place to set up a mining operation.”
‘A great old elephant’
The one thing everyone has in common is they say they want what’s best for Clifton. They just have different ideas as to what that is.
“I think it could turn around down here and be a real nice area,” said Lee, who grew up in Clifton and recently moved back. “It’s a beautiful area. It’s just a matter of somebody spending some money and doing the right things to make it happen. And I don’t think this cat here is the guy to do that.”
Don Bramblett, a community activist, hopes to see the small beach once again become a hot spot for the community to fish, swim or rest in the sun. Crime got out of control a few years ago, and the beach has largely been closed off, although it’s still easy enough to get to.
“People out here can’t afford to pay dues at a neighborhood pool or Spartanburg Country Club. They’ve got to have access to a place to recreate. I know Spartanburg County is trying to build more parks, but we have nothing out here. We have nothing. If we could — and this is private property, I know — but there is a lot of interest in people kayaking and canoeing that’s just been generated over the last couple of years. So, I’d like to see that nurtured and grow into something nicer,” Bramblett said. “Mr. Sawyer … had good intentions originally, but I think they’ve kind of gone sour. And for him to venture out into some long-term project, with a huge investment of money, when on the surface it looks like there’s a lot of other problems, it’s somewhat distressing to me as a resident. I’d hate for him to come in here and start doing things and leave it in a mess.”
Goode said if he and Davis do get the mill property back, “We really don’t know what we’d do with it.”
And so, Sawyer is pressing forward. He can tell you the history of the mills along the Pacolet back to the disastrous flood of 1903, and then some.
“This is a great old elephant, and we want to keep it alive,” Sawyer said. “Our dream is to make residences there. I want to save the building. It’s a beautiful, historic building. I still think this is the prettiest industrial building in the South. We have had no help from local lenders on this project. The people who we felt would benefit the most from it have all turned us down. You don’t have to have a whole lot of imagination to see that lofts and adaptive re-use of a historic building could work. It’s worked everywhere in the country. But these folks are so near-sighted that they won’t help it come true.”
Sources:
http://www.slobotabouttown.com/clifton_mill_one.html
Clifton: A River of Memories and Herald Journal
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9E05E2DA1639E433A25754C0A9609C946297D6CF
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9E05E2DA1639E433A25754C0A9609C946297D6CF
http://www3.gendisasters.com/south-carolina/6367/clifton-pacolet-sc-cloudburst-causes-flooding-june-1903
http://sciway2.net/2001/clifton-glendale-sc/Index.htm
http://books.google.com/books?id=Ibd1u3CgOHMC&pg=PA94&lpg=PA94&dq=clifton+manufacturing+company,+SC&source=web&ots=lJYvd4lXbm&sig=iz5ZP6EGfN6cPiAjWtPvpNwtIHY&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=6&ct=result
These are the photos I made of Clifton Mill #2 on 12/13/2008.
This is a bar located on Goldmine Rd and it's in this dirt parking lot that you park. You cross the street to the "No Trespassing" sign and you can see the path to the Clifton Beach on the Pacolet River. Crime used to be pretty high in this area so I don't recommend it.
Clifton Beach
The Pacolet River downstream from Clifton Mill #2
Pacolet River looking upstream from the Clifton Beach at Clifton Mill #2
Clifton Mill #2, front with bell tower (all the cotton mills had bell towers to ring the beginning and end of the shifts)
The road in front of the Clifton Mill #2. You can see the old iron bridge buttresses just beside the newer bridge. Also, notice the turnstile.
Great brickwork!
This is the field behind the Clifton cotton factory. The mill village climbs up the hill and looks down over the mill.
Here is a short video
Senin, 27 September 2010
Beaumont Historical Celebration
On 9/11/2010 Beaumont Mill Village had a historical celebration and the Beaumont United Methodist Church. My husband's mother, Peggy, grew up in Beaumont. Stan lived for awhile in Beaumont as a young boy so they have strong ties to the little mill village behind Beaumont cotton mill. So Stan and I took Peggy to the celebration. They had several speakers and then a free hot dog picnic behind the church. There was a representative from the Preservation Trust of Spartanburg, City Councilwoman Linda Dogan presented a plaque that names 9/11/2010 as Beamont Day, the President of the Beaumont Neighborhood Association, a speaker who gave the history of the Methodists in the upstate and especially the Beaumont UMC, and a local historian who gave the history of the mill village. The house behind the church which is owned by the church, was set up with old photos and newspaper clippings as well as old copies of the Beaumont "E" ("E" for Excellence) newsletters.
Beaumont was once a beautiful hill that was part of the Cherokee hunting grounds. It was named Beaumont from the French, "beau" meaning beautiful and "montagne" meaning mountain, "Beau" "mont". It is situated on Chinquapin Creek and was run with steam engines. It is beside one of the railroads that criss cross Spartanburg, which is also nicknamed Hub City for all the railroads that intersect in Spartanburg. We heard interesting stories about life in a mill village. There was Baptist, Presbyterian and Methodist churches in Beaumont. Stan and I met at Roselane Presbyterian Church in 1977. Beaumont used to have a park and baseball field and I watched some of the Harris' play softball games there back when Stan and his brothers and sisters played. In fact, when I was a little girl, my Dad was city engineer and he was an organic gardener. The city used to dump the leaves they picked up at the back of the Beaumont Park. We went with Dad in his old truck to get a load of leaves to mulch his garden. The truck got stuck in the leaves and the friction and heat from the muffler and tires started a fire under the truck. He got us girls out safely but the truck was completely burned up!
Peggy (with her back towards me) is a very social person and she remembers everybody! Her children are like that too. They never go anywhere without seeing someone they know.
The little church was full.
For more history on Beaumont, check out my post on Beaumont at:
Beaumont Mfg Co.
Beaumont was once a beautiful hill that was part of the Cherokee hunting grounds. It was named Beaumont from the French, "beau" meaning beautiful and "montagne" meaning mountain, "Beau" "mont". It is situated on Chinquapin Creek and was run with steam engines. It is beside one of the railroads that criss cross Spartanburg, which is also nicknamed Hub City for all the railroads that intersect in Spartanburg. We heard interesting stories about life in a mill village. There was Baptist, Presbyterian and Methodist churches in Beaumont. Stan and I met at Roselane Presbyterian Church in 1977. Beaumont used to have a park and baseball field and I watched some of the Harris' play softball games there back when Stan and his brothers and sisters played. In fact, when I was a little girl, my Dad was city engineer and he was an organic gardener. The city used to dump the leaves they picked up at the back of the Beaumont Park. We went with Dad in his old truck to get a load of leaves to mulch his garden. The truck got stuck in the leaves and the friction and heat from the muffler and tires started a fire under the truck. He got us girls out safely but the truck was completely burned up!
Peggy (with her back towards me) is a very social person and she remembers everybody! Her children are like that too. They never go anywhere without seeing someone they know.The little church was full.
For more history on Beaumont, check out my post on Beaumont at:
Beaumont Mfg Co.
Beaumont Manufacturing Co.
Beaumont Mfg Co. in 1909
The introduction of Eli Whitney's cotton gin in 1793, James Watt's steam engine in 1776, Fulton's steamboat in 1807, Stephenson's locomotive in 1825, Cyrus McCormick's reaper in 1831, the Howe-Singer sewing machine in 1854, and Sir Henry Bessemer's converter in 1858 made essential contributions to the revolution. The new devices lowered the cost of producing cotton clothing, creating a world-wide demand for it, and in the process, freed farm workers to enter the newly created factories.
Cotton mills had abounded in the Spartanburg area since 1816. The abundant streams and rivers in the area are just beginning their descent towards the lower-lying Midlands region (called The Piedmont). In many places, these waterways descend abruptly, providing a source for plentiful waterpower. Cotton mills were built along these rivers to harness this power. By the mid-1800s, many investors flocked to Spartanburg County, SC to establish textile factories. By 1860, there were nearly 900 Spartanburg County residents employed in textile mills. Just 20 years later, that number had more than doubled, with 2,000 “operatives,” as employees were called, working in 14 mills across the county. These mills, their owners and their laborers dominated the politics and economy of the region for nearly a century but now they are closed and abandoned. Some are totally gone and others are just ruins.
According to statistics from the 1900 census and questionnaires
The Cotton Mills of South Carolina, 1907 Letters Written to the News and Courier By August Kohn, South Carolina Dept. of Agriculture: "The summary shows that there are 54,434 people in the actual employ of the cotton mills of South Carolina and that there are 126,779 practically one tenth of the total population of the State and a very much larger proportion of the white population owe their livelihood to the cotton mill industry to day The census for 1900 shows a total population of 1,340,316 for South Carolina Of this number 557 807 are whit s How many people realize that in 1907 fully one fifth of the total white population making due allowance for the increase in population since 1900 are dependent on the cotton mills for a livelihood in 1900 the white population of South Carolina was 657,807 To day 126,799 white people earn their livelihood through South Carolina's cotton mills The totals which are"
Mills were located along the waterways but the towns were sometimes a distance away so the mill owners built villages around the mills to provide nearby housing for their workers. They began to recruit workers from the rural and mountainous areas around their mills. Providing housing, company stores, community churches and schools was very appealing to hardscrabble farmers with large families. The Piedmont of SC had been farmed to death and without the knowledge or financial ability to farm responsibly by using fertilizers and terracing (to stop soil errosion) the soil became more and more depleted. It produced less and less. In the Appalachian Mountains not everyone had "good bottomland" to farm. Large farms were divided to children by inheritance and it kept getting subdivided. And more and more people living in America meant smaller and smaller farms. Land had been plentiful and cheap. But the more people who moved into an area, the less land was available, affordable or farmable. Families living in the mountains were living pretty isolated lives too. Not many schools, towns, or ways to communicate outside the area meant children were raised illiterate, dirt poor, and not knowing anything about the world around them. Thousands of people were destitute after the War of Northern Aggression. The years of Reconstruction did anything but re-construct the South. Poverty was palpable! But the Industrial Revolution brought them new hope. The mills recruited them and brought them in. These people had known more freedom and independence in their agrigultural life and were used to being outdoors. So even though these mills sounded good, they really traded one problem for another. Taking these people and placing them in rows of primitive houses, ringing the bells for start and stop of shifts, crowding them into huge buildings with horrendous noise and cotton lint flying thickly in the air was a real culture shock. Some of the mill owners were better than others. The bad ones let their greed determine the treatment of their workers. Some called it paternalistic as though these workers couldn't act or think for themselves. And that was the best of situations. Others called it industrialized totalitarianism. Owners and bosses could be tyrants and the workers had little choice but to take it. They had to provide for their families. And many times they got into debt to the company (especially through the company store) and couldn't leave. It wasn't much better than slavery had been. Conditions could be squalid and filthy and children were forced to work. All were made to follow the rules inside and outside the mill or be threatened with losing everything they had. But then, they had come from destitute poverty, squalid log cabins and children had always been forced to work in one way or another. Mill owners would point to their attempts to provide the basic necessities for their workers. For instance, in 1907, the Beaumont mill village had 1 church in which the mill contributed more than 3/4 of it's cost. The mill kept the church repaired, supplied fuel and paid the church $50/year. The mill also contributed a teacher to the village's school.
Beaumont was built in 1890 on the Chinquapin Creek within the city limits of Spartanburg, SC. J. H. Sloan (president), John B. Cleveland, Joseph Walker (the original land owner), H. A. Ligon, C.E. Fleming, Vardry McBee, and others filed for the charter and equipped with 3,072 spindles, 640 twisters, and 40 bag looms. It was originally only 1 storey and was located beside the Richmond & Danville Railroad (later Southern Railroad). They built 15 mill houses at the same time on what is North Liberty St.
In 1907 300 workers worked in Beaumont with an annual payroll of $80,000.00. It had 20,237 spindles and 253 looms and consumed 8,000 bales of cotton to produce $450,000.00 worth of cloth and yarn.
My Great Grandfather, Bailey Bright Reese, was one of those recruited from the Blue Ridge Mountains. They came to work in the Beaumont Manufacturing Company with their first child. Minnie Louesta "Estie" Reese was born 11/7/1907 in Madison County, NC.
Cotton mills had abounded in the Spartanburg area since 1816. The abundant streams and rivers in the area are just beginning their descent towards the lower-lying Midlands region (called The Piedmont). In many places, these waterways descend abruptly, providing a source for plentiful waterpower. Cotton mills were built along these rivers to harness this power. By the mid-1800s, many investors flocked to Spartanburg County, SC to establish textile factories. By 1860, there were nearly 900 Spartanburg County residents employed in textile mills. Just 20 years later, that number had more than doubled, with 2,000 “operatives,” as employees were called, working in 14 mills across the county. These mills, their owners and their laborers dominated the politics and economy of the region for nearly a century but now they are closed and abandoned. Some are totally gone and others are just ruins.
According to statistics from the 1900 census and questionnaires
The Cotton Mills of South Carolina, 1907 Letters Written to the News and Courier By August Kohn, South Carolina Dept. of Agriculture: "The summary shows that there are 54,434 people in the actual employ of the cotton mills of South Carolina and that there are 126,779 practically one tenth of the total population of the State and a very much larger proportion of the white population owe their livelihood to the cotton mill industry to day The census for 1900 shows a total population of 1,340,316 for South Carolina Of this number 557 807 are whit s How many people realize that in 1907 fully one fifth of the total white population making due allowance for the increase in population since 1900 are dependent on the cotton mills for a livelihood in 1900 the white population of South Carolina was 657,807 To day 126,799 white people earn their livelihood through South Carolina's cotton mills The totals which are"
Mills were located along the waterways but the towns were sometimes a distance away so the mill owners built villages around the mills to provide nearby housing for their workers. They began to recruit workers from the rural and mountainous areas around their mills. Providing housing, company stores, community churches and schools was very appealing to hardscrabble farmers with large families. The Piedmont of SC had been farmed to death and without the knowledge or financial ability to farm responsibly by using fertilizers and terracing (to stop soil errosion) the soil became more and more depleted. It produced less and less. In the Appalachian Mountains not everyone had "good bottomland" to farm. Large farms were divided to children by inheritance and it kept getting subdivided. And more and more people living in America meant smaller and smaller farms. Land had been plentiful and cheap. But the more people who moved into an area, the less land was available, affordable or farmable. Families living in the mountains were living pretty isolated lives too. Not many schools, towns, or ways to communicate outside the area meant children were raised illiterate, dirt poor, and not knowing anything about the world around them. Thousands of people were destitute after the War of Northern Aggression. The years of Reconstruction did anything but re-construct the South. Poverty was palpable! But the Industrial Revolution brought them new hope. The mills recruited them and brought them in. These people had known more freedom and independence in their agrigultural life and were used to being outdoors. So even though these mills sounded good, they really traded one problem for another. Taking these people and placing them in rows of primitive houses, ringing the bells for start and stop of shifts, crowding them into huge buildings with horrendous noise and cotton lint flying thickly in the air was a real culture shock. Some of the mill owners were better than others. The bad ones let their greed determine the treatment of their workers. Some called it paternalistic as though these workers couldn't act or think for themselves. And that was the best of situations. Others called it industrialized totalitarianism. Owners and bosses could be tyrants and the workers had little choice but to take it. They had to provide for their families. And many times they got into debt to the company (especially through the company store) and couldn't leave. It wasn't much better than slavery had been. Conditions could be squalid and filthy and children were forced to work. All were made to follow the rules inside and outside the mill or be threatened with losing everything they had. But then, they had come from destitute poverty, squalid log cabins and children had always been forced to work in one way or another. Mill owners would point to their attempts to provide the basic necessities for their workers. For instance, in 1907, the Beaumont mill village had 1 church in which the mill contributed more than 3/4 of it's cost. The mill kept the church repaired, supplied fuel and paid the church $50/year. The mill also contributed a teacher to the village's school.
Beaumont was built in 1890 on the Chinquapin Creek within the city limits of Spartanburg, SC. J. H. Sloan (president), John B. Cleveland, Joseph Walker (the original land owner), H. A. Ligon, C.E. Fleming, Vardry McBee, and others filed for the charter and equipped with 3,072 spindles, 640 twisters, and 40 bag looms. It was originally only 1 storey and was located beside the Richmond & Danville Railroad (later Southern Railroad). They built 15 mill houses at the same time on what is North Liberty St.
In 1907 300 workers worked in Beaumont with an annual payroll of $80,000.00. It had 20,237 spindles and 253 looms and consumed 8,000 bales of cotton to produce $450,000.00 worth of cloth and yarn.
My Great Grandfather, Bailey Bright Reese, was one of those recruited from the Blue Ridge Mountains. They came to work in the Beaumont Manufacturing Company with their first child. Minnie Louesta "Estie" Reese was born 11/7/1907 in Madison County, NC.
This is Lillian Vianna Conner and Bailey Bright Reese and their first child, Estie. It may have been about this time that they moved to Spartanburg.
She was 2 years old when she died on 8/13/1909 in the Beaumont mill village in Spartanburg, SC. They were living at 148 Fairview Avenue. According to her death certificate (Great Grandpa Reese had kept a copy of the SC State Board of Health Physician's Certificate & Transportation of Corpse in his Bible and I have a copy of it.) she died of Illeocolitis which is inflammation of the mucous membrane of the ileum and the colon (we know it more as Crohn's Disease). They wanted to take her body back home to be buried so they took the train back to Hot Springs, Madison County, NC. They never came back to Spartanburg although he did work in some other mills. He ended up moving to the Clinchfield Mill in Marion, McDowell County, NC and worked as the night watchman while they lived in the mill village there. He died there.
It was a sad time for little children to be forced to work. On the other hand, the families may have been really in need of what the children could make in order to survive. Back then there was no government aid or welfare. With mouths to feed, survival might have meant they had to work. If the government passed a law that protected children from having to go to work so young, would this help the children and give the most vulnerable people in our society protection? Or, would the law mean the death of these children and their families because they wouldn't be allowed to work to make the money to put food on the table? It was a very hard question. Some families had good-for-nothing fathers. But others had disabled fathers, or their fathers couldn't make enough money to take care of all the little mouths, or their mother's were widowed, or they were orphans. Sometimes their home life was so bad that working got them safely out of it. Many little street urchins (either orphaned or runaways due to bad home situations) needed jobs to provide for themselves. If they didn't work they would be begging on the streets. Which was worse? So there are a lot of ways to look at it. I can only be thankful that my nieces and nephews have never known such want and they've never had to work in order to eat. These days we don't have a clue as to how bad things can really be. We are so blessed in this country! Thank You, God!
I found these photos by Lewis Wickes Hine in May 1912. These photos are from the National Child Labor committee and are in the Library of Congress. Children weren't suppose to work if they were younger than 12 but families who needed or wanted money would lie about their children's ages in order to get them papers so they could work and bring in money. This photographer was trying to document this and he came through Spartanburg in May, 1912. He took photos of children cotton mill workers at Beaumont, Saxon, Drayton, Arkwright, Arlington and Clifton. Here are the ones from Beaumont.
Notice the little boy in the front row in the middle! As all little boys will do, he is crossing his eyes and screwing up his mouth to make a funny face.
These children were working barefooted. Poor little dirty raggamuffins look much older than their years.
Little Emmett Capps has a bandaged foot. Notice the people behind him?
Little girls were put to work too! These girls were suppose to be 12 or older. They are working barefooted and have covered their work dresses with aprons to make them last longer.
These Beaumont boys are on their way to church. The boy in fron on the left is Elish Putnam. The boy in the front middle is Bryson Emmett. The boy in the front right is George Powell. Notice some of the boys were going to church barefooted and one didn't even have a jacket to wear. The house behind them has someone who takes pride even if they don't have anything. The walk is swept and neatly lined. The porch has a railing with a row of potted flowers the fence is neat and in good repair.
The same boys with some more added are in this picture. Probably some of their father's are in the back row. On the front row left is Emmett Capps, a Doffer who had been working for a year before this photo was taken. On front row right is Bob Cook who worked in the Spinning Room making 50 cents/day. He had also been working for a year.
These two little barefoot boys are (left) Emmett Capps, a Doffer and (right) Bob Cook who worked in the Spinning Room. They certainly don't look like they are 12 or older!
This little boy with the haunting eyes and crooked smile is Bob Cook who had started working a year previous making 35 cents/day but was making 50 cents/day by the time this photo was taken.
After J. H. Sloan’s death, Dudley L. Jennings became president.
National Geographic News, Willie Drye, October 19, 2004"...But with people willing to work for very low wages, most of the mills made money anyway. Profits started booming in 1914, when World War I began and Southern textile mills landed huge military contracts.
"But things changed when the war ended and windfall profits stopped. Many mills were now in the hands of owners who weren't motivated by "social salvation." By the late 1920s their greed and mismanagement had brought hard times to the textile towns. Many mill hands lost their jobs, and those who continued to work faced ever increasing production demands.
"Flaring tempers and violence took a deadly turn in March 1929, when textile workers fed up with pay cuts and ceaseless demands for more production went on strike in Gastonia, North Carolina. A sheriff and several mill workers were shot dead.
"Mill owners often used brutal tactics to break textile strikes, and organized labor was never able to gain much of a foothold in the South.
"By the end of World War II in 1945, the industry had stabilized again, and textile towns flourished for about 25 years. No one knows exactly how many people worked in the southern mills when they were at their peak employment. But in 1960 there were 505,000 textile workers in North Carolina alone.
"The textile industry has never lost its appetite for cheap labor, and the jobs that once filled the southern mills started to be shipped outside the United States... "
By 1920 there were 142 homes in the village. Walter S. Montgomery, Sr. acquired the plant in 1941 when plant equipment was modernized for the production of heavy cotton duck fabric needed by the armed services for the impending war. It became one of the mills in the Spartan Mills conglomerate. Beaumont employees won five coveted Army-Navy “E” awards during the World War II.
Stan's Mother's Grandfather (Stan's great Grandfather) began working at Beaumont. Franklin Drayton Prince worked in the Company Store and was considered management. Peggy remembers her Prince grandparents living on 740 N. Liberty Street in the big two-story shingled house. Frank Prince was born 7/18/1880 in Union County, SC. He played baseball in textile mill leagues. He married Mary "Mollie" Cynthia Bain, daughter of Elisha Bain and Mary Bogan.
Frank Prince and Molly Prince had 11 children:
It was a sad time for little children to be forced to work. On the other hand, the families may have been really in need of what the children could make in order to survive. Back then there was no government aid or welfare. With mouths to feed, survival might have meant they had to work. If the government passed a law that protected children from having to go to work so young, would this help the children and give the most vulnerable people in our society protection? Or, would the law mean the death of these children and their families because they wouldn't be allowed to work to make the money to put food on the table? It was a very hard question. Some families had good-for-nothing fathers. But others had disabled fathers, or their fathers couldn't make enough money to take care of all the little mouths, or their mother's were widowed, or they were orphans. Sometimes their home life was so bad that working got them safely out of it. Many little street urchins (either orphaned or runaways due to bad home situations) needed jobs to provide for themselves. If they didn't work they would be begging on the streets. Which was worse? So there are a lot of ways to look at it. I can only be thankful that my nieces and nephews have never known such want and they've never had to work in order to eat. These days we don't have a clue as to how bad things can really be. We are so blessed in this country! Thank You, God!
I found these photos by Lewis Wickes Hine in May 1912. These photos are from the National Child Labor committee and are in the Library of Congress. Children weren't suppose to work if they were younger than 12 but families who needed or wanted money would lie about their children's ages in order to get them papers so they could work and bring in money. This photographer was trying to document this and he came through Spartanburg in May, 1912. He took photos of children cotton mill workers at Beaumont, Saxon, Drayton, Arkwright, Arlington and Clifton. Here are the ones from Beaumont.
Notice the little boy in the front row in the middle! As all little boys will do, he is crossing his eyes and screwing up his mouth to make a funny face.
These children were working barefooted. Poor little dirty raggamuffins look much older than their years.
Little Emmett Capps has a bandaged foot. Notice the people behind him?
Little girls were put to work too! These girls were suppose to be 12 or older. They are working barefooted and have covered their work dresses with aprons to make them last longer.
These Beaumont boys are on their way to church. The boy in fron on the left is Elish Putnam. The boy in the front middle is Bryson Emmett. The boy in the front right is George Powell. Notice some of the boys were going to church barefooted and one didn't even have a jacket to wear. The house behind them has someone who takes pride even if they don't have anything. The walk is swept and neatly lined. The porch has a railing with a row of potted flowers the fence is neat and in good repair.
The same boys with some more added are in this picture. Probably some of their father's are in the back row. On the front row left is Emmett Capps, a Doffer who had been working for a year before this photo was taken. On front row right is Bob Cook who worked in the Spinning Room making 50 cents/day. He had also been working for a year.
These two little barefoot boys are (left) Emmett Capps, a Doffer and (right) Bob Cook who worked in the Spinning Room. They certainly don't look like they are 12 or older!
This little boy with the haunting eyes and crooked smile is Bob Cook who had started working a year previous making 35 cents/day but was making 50 cents/day by the time this photo was taken.
After J. H. Sloan’s death, Dudley L. Jennings became president.
National Geographic News, Willie Drye, October 19, 2004"...But with people willing to work for very low wages, most of the mills made money anyway. Profits started booming in 1914, when World War I began and Southern textile mills landed huge military contracts.
"But things changed when the war ended and windfall profits stopped. Many mills were now in the hands of owners who weren't motivated by "social salvation." By the late 1920s their greed and mismanagement had brought hard times to the textile towns. Many mill hands lost their jobs, and those who continued to work faced ever increasing production demands.
"Flaring tempers and violence took a deadly turn in March 1929, when textile workers fed up with pay cuts and ceaseless demands for more production went on strike in Gastonia, North Carolina. A sheriff and several mill workers were shot dead.
"Mill owners often used brutal tactics to break textile strikes, and organized labor was never able to gain much of a foothold in the South.
"By the end of World War II in 1945, the industry had stabilized again, and textile towns flourished for about 25 years. No one knows exactly how many people worked in the southern mills when they were at their peak employment. But in 1960 there were 505,000 textile workers in North Carolina alone.
"The textile industry has never lost its appetite for cheap labor, and the jobs that once filled the southern mills started to be shipped outside the United States... "
By 1920 there were 142 homes in the village. Walter S. Montgomery, Sr. acquired the plant in 1941 when plant equipment was modernized for the production of heavy cotton duck fabric needed by the armed services for the impending war. It became one of the mills in the Spartan Mills conglomerate. Beaumont employees won five coveted Army-Navy “E” awards during the World War II.
Stan's Mother's Grandfather (Stan's great Grandfather) began working at Beaumont. Franklin Drayton Prince worked in the Company Store and was considered management. Peggy remembers her Prince grandparents living on 740 N. Liberty Street in the big two-story shingled house. Frank Prince was born 7/18/1880 in Union County, SC. He played baseball in textile mill leagues. He married Mary "Mollie" Cynthia Bain, daughter of Elisha Bain and Mary Bogan.
Frank Prince and Molly Prince had 11 children:
1) Julian Rhett Prince married Clara Marie Wilder and had 3 daughters, Wilma Prince, Louise Prince and Peggy Prince (my husband's Mother).
2) Hubert L. Prince married Lillie Belle Toney and they had Betty Jean Prince and Francis Prince.
3) Ralph Dupree Prince married Carolee (or Carrie Lee) Garrett and they had Bobby Prince, Kenneth Prince, Larry Prince, Barbara Prince, Mary Elaine "Lanie"Prince, Linda Prince.
4) Wilbur Eugene Prince married Ruth Ansel West and they had Suzie Prince, Joanne Prince, Martha Prince, Wilbur Eugene "Buddy"Prince, Joseph Stephen Prince.
5) Franklin Harold Prince married Elenora (aka Eleanor, Elanore) Savannah Shirley and they had Frank Donald "Donnie Prince and Jerry Prince.
6) Mary Prince married Lewis Ray. Lewis died 7/20/1942 during the War.
7) Ruth Prince married J. R. Shepherd and they had Gail Shepherd and Nancy Shepherd.
8) Marvin Lewis Prince married Margie Hurd.
9) Vernon C. Prince, never married.
10) Margarite Prince married Jack Key and they had Bobby Key and David Key.
11) Mildred Prince married Edward "Ed" Norman Comer, Sr. and they had Edward Norman Comer, Jr, Harold "Hal" Comer.
F.D. Prince died in his sleep of a massive coronary heart attack on 5/14/1940. If you think about that time...he had lived through World War I and the Great Depression, the Big Strike of '34 but died before we got involved in World War II. Mollie Prince lived until 10/31/1974. She stayed in that 2 storey house in Beaumont. Several of their children, spouses and grandchildren worked at Beaumont.
In 1930, Beaumont had 37, 320 spindles and B.L. Jennings was President.
Throughout the 1920's the mills faced an intractable problem of overproduction, as the wartime boom for cotton goods ended, while foreign competition cut into their markets. Although manufacturers tried to reduce the oversupply by forming industry associations to regulate competition, their favored solution to the crisis was to squeeze more work out of their employees through what workers called the "stretch-out": speeding up production by increasing the number of looms assigned to each factory hand, limiting break times, paying workers by piece rates, and increasing the number of supervisors to keep workers from slowing down, talking or leaving work. In the 1930s, it was trying times for many mills as the Great Depression squeezed profits. Mills, who relied on bankers in New York for financing, often lost their mills when sales did not earn enough to service the debt. Others had a group of investors take over the loans and when the mills couldn't make the payments, those investors took over the mills. Keeping the mills open during the Depression wasn't easy. At times, workers only worked a couple of days per week. In order to keep afloat or make a profit, the mills often laid off as many workers as they could but then expected the remaining workers to pick up the slack and work 'round the clock and do more than just their job. And getting paid overtime, as we understand it, wasn't done back then. Labor Unions began to move in and found overworked, underpaid, desperate, scared, angry workers in these mills. As the economy atrophied, organized labor strengthened. Mill workers found their united voice, and the result at times was bloody. There were 80 strikes in SC in 1929 alone! That year also saw the massive strikes that began in Gastonia, NC, and Elizabethton, TN, which were violently suppressed by local police and vigilantes. The election of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and the passage of the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) appeared to change things. The NIRA, which Roosevelt signed in June, 1933, called for cooperation among business, labor and government and established the National Recovery Act(NRA). It was to oversee the creation of codes of conduct for particular industries that would reduce overproduction, raise wages, control hours of work, guarantee the rights of workers to form unions, and stimulate an economic recovery. It didn't live up to it's promises. But the promise of the right to join a union had an electrifying effect on textile workers: the United Textile Workers, which had no more than 15,000 members in February, 1933, grew to 250,000 members by June, 1934, of whom roughly half were cotton mill workers. Textile workers also put tremendous faith in the NIRA to bring an end to the stretch-out, or at least temper its worst features. As one union organizer said, textile workers in the South saw the NIRA as something that "God has sent to them." The NIRA quickly promulgated a code for the cotton industry regulating workers' hours and establishing a minimum wage; it also established a committee to study the problem of workloads. In the meantime, however, the employers responded to the new minimum wages by increasing the pace of work. When the labor board set a forty-hour work week, mill owners required the same amount of work in those forty hours as they had in the previous fifty- to sixty-hour week. By August 1934, workers had filed nearly 4,000 complaints to the labor board protesting "code chiseling" by their employers ; the board found in favor of only one worker. Union supporters often lost their jobs and found themselves blacklisted throughout the industry. Violence was inevitable. The UTW started talking about a national strike and one started in Alabama. But it was ineffective: many employers welcomed it as a means of cutting their expenses, since they had warehouses full of unsold goods. The UTW had a convention in NY and drew up a list of demands: a thirty hour week, minimum wages ranging from $13.00 to $30.00 a week, elimination of the stretch-out, union recognition, and reinstatement of workers fired for their union activities. The mill owners didn't take them seriously and the White House ignored everything.
The Great Strike of 1934 swept through Southern cotton mills, outpacing the union organizers and employing "flying squadrons" which traveled by truck and on foot from mill to mill, calling the workers out. In Gastonia, where authorities had violently suppressed a strike led by the National Textile Workers Union in 1929, an estimated 5,000 people marched in the September 3rd Labor Day parade. The next day union organizers estimated that 20,000 out of the 25,000 textile workers in the county were out on strike. It tapped a deep bitterness in the workers. But the owners were taken by surprise. Governor Blackwood (SC) announced that he would deputize the state's "mayors, sheriffs, peace officers and every good citizen" to maintain order, then called out the National Guard with orders to shoot to kill any picketers who tried to enter the mills. Mill owners persuaded local authorities throughout the Piedmont to augment their forces by swearing in special deputies, often their own employees or local residents opposed to the strike; in other cases, they simply hired private guards to police the areas around the plant. Violence between guards and picketers broke out almost immediately. Six picketers were shot to death, many in the back as they turned to run, in Honea Path, SC. Authorities ordered out the National Guard in the second week of the strike. The strike was, in fact, already falling apart, particularly in the South, where local governments refused to provide any relief assistance to strikers and there were few sympathetic churches or unions to provide support. Although the union had pledged to feed strikers, it was wholly unable to fulfill this promise. President Roosevelt established a committee to look into it and encouraged the workers to go back to work. The strike was a total defeat for the union, particularly in the South. The union had not forced the mill owners to recognize it or obtained any of its economic demands. The employers refused, moreover, to reinstate strikers throughout the South. Anti-union sentiment in the South kept wages low for decades, but also acted as a catalyst for development later when industries moved there from the North and Midwest because of lower costs.
Dissatisfied workers would often move around going back to the farm or switching to other mills. Keeping a work force became a problem. Owners wanted a stable, well trained work force so they came up with different ways to attract and keep workers. Cheap and attractive ways. Recreation was important in bringing relief to the workers. Baseball became very popular and forming textile baseball teams helped bring fun and recreation to a hard lifestyle and gave a sense of community to the mills and their villages. It also taught the young men how to be team players and how to work together for a goal and provided exercise. To the mill owners this was a win/win situation! Cheap but effective. So they encouraged teams. Going to the baseball field either to play or watch became the favorite pasttime. Everyone in the village would turn out to watch their team. It fostered community pride. By the 1880's the mill teams were enthusiastically supported. The Spartanburg Mill Base Ball (sic) League began in 1913 and included Drayton, Saxon, Glendale, Whitney, Converse, Beaumont, Arkwright, Spartan Mill and Arcadia. It began to leave it's amateur beginnings behind. Men and women played and had teams. Beaumont had it's own ballfield and park.
World War II drew people back together again. When Japan attacked Hawaii on 12/7/1941, people were shocked into banding together against common enemies. No one in the world was unaffected by the Second World War! And that included the families in Beaumont. Beaumont revved up to acquire and fulfill wartime contracts. Men who were physically able, joined the military. Those family members left behind had to work the mills to supply their "boys" overseas. Everyone in Beaumont worked together, supported each other and had common goals.
Mary Prince Ray lost her husband in the War and the very next year she died in a car accident in Beaumont.
Spartanburg Herald, 10/15/1943, Pg 5
"Mrs. Mary Ray Dies of Auto Crash Injuries"
"Funeral Service Planned This Afternoon for Beaumont Victim"
"Mrs. Mary Prince Ray, 29, of 642 North Liberty Street died at 7am yesterday morning at Mary Black Hospital of injuries suffered Wednesday night in an automobile accident in the Beaumont section of the city."
"Her death was the 18th fatality of the year in the county as the result of traffic accidents."
"A report of the accident filed by investigating officers at city police headquarters said it occurred at 8:20pm Wednesday night at the intersection of North Fairview Avenue and Maywood Street. The car in which Mrs. Ray was riding was traveling south on Maywood Street, failed to make a turn at the Fairview Avenue intersection and truck a telephone pole, according to the report. Mrs. Ray was listed as the driver and Joe R. Clubb as the owner of the car in the police report."
"Clubb was given emergency treatment at Mary Black Hospital following the accident."
"Patrolment Charley Brown and Wofford Blanton (Red Blanton) investigated the accident."
"At the hospital it was reported that Mrs. Ray suffered a fractured skull and internal injuries."
"No plans for an inquest into Mrs. Ray's death had been made yesterday afternoon, Coroner John W. Pearson said."
"Funeral services for Mrs. Ray will be conducted today at 4:30pm at Beaumont Baptist Church by the Rev. E. G. Harrison and the Rev. Carl O. Page. Interment will be in Oak Grove Baptist Church cemetery."
"Active pallbearers will be Archie West, Henry Lewis, Bill Kirby, Dewey Welchel, Bruce Justice and William Richards."
"Mrs. Ray is survived by her mother, Mrs. D. F. Prince of Beaumont; six brothers, Hubert Prince of Spartanburg; Ralph D. Prince of the detective division of the Spartanburg police department; Harold Prince of Spartanburg; Marvin Prince of the U.S. Navy; and Vernon Prince of the U.S. Army, now stationed overseas; and three sisters, Mrs. Ruth Shepherd, Miss Marguerite Prince and Miss Mildred Prince, all of Beaumont."
"The body will be at the home, 642 North Liberty Street, until the hour of the funeral."
During World War II, Beaumont printed a company newsletter called The Beaumont "E". In the Kennedy Room at the Spartanburg County Public Library, they have copies of some of these newsletters.
Beaumont had a war time newsletter for their employees. I found a few copies. The Beaumont "E" newsletter dated 11/11/1942, pg ?, "Letters From the Boys", located in Kennedy Room, Spartanburg County Public Library, Pamphlet files, "Spartanburg Textile Industry-Beaumont"
"October 23, 1942.
"Dear Mrs. Phifer:
"I received your letter today and I am very glad to hear about Beaummont winning the Army-Navy E. It makes us boys in the service feel good to know that the people back home are backing us up 100 percent.
"The army life isn't as bad as some people seem to think it is. I like it out here very much. We have plenty of entertainment in our spare time, and the civilians out here treat us swell. There are some pretty large cities close by: such as Berkeley, Oakland, and San Francisco. I was down at Berkeley last Saturday to see a football game between the University of California and U.C.L.A. I will close now and I know the people of Beaumont will keep the wheels of industry rolling and I wish them the best of luck.
"Very truley yours,
"Pvt. Vernon C. Prince
"Camp Stoneman, Pittsburg, CA"
The Beaumont "E" newsletter dated 5/17/1943, pg 4, "Soldiers and Sailors of Beaumont Honored When Honor Roll Dedicated and Unveiled", located in Kennedy Room, Spartanburg County Public Library, Pamphlet files, "Spartanburg Textile Industry-Beaumont"
"The roll of those employees who have left the service of Beaumont Manufacturing Co. to join the service of the United States Army, Navy, or Marines since July 1st, 1940, in order of teh date of the leaving the mill are:
(1st column, 3/4 down) "Vernon C. Prince"
The Beaumont "E" newsletter dated 8/1944, pg ? last page, "Mrs. Prince Has Persian Cloth", located in Kennedy Room in Spartanburg County Public Library, Pamphlet files, "Spartanburg Textile Industry-Beaumont"
"Mrs. Mollie Prince of North Liberty Street has a lovely Persian cloth of which she should be, and really is, very proud. It is handwoven and the colors are soft and beautiful and the design just what you would expect a Persian design to be.
"Where did it come from? Why from her son, Vernon, who is in Iran or Iraq or Persia, or some far country where our boys are fighting for freedom.
""When Vernon was employed at Beaumont, he was in the weave room so of course, a lovely piece of weaving interested him. But, we would be willing to venture, nothing would look any prettier to him right now than good stout Duck from Beaumont unless it was seeing a roll of duck coming right off the Beaumont looms."
The Beaumont "E" newsletter dated 4/17/1943, pg 10, "Celebrates Seventh Birthday With Party", located in Kennedy Room of Spartanburg Public Library, Pamphlet files, "Spartanburg Textile Industry-Beaumont"
"Little Miss Mary Evelyn Shirley celebrated her seventh birthday on March 30 by entertaining many of her little friends at a delightful party at the home of her grandfather, Mr. R.R. McCraw, 790 Camp Street. She is the daughter of Mrs. Grace McCraw Shirley. After games had been enjoyed by the happy group, delicious refreshments were served by her mother, assisted by Miss Ocie McCraw, Miss Sybelle Lloyd and Mrs. Louise Skipper..."
Front row, seated, 4th boy from left is Donnie Prince and Second row, standing, 3 girl from left is Gail Shepherd and Third row, standing, 3rd girl from left is Nancy Shepherd and Fourth row, standing from left first boy is Jerry Prince.
The Beaumont "E" newsletter, copy located in Kennedy Room of Spartanburg County Public Library in Pamphlet files, "Spartanburg Textile Industry-Beaumont", date4/17/1943, Pg 12, $2,219.39 Raised In Red Cross Drive Gives Beaumont Third Place In Textile Groups
"Workers on the first and second shifts in the Red Cross Drive who contributed so materially to Beaumont's excellent record are (reading right to left): 6th woman is "Mrs. Elnora Prince"
The Beaumont "E" newsletter, copy located in Kennedy Room of Spartanburg County Public Library in Pamphlet files, "Spartanburg Textile Industry-Beaumont", date 8/1944, pg 2, Employees Praise Cafeteria, We Like The Showers
"'The Cafeteria is fine, really wonderful But the showers are the grandest things at Beaumont'. That's what Mrs. Thomas D. Pack, Mrs. Clara Prince and Miss Mildred Putnam told Mrs. Phifer while they were at lunch the other day. 'We really enjoy the cafeteria and such a nice place to eat our lunches, but we are crazy about the showers.'"
Also in the Beaumont "E" newsletter ("E" for "Excellence") Peggy's sister, Wilma Prince, was recognized as one of the Beaumont teens who graduated from high school. This would have probably been in 1943. I forgot to look for the date on the newsletter. Wilma is now 84 years old and still a beautiful woman.
My Mother-In-Law, Peggy Prince Harris played women's fast pitch softball on the Beaumont team. These photos were taken for the Beaumont "E" newsletter in 1949.
In this photo she is the third from left in the seated front row.
Clara Wilder Prince's husband, Julian Rhett Prince, died in 1935 in a car accident. She had to go to work at Beaumont to support their three daughters. In the 1950's the mills began selling off the mill village houses. Stan's Grandmother bought her house on Maywood St. She retired from Beaumont. Her daughter, Peggy (Stan's Mother), also worked at Beaumont and retired from there. Peggy, Billy and their 6 children lived for some time in this little house on Maywood St.
Some of the Owners of Beaumont
John Henry Montgomery (1833 - 1902)-Capt. John Henry Montgomery was born into a family distinguished in British history. His great-great grandfather moved from Northern Ireland, as did many Scotch-Irish and settled in Pennsylvania. Like many others, he followed the road south and settled in Spartanburg County, SC in 1775. His early training was in the mercantile area. At age 19, he became a clerk in a country store in the county. Later, he formed a partnership with a brother-in-law. With the death of his partner, he continued the business and added a tannery.When the War of Northern Aggression broke out in 1861, Montgomery joined the army and was soon made commissary of the brigade. He assisted with such activities throughout the Civil War and rose to the rank of Captain, CSA. After the War, he returned to the mercantile and tanning business. He added commercial fertilizers-Walker, Flemming & Company-and warehousing to his business interests. The first opportunity in textiles came with the acquisition of waterpower rights by Walker, et al., at Trough Shoals on the Pacolet River. Like many aspiring Southern entrepreneurs, Montgomery went to New York seeking backers to invest in the growing Southern textile industry. He met with Seth Milliken who put up $10,000 of the $100,000 capitalization “as a starter.” This was the beginning of a long and interesting association between the two men. A cotton mill was erected in 1881 and became the first unit of the Pacolet Manufacturing Company. Montgomery was chosen president and treasurer. The initial 10,000 spindles were increased to 20,000 in 1887 and 40,000 in 1893. Pacolet Number 2 followed in 1888. In 1889, Montgomery organized the Spartan Mills, an integrated spinning and weaving mill in Spartanburg, where he became president and treasurer. It was his own company, Spartan Mills, in downtown Spartanburg in 1890. Under the leadership of his sons and grandsons, the company grew and prospered. Walter S. Montgomery was born in Spartanburg, S.C., October 18, 1900, he was a graduate of Virginia Military Institute. He has served as manager, treasurer, president or chairman of a number of textile mills, including Spartan Mills, founded by his grandfather, Startex and Beaumont Mills. He was an organizer of South Carolina Mills, a mail order firm dealing only in items of cotton, an organizer of the Spartanburg County Foundation and a long-time director of Textile Hall Corporation. Pacolet Number 3 was built in 1891 , Spartan Number 2 in 1896. The products included print cloth, broadcloth and sheeting. Montgomery also became involved in the Gainesville Cotton Mills, Gainesville, GA; the Whitney Mills, Whitney, Spartanburg, SC; the Lockhart Mills, Lockhart, SC; The Clifton Mills, Clifton, Spartanburg, SC; and the Morgan Iron Works, Spartanburg, SC. He died after falling from a scaffold while inspecting a new Pacolet mill in Gainesville, GA.
Seth Mellen Milliken (1836-1920), was the son of a physician in New Hampshire. Young Seth set out to begin a new career, one based on merchandising, when he became a miller, a schoolteacher and a storekeeper. In 1861, at the age of 25, he moved about 30 miles from his home in Minot to Portland, ME and invested in a retail business with his brother-in-law, Dan True. In 1865, after the Civil War, he formed a partnership with William Deering to open a general store doing business as Deering and Milliken. Later, they became textile sales agents for the Farnsworth Mill of Lisbon Center, ME. When a fire destroyed the building occupied by Deering and Milliken and all their sales inventory except for potatoes, Milliken loaded the potatoes on board a ship and headed for Boston. In Boston, he found a saturated potato market and sailed on to New York where he sold potatoes with little trouble. Having no business to return to in Maine and finding a flourishing market in New York, the partners established their business in New York. Shortly after arriving in New York, Deering had an idea to develop harvesting equipment and wished to leave for the mid west. He left for Chicago and set up the Deering Harvesting Machinery Company. Milliken so admired his friend that he kept the Deering name in his mercantile business for years. Deering Harvesting later became International Harvester. In 1916, son Gerrish Hill Milliken ( - 1947) joined the family business. He was reportedly an excellent tennis player, had studied at Yale, and more importantly, an excellent businessman. Mills that flourished during World War I often had a difficult time making the adjustment to peacetime business in the early 1920s. He acquired the Judson Mill, Greenville, SC, noted for years as a very fine combed-yarn spinning and weaving mill. Gerrish was not afraid to try new things. For those who survived the post-war transition and subsequent growth in the 1920s, the 1930s were trying times for many mills as the Great Depression squeezed profits. Mills, who relied on bankers in New York for financing, often lost their mills when sales did not earn enough to service the debt. Gerrish Milliken’s main products were woolen and worsteds, manufactured chiefly in New England. He continued to represent Southern mills as well and financed a few through the “factoring” business. Reportedly, the combination of Montgomery and Milliken controlled more textile mills in the South Carolina “Upcountry” than anyone else. When mills failed to repay debts, factors became the new owners. Pacolet Mills, Pacolet, SC, the first mill organized by John Montgomery and financed by Seth Milliken became partially owned by Deering Milliken in the 1930s and 1940s, as did Drayton, Lockhart and Gaffney Manufacturing. Pacolet was totally consolidated into the Milliken business in 1967. Drayton Mills, Spartanburg, SC, organized by Montgomery and others in 1902, was sold to Deering Milliken in 1937. The Montgomery family kept Spartan, Beaumont and Startex. Other mills joined the business: Red Springs Woolen Mill, Red Springs, NC; Hatch Woolen Mill, Columbus, NC; Darlington Manufacturing Co., Darlington, SC; Hartsville, SC; Ottaray Mill, Union, SC; Excelsior Union, Union, SC; McCormick Woolen Mill, McCormick, SC; and Johnsonville, SC. Roger Milliken (1915-still alive at this time and head of his family business) succeeded his father Gerrish H. as president upon his father’s death in 1947.
Joseph Walker was born on Fair Forest Creek within two miles of the city of Spartanburg. The mother of this family died in 1850 and subsequently the father married Miss Adaline Patterson, who bore him five children, four sons and one daughter. Men of the Time Sketches of Living Notables. A Biographical Encyclopedia of Contemporaneous South Carolina Leaders By J. C. Garlington: "WALKER JOSEPH Was born in a log cabin on Fair Forest Creek Spartanburg County April 18 1835. His father was a son of Colonel John Walker of Virginia and his mother was the daughter of John Cannon also of Virginia. Colonel Walker was reared upon the homestead farm receiving a common school education. In 1853 he accepted a position as clerk for John B. Cleveland and remained with him three years. From 1856 to 1860 he did business on his own account. In 1860 he married Miss Susan E Wingo daughter of Alexander Wingo who was once sheriff of Spartanburg County. He volunteered at the breaking out of the war and was chosen captain of Company K, Fifth South Carolina Cavalry Regiment April 1861. He was in command of that company one year. In April 1852 upon the reorganization of the South Carolina troops he was elected Lt Colonel of the Palmetto sharpshooters, a regiment composed of twelve companies. Soon after this he was made colonel of the regiment and served as such until the close of the war. At the close of the war Colonel Walker engaged in the cotton trade and that has since been his vocation. In 1871 he helped to organize the National Bank of Spartanburg and is a stockholder and director therein. In 1888 he was one of the organizers of the Merchants and Farmers Bank and has since been its president. He is a director in the Pacolet Manufacturing Company, Whitney, Beaumont, and the Produco Mills all of Spartanburg County. A director in the Columbia & Greenville and the Spartanburg Union and Columbia Railroad director and vice president of the Spartanburg and Asheville Railroad. Director in Converse College Company and Fidelity Loan and Trust Company. President and director of the Peoples Building and Loan and the Columbia Phosphate Company. He has six times been mayor of Spartanburg and served one term in the State Legislature."
John Bomar Cleveland History of South Carolina By Yates Snowden, Harry Gardner Cutler Published in 1920, "Mr Cleveland who was born at Spartanburg in 1848 is of an old and prominent family. In remote generations the Clevelands derived their name from a tract of country in the North Riding of Yorkshire, England still known to this day as Cleveland. One branch of the family went to New England and from it was descended the Moses Cleaveland founder of the City of Cleveland, Ohio and also the late President Grover Cleveland was of the same branch. In Colonial times, another member of the family was John Cleveland of Prince William County, Virginia. He had several sons among them being Gen. Benjamin Cleveland who lives in history as one of the heroes of the battle of King's Mountain for whom Cleveland County, North Carolina was named. Another son of John Cleveland was Robert Cleveland, captain of a company under his brother at King's Mountain. Two of the sons of Robert Cleveland were Jeremiah and Jesse Cleveland both of whom settled in Greenville County, South Carolina. Jesse Cleveland, grandfather of John Bomar Cleveland was born in Wilkesbarre, North Carolina, and in early days removed from Greenville to the adjoining County of Spartanburg. He became a great merchant and for many years was one of Spartanburg County's wealthiest and most prominent citizens. His wife was Mary Blassingame. Dr Robert Easley Cleveland, father of the Spartanburg business man, was born at Spartanburg, January 6, 1822. Graduating from Charleston Medical College in 1843, he began his professional work in Spartanburg the same year and soon had an extensive practice calling him to adjoining counties and also to North Carolina. After retiring from the practice of medicine in 1870, he gave his attention to his extensive private affairs. He was a man of great progressiveness and public spirit and his far vision brought him a connection with manv enterprises out of the ordinary scope of the individual. He became interested in railroad building in Upper South Carolina and was a leader in the building and successful operation of Spartanburg & Asheville Railroad and the Air Line Railroad. Doctor Cleveland married Elizabeth Bomar, daughter of John Bomar. This is another old family of Spartanburg County coming here from Virginia. John Bomar Cleveland graduated from Wofford College in the class of 1869, then studied law was admitted to the bar and for ten years was a successful lawyer of his native city. Most of his modern contemporaries however know him hardly at all as a lawyer. From the law he entered banking and the cotton mill business and his enterprises comprised a large group in commerce finance and industry in this section of the state. He was one of the organizers of the First National Bank of Spartanburg and was been first vice president for many years. This bank was organized in 1871. For twenty seven years he was president and treasurer of the Whitney Manufacturing Company Cotton Mills and for twenty five years was receiver and president of the Charleston & Western Carolina Railway. A list of the corporations and industrial and commercial enterprises of which he had been either the promoter or a heavy financial supporter would almost make a directory of the business interests of Upper South Carolina. With the wealth that fortune had favored him, Mr Cleveland was foremost in upbuilding the business and industrial resources of Spartanburg County. He served one term in the South Carolina Legislature during the session of 1880. He was a delegate to the National Democratic Convention at Chicago which nominated Cleveland for his first term in 1884. For many years he was a member of the board of trustees of Wofford College and was a chairman of the board of trustees of Converse College. Mr Cleveland was a member of the Episcopal Church. November 4, 1871 he married Miss Georgia Alden Cleveland of Bedford County, Tennessee They are the parents of seven children: Jesse F., Henry M., Van Noy Vernor., Mrs Frederick L. Screven, Mrs A.A. Towers, Mrs Alice Reynolds, and Mrs Jesse Cleveland Jr.
What is left of Beaumont Mill today
What is left of Beaumont Mill today
For another post on Beaumont check my post at:
Sources:
http://www.textilehistory.org/MillikenandCo.html
National Geographic, Willie Drye, October 19, 2004 http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/10/1019_041019_textile_mills.html
Wikipedia on "Spartanburg, SC"
Cotton Mills of SC by August Kohn, 1907
History of SC Volume II, by Yates Snowden, 1930
American Social History Online http://www.dlfaquifer.org/search/item/Beaumont-Cotton-Mill-Spartanburg-SC/oai%253Alcoa1%252Eloc%252Egov%253Aloc%252Epnp%252Fpan%252E6a09719?page=5
Copyright deposit; Haines Photo Co.; April 12, 1909; DLC/PP-1909:43776
Child Labor photos Library of Congress, Hine, Lewis Wickes, 1874-1940, photographer. http://www.dlfaquifer.org/search?facet=decade&facet_browse=Spartanburg%2C+SC&facet_tag=city_state_facet&new_search=1
History of Spartanburg County by J.B.O. Landrum,
http://www.textilehistory.org/JohnHenryMontgomery.html
http://txnetwork.net/walker/military/josephw.htm
http://narvellstrickland1.tripod.com/cottonmillhistory2/index1.html
Textile Town, Spartanburg, SC by the Hub City Writer’s Project, Betsy Wakefield Teter, Editor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Textile_workers_strike_(1934)
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