The importance of Camp Reliance, a Confederate obstruction along the Pee Dee River, might have been debated during the Civil War, but not now, as government officials ensure the site’s remains are preserved.
The Florence County/ Municipal Historical Commission voted unanimously Monday to request a memorandum of agreement between Santee Cooper, which owns the land today, and the S.C. Department of Archives and History to ensure that no ground-disturbing activities take place at the site.
Santee Cooper, which commissioned the archaeological survey that uncovered the Civil War site, is committed to preserving the site, which it has never planned to disturb, said Babs Warner, environmental counsel for Santee Cooper.
During the Union’s blockade of Southern ports, many people worried that Union boats might go inland, where farmers produced rice for Confederate troops, said senior archaeologist Paul Avery of Mactec Engineering and Surveying, which performed the survey.
So Confederate Gen. William W. Harllee — after whose daughter the city of Florence is named — found an area along the Great Pee Dee where an obstruction and artillery could be placed, Avery said.
“This was not a popular expenditure at the time,” Avery said, referencing an editorial in the Aug. 6, 1862, issue of the Marion Star that stated:
“One of the governors with some voluntary aids who know as much about military fortifications as a jackass does of Christianity, surveyed the Pee Dee swamp and finally found a bluff — the last place where (President Abraham) Lincoln or (Secretary of State William H.) Seward would ever dream of sending a gunboat and where ‘Fort Finger’ sprung into existence.”
A Union boat that reached that point of the river likely wouldn’t be big enough to carry significant artillery or troops, Avery said.
The editorial is the the only instance in which Avery said he saw Camp Reliance referred to as “Fort Finger.” J.F. Finger of Marion served as the foreman of carpenters in building Camp Reliance.
Slave owners earned $1 a day per slave working on the site, while horse owners received $5 a day per horse, Avery said.
While archaeologists have found no definitive military artifacts at the former Camp Reliance, “it doesn’t necessarily mean that there weren’t any soldiers there,” Avery said. The ones who manned the camp likely had “the clothes they were wearing from the house and a rifle, maybe,” he said.
As for the obstruction, it was made of rafts chained together and is “long gone,” Avery said.
The site was originally recorded in 1981 as prehistoric. The remaining features of Camp Reliance — including trenches and magazine pits — were found when the area was revisited in 2007, Avery said.
The historical commission also designated the site as historical and supports efforts for the site’s placement on the National Register of Historic Places.
Commissioner Peggy Brown introduced Monday’s resolution, and commissioner Jack Dowis seconded her motion.
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