Rich History & Authentic Lowcountry CultureSince the days when history was family – their stories and ways, their myths and legends – when the only recorded history was in the hand-wrought designs pressed into pottery. For all these centuries, Daufuskie Island has been precious to the people who’ve lived here. It’s no different today, and it will take you no time at all to sense why they’ve held this place so dear.
Time Without Counting
Planting Flags
When the Scots with Henry Erskine, Lord Cardross, settled on Port Royal in 1684, Spanish soldiers enlisted native warriors to join forces with their three Spanish galleys and drive the Scottish settlers from their tiny Stewart Town. So began the sad chapter of native entanglement in European history that set a culture of nature against a culture of property. A so-called Indian uprising brought with it three battles on our southwestern shore between 1715 and 1717, and gave it the name it bears today, Bloody Point. What it Took to Stay
Italian Prince Filippo di Martinangelo fled the Inquisition about 1740 and settled in America as Phillip Martinangele. His daughter, Mary, is buried on Daufuskie Island, and the Mary (Martinangele) Dunn cemetery is worth a quiet visit. The Mongin and Martinangele family stories became intertwined even though the former were Whigs and the latter were Torries during the American Revolution. Eventually the Mongin family had acquired 11 of the 12 plantations on Daufuskie Island. The 300-acre Mary Dunn property was the only exception. The Industry of Nature's Gifts
The Language of Enduring
Some Find it Really Hard to Leave
“De Ole Gullah say, Modern Times
Today a Plan to Have it All
Daufuskie’s history is like a lot of other things you’ll find here. It is so fresh, so alive, that it is better explored than told. Come look around with us. Click here to download the Robert Kennedy Historic Trail Guide that gives you a map of the Daufuskie historical sites, along with a brief history.
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Native artifacts found on Daufuskie date back at least nine thousand years, so the European and American stories take place only in the past couple of minutes in the hour of history. Ancient piles of oyster shells testify that people found abundance and contentment on the island before time was counted. The name, Daufuskie, comes from the Muscogee language, meaning “sharp feather,” for the island’s distinctive shape. Learn more at the 
Spain claimed Daufuskie Island – and all the coast from St. Augustine to Charles Town – in 1521, yet a French expedition settled nearby anyway, giving Port Royal its name, in 1525. The native people who already thrived here took little notice.
The quest for religious freedom finally brought two European families to Daufuskie to stay. The French Huguenot family of David Mongin came to the new world in 1685. Mongin’s great grandson settled with his wife, Sarah Irwin, on Daufuskie Island around 1812.
Rice and cotton were the plantation crops of the Carolina Lowcountry, and the cotton grown on Daufuskie – Sea Island cotton – was for generations considered the best in the world. (The curiously brand-conscious author of the James Bond novels, Ian Fleming, wrote that Bond preferred Sea Island cotton for his shirts.) The intensive labor that produced these crops came from West African slaves. Their strength and spirit still pervade the island, even as the numbers of their descendants who live here dwindle. Something about nature defies commerce to a degree, and the values of these descendants kept the nature of Daufuskie alive when commerce moved elsewhere.
The Gullah language is a legacy of the people who stayed on when the plantations folded up. The Lowcountry was out of the way until halfway through the 20th Century, and Daufuskie was even more remote than that. This preserved the manners and the speech of the African descendants who lived here in a way that no historical record ever could have done. The patois of West African and rural English dialects has endured. It is direct, rhythmic, colorful – and endangered. When you hear it, do treasure it, for it is not heard much anymore.
Plenty of islanders will tell you that even the spirit world conspires to keep Daufuskie unspoiled. Surely there are ghost stories here; just ask around. But don’t miss the forest for the trees. The best Daufuskie ghost story of all doesn’t have a beginning, middle or an end. It’s in the way so many islanders just assume that spirits are their neighbors. Notice the “heaven blue” shutters and doorways and window frames on the old houses. A favorite artifact of ours bears this inscription:
Only in the mid-1980’s did a large timber company and group of local investors buy the Haig’s Point and the Melrose plantations. The luxury residential club at Haig Point began with hiring an archaeologist and historical architects. They dated the tabby ruins that stand near the northern tip of the island and located the foundation of the large mansion that stood there. The beauty and grace of Haig Point today reflect the sensibility of that beginning. The Melrose resort brought a Jack Nicklaus golf course and other amenities.
Thanks to the vision of residents who treasure what Daufuskie Island has now, and the expertise of scholars and architects who were recruited to plot a harmonious future, Daufuskie Island has a plan. The plan preserves historic sites and districts, promotes open spaces and walkable neighborhoods and apportions some of the South’s most beautiful coastline as the locale for resort amenities that will continue to thrill our guests.