Montagu Mansion

On a moonlit night in Charleston, you just never know what you might find...........

Well, I just could not resist this gate! Y'all know how I am about creaky old gates!

so.....I started looking around, very curious, even though this sign was here---

Even got my picture made in front of the gate!

one of my favorite things 

side door---needs a little help

The house was built in 1860 and has 6,491 square feet. She's four stories tall, with a full basement, and is Greek Revival in style. Oh, and for a city lot, it has a very large back yard!

The empty mansion sits at Gadsen Street, one of the original streets in this section of Charleston. The neighborhood is known as Harleston Village and was laid out in 1770. The street was named for Christopher Gadsen, a Patriot General and also Lieutenant Governor of South Carolina in the Revolution.

Who lived in this house?

A man named August Heinrich Scherfesee was born in 1796. He was a carpenter in Prussia. He came to America and became a grocer in Charleston.He also made cabinets. He was probably a Catholic in Prussia, but attended a Lutheran church in Charleston.
His wife was Sophia Charlotte Prosky (Prusky). She was a seamstress and made dresses.
They sailed for the New World with their baby son and settled in Charleston about 1843.
They had many children, including Heinrich (Henry) Louis Scherfesee, who was born in July of 1842 in Minden, Prussia. He was baptised in July of 1842 in St. John's Lutheran church here in Charleston.  I think he may have  worked as a life insurance agent after the War.
LOUIS:

I read that he was a fireman around the time he enlisted into the Condederate service. I read that he went through many battles.He was a color bearer. A museum in Columbia, S.C. has the flag he carried all through the War.
He met a lovely girl from Charleston named Annie Sophia Griffith. Annie was born in 1846 and baptised (St. John's Lutheran Church) on June 28, 1848, in Charleston.

Here I am At the Charleston Museum with Hoop Skirts

She might've worn dresses like this when she was a little girl:

Little girls wore shorter hoops underneath their dresses called "bell hoops"

Little girls of this era liked to play a game called "graces", where they sailed hoops decorated with pretty ribbons to each other, and would catch them on wands. They also played with rolling hoops, jacks, hopscotch, and with their beloved dolls.

Boys liked yo-yos, marbles, play swords and guns, drums, and dominoes. Smaller children had tops to spin, wood blocks, and rocking horses.

Annie and Louis were married on October 27, 1869. 

wedding gown style popular in 1870

Blooming that time of year are tea olive blossoms, lantana, and probably lots and lots of camellias in different colors, so her wedding bouquet likely included some or all of these.

They probably enjoyed outings to the park, having friends over to play charades, attending art exhibits, listening to bands play at the bandstand, going to see choirs and orchestras, going to the opera and music halls. There was no radio, t/v, or movies. They likely were involved in their church's activities as well. Ladies had sewing and quilting circles and also had lots of committees to raise funds for various church, hospital, and community needs.


They were quickly blessed with their firstborn, a baby girl they named Charlotte Elizabeth. She was born in September, 1870. When little Charlotte was about two years old, Annie gave birth to a boy this time--Moseley Fitch, in 1872.
"Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" by Lewis Carroll, had come out several years before, and it might have been read to the children.
Little Charlotte might've enjoyed card games, jump ropes, making pretty scrapbooks, putting together puzzles and being a "mommy" to her dolls. Children from more well off families had prettier dolls with frilly dresses and china heads and they also had elaborate doll houses and tea sets.

Here I am last month with a pretty dollhouse at the Charleston Museum

You can see the joggling board here, and some pretty dishes

Annie might've received pretty dishes like this for a wedding gift

Antique Doll

Young children from this era-I can just imagine them scampering up and down all those stairs in that big house, can't you?

Young Mosley probably had blocks, puzzles, balls, toy soldiers and toy boats to take and sail on the near-by Rutledge Pond. Plastic hadn't been invented, and toys were much better made than today and lasted longer.

Charleston Museum

Common attire on the streets of Charleston during this time:

Popular music during this era included lots of traditional folk songs. With the War being over and healing begun, there were many post-war songs such as "good-bye Liza Jane" and "Carry me back to Old Virginny".

 Annie's parents were Robert Griffith and Eliza Nelson, and they were from Ireland.
Annie died August 16, 1913, in Charleston.

I went back today to get photographs in the daytime:

Looks like a light on upstairs--there isn't--it's the sun coming through

I love the "catty-corner" gate on the fence here. There may be another one in Charleston, but if there is, I don't know about it. 

NOW.....

........AND BACK THEN.......

Library of Congress
Photographer- Frances Benjamin (1864-1952)

I'm not sure when the last of the Scherfesee family left the home, but I read that the house had been vacant for almost fifty years! Whoever owned it was from another city and they kept it, but did not live in it. I think the owner recently died, and it looks like the house sold back in January. I wonder who bought it, and what they plan to do with it? Hopefully restore it! I would love to see it all fixed up and somebody loving it once more--pretty curtains in the windows, rocking chairs on the piazzas,  children playing in the yard, and people going in and out of that wonderful creaky old gate once more!