8202 Oyster Factory Rd
Edisto Island, SC, USA

National Register of Historic Places - Crawford's Plantation House

Statement of Significance:

Crawford's Plantation House is significant for its architecture. Its T-plan, nineteenth century detail, and setting are significant as a distinctive remnant of an antebellum Sea Island cotton plantation. The architecture shows the influence of the Greek Revival style on Lowcountry design. The plantation is associated with several families prominent in the economic and social history of Edisto Island, particularly the Mikell, Edings and Whaley families. Its ownership history typifies the complicated pattern found on the South Carolina Sea Islands, particularly Edisto, Wadmalaw and Johns islands, of marriages and inheritance among generations of closely related families.

Historical background and significance:

The name Crawfords was applied to the property at an early date. In 1784 James and Elizabeth Beckett granted an Indenture to James Crawford for a plantation of 110 acres.’’ This parcel was sold by Crawford in 1802 to Thomas Baynard, then to Ephraim Mikell.2 At his death in 1809, Mikell left "the Plantation or Tract of land I first purchased from Thomas Baynard and known as Crawford's," to his son Ephraim Mikell.

This Ephraim Mikell and his wife Providence were parents of at least ten children. They included Sarah, who married William Edings, a nephew of William Edings of Seaside Plantation, in 1832, and William Archibald Mikell, who married Hess Marion Waring Smith in 1835.
From his father William Archibald Mikell inherited Crawford's, the adjacent Devants (or Davants) tract, and other lands including a house and outbuildings at Edingsville in 1838. The house at Crawford's was probably built for William and Hess Mikell, perhaps before the inheritance was made final. Construction and architectural details indicate a date of 1835-40. William A. Mikell died in 1840, leaving Hess and three sons; the 1840 Census lists William Mikell's estate with 55 slaves, 48 of them agricultural workers. The estate also included "one plantation, 490 acres more or less... being composed of two tracts of land called 'Crawfords' and 'Davants' a two-story wooden building and outbuildings at Edingsville; the "household and kitchen, furniture of every description now being on the plantation heretofore described... 60 head of black cattle, 6 horses, 4 mules and a 4 wheel carriage."

In February 1844 Hess M. W. Mikell, W. A. Mikell's widow, married William Edings, whose wife Sarah Mikell Edings had died sometime after 1840. It is not clear where William and Hess Edings, their six children, and the six from their earlier marriages, lived. In 1847 the 490 acre Crawford's/Devants Plantation was sold to William James Whaley, for fifty-five dollars an acre for the high land.

The father of four children, W. J. Whaley was listed in the 1850 Census as a planter with 1350 acres of improved land and 886 unimproved acres; 4 horses, 106 milk cows, 12 working oxen, 30 "other cattle" and 50 sheep. The previous year's production totaled 1300 pounds of rice; 11 bales of ginned cotton; 100 pounds of wool; 1000 bushels of Indian corn; 100 bushels of peas/beans; 3000 bushels of sweet potatoes; and 900 pounds of butter. Whaley probably grew rice at his plantation on Chehaw River in the Combahee basin, not at Crawford' s. By 1860 Whaley only farmed 800 acres, but owned 1300 acres unimproved land. He produced 48 bales (400 pounds each) of cotton, but no rice.

William James Whaley served in the Confederate Army and the family evacuated Edisto Island by late 1861. Whaley family tradition holds that just after the Civil War Crawford's Plantation House was occupied by two Freedmen's Bureau teachers,''^ Mary Ames and Emily Bliss, who were on Edisto Island between May 1865 and September 1866. Miss Ames' diary is inexact about their residence; she refers to it as the "former home of Dr. Whaley," about one-half mile from the church where they held school.

After the Civil War, William James Whaley returned to Edisto Island and adjusted to wage labor. His real estate was greatly reduced by 1870 to 350 acres of improved land, 200 acres unimproved and 511 acres woodland. That year he paid wages of $800.00, and produced sixty 150-pound bales of cotton and 500 bushels of peas. In 1879, employing one laborer, he produced goods valued at $864.00: 40 bushels of corn, 6 bales of cotton, and 100 bushels of sweet potatoes. In 1880, the sixty-one-year-old William James Whaley was still cultivating 400 acres. William James Whaley died in 1888.His son William James Whaley, Jr., inherited Crawford's Plantation, and in 1899 married Martha E. Bailey of Wadmalaw Island. After the death of William James Whaley in 1922, his wife and three sons moved to Charleston, and the house was no longer occupied on a fulltime basis.'' The plantation remained in the Whaley family until 1945 when it was sold to I. C. Tavell.'”