SOLON ROBINSON, 1850 379 



southwest of Charleston, containing 5,000 or 6,000 inhab- 

 itants, is the principal point where this valuable crop is 

 cultivated, It is a sandy soil, but little above tide, which, 

 flowing through many channels, gives very irregular 

 shapes to the farms, but boatable water almost at every 

 man's door. By this means, the crop is conveyed to mar- 

 ket, boats being substituted for wagons. There is con- 

 siderable marsh, some of which has been reclaimed, and 

 produces good cotton. 



Salt-marsh mud is much used for manure at the rate 

 of about forty one-horse cart loads to the acre. Some 

 compost it, others put it in the cattle pens. Some dry it 

 before hauling, and then spread upon the land. Mr. John 

 F. Townsend^ prefers to use it as soon as dug, spread 

 upon the land wet, and plowed in. He is the only man on 

 the island who uses plows to any extent. All the land 

 is cultivated with hoes, upon the two-field system; that 

 is, one field in cotton, corn, and sweet potatoes, in the 

 proportion of about seven twelfths cotton, three twelfths 

 corn, and two twelfths potatoes ; in all, less than six acres 

 to the hand. As the soil is generally very light, it is un- 

 productive without manure. Therefore, as many cattle 

 are kept as can be pastured upon the "field at rest," and 

 the marsh and woodland. These are penned in movable 

 yards, littered with fine straw and coarse marsh grass or 

 weeds, which is also used to lay along between the old 

 rows, to which muck and manure is added, and all the 



'John F. Townsend, born 1799; died 1881. Married Mary Caro- 

 line Jenkins in 1835 and lived on Wadmalaw Island across from 

 Edisto Island, until the death of his father. Moved to Bleak Hall 

 plantation, Edisto Island. Noted for fine sea-island cotton which 

 he shipped to France, Belgium, and Svi^itzerland. Raised horses, 

 particularly marsh tackles, cultivated orchards, and grew sweet 

 potatoes and sugar cane; raised sheep, cattle, and hogs on own 

 plantation. Owned Sea Cloud and Shere Gold plantations, on 

 which he also specialized in sea-island cotton, which could be 

 planted continuously only on the three islands, James, Johns, and 

 Edisto, just south of Charleston. Letter of John F. Townsend, 

 Charleston, South Carolina, to Herbert A. Kellar, June 6, 1936; 

 letter of Theodore D. Jervey to Herbert A. Kellar, May 11, 1936. 



