Library of the College Re-organization of 1882.. Opposition of the Denominational Schools Present Condition Cost to the State-Amount of Appropriations Outline of Re-organization of University of South Carolina. CHAPTER VIII. Bibliography of the History of Higher Education in South Carolina...... APPENDIX I. PAGE 185 186 187 187 188 188 190 193 Legal Title of the State Institution...... Presidents of South Carolina College and University. Professors of South Carolina College. 199 199 200 Professors of the University of South Carolina, 1866 to 1876.. 201 201 202 203 204 APPENDIX II. Education in South Carolina prior to and during the Revolution; by Edward HISTORY OF HIGHER EDUCATION IN SOUTH CAROLINA CHAPTER I. EARLY EDUCATION IN THE COLONY. After the unsuccessful efforts of the French to establish themselves in Carolina, came the English, a people fitted by nature to rule and to colonize. They came over when Milton and Barrow, Locke, Tillotson, and Watts were still living, and the first struggles of the young colony were nearly contemporaneous with the founding of the Royal Society of London. Though there were no men among them eminent in the world of letters or of science, yet there were some who appreciated learning. As soon as the founding of the colony was accomplished, the colonists. turned their attention to providing educational facilities for the coming generation. It was nearly thirty years after their first arrival and settlement on the Ashley that we have any account of their organized efforts in a literary way. In 1698 or earlier, a law was passed for "securing the provincial library of, Charleston."1 After this libraries were founded in nearly all the parishes, but they were chiefly limited to the use of the ministers. The chief promoter of all this movement was Dr. Bray, of Charleston. Religious societies, which have always been one of the most important factors in the diffusion of knowledge in nearly all places, were also active in the movement in South Carolina. The Society for Propagating the Gospel in Foreign Parts, with headquarters in London, was especially active in promoting the cause of the libraries. Finally the Assembly brought their management under a central control, and appointed commissioners to take charge of all the various libraries and attend to the lending of books. If anything was done for establishing schools before 1710, the records of such action are lost, though an act of that year recited that gifts had already been made for founding a free school. The acts of Ramsay's History of South Carolina, p. 353. 1710 and 1712, providing for a free school at Charleston, may be con sidered the earliest authentic record on the subject of schools in South Carolina. The preamble set forth "the necessity that a free school be erected for the instruction of youth in grammar and other arts and sciences, and also in the principles of the Christian religion; and that several well disposed Christians by their last will had given several sums of money for the founding of a free school." It was then provided among other things, that the preceptor "should be of the religion of the Church of England and capable of teaching the Latin and Greek languages." His salary of one hundred pounds yearly was to be paid out of the public treasury. In return for the free use of the lands and buildings of the school, he was to teach twelve scholars free, but to charge all others four pounds each per annum. Provision was also made for an usher, and a master to "teach writing, arithmetic, merchants' accounts, surveying, navigation, and practical mathematics." It was also enacted "that any schoolmaster settled in a country parish, and approved by the vestry, should receive ten pounds per annum from the public treasury;" and the vestries were authorized to draw from the same source twelve pounds towards building a school-house in each of the country parishes. Here a general plan was formulated for the whole colony, but no provision was made for a central supervision. But during the same time the Church was erecting and managing schools. The missionaries addressed a letter to the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, and described the condition of the colony as in want of sufficient education. The Society heard the appeal and established a school in Charleston in 1711, under the care of the Rev. William Guy, A. M. It sent out missionaries, not only to preach, but "to encourage the setting up of schools for the teaching of children." Their schoolmasters were enjoined to "take especial care of the manners of the pupils in and out of school; warning them against lying and falsehood and evil speaking; to love truth and honesty; to be modest, just, aud affable; to receive in their tender years that sense of religion which may render it the constant principle of their lives and actions." It was not to be expected that the proprietary governors would urge the subject very closely upon the attention of the people, since the Constitution of John Locke contained not one word on the subject of education, though it did contain many foolish provisions forbidding lawyers, commentaries, and legal reports, and compelling a man to worship some Deity publicly or be driven from the colony, and giving the master absolute power over his slave. But the first royal Governor, Sir Francis Nicholson (1721-1724), was a great friend to learning, and under his influence many legacies were left to the schools. The private contributions and donations about this time, and for a few years later, were remarkably large for so small and weak a colony, its population 1 Ramsay, pp. 354-55, |