Gippy Plantation – Cooper River – Berkeley County
Basic Information
- Location – Western branch of the Cooper River, St. John's Berkeley Parish, Berkeley County
366 Avenue of Oaks, Moncks Corner
John Strobel transcribed the historic location from a 1859 mortgage document (page 1 | 2) to read "the Plantation is bounded to the North by part of 'Fairlawn' known as 'Old House Tract' owned by John S. White. Bounded to the East by the Cooper River; South by lands of Keating Simons Sr. and Keating Lewis Simons known as 'Lewisfield' also by lands of Alexander M. Porcher known as 'Oak Hill' also by lands formerly owned by H.B. Magrath and sold to Dr. Theodore S. Gaillard then sold to ??; West by Black Tom Bay." (5)
- Origin of name – Named for nearby Gippy Swamp (3, p. 95).
- Pronunciation – The 'G' is soft and pronounced as a 'J' as in Jippy (7).
- Other names – Jippy, Geppy, No. 3 Colleton Barony (5)
Both Gippy and Jippy are Bantu (African) words for "short." For example, Tshitupa tshipi means "in a short time, in a jiffy" (1). The swamp in the area was called Gippy and John White named his plantation after the swamp (3, p. 95).
- Current status – Originally part of Fairland Barony, most of the property has been subdivided into residential and commercial properties. The house remains and sits on a 4.81-arce lot.
— Gippy Plantation © USC University Libraries —
(Berkeley County Photograph Collection sbc008)
Timeline
- ? – Earliest known date of existence
- 1821 – On March 17, the 1,875-acre No. 3 Colleton Barony was conveyed to John White by Samuel Colleton Graves (3, p. 33) (5).
- ? – House built by White (3, p. 95).
- 1852 – The house was lost in a fire (3, p. 95).
- ? – A new house built with the help of neighboring planters (3, p. 95).
- 1859 – John S. White put the plantation up as collateral for a mortgage with William James Ball. White would pay installments until 1864. If he failed to pay, Gippy Plantation would become Ball's (mortgage document, page 1 | 2) (5).
- 1861 – John S. White died and it seems the plantation was left to his son, John St. Clair White (3, p. 95).
- 1895 – Samuel Porcher Stoney, Sr. purchased the plantation from the White family. The two families were related (3, p. 95).
- 1927 – Nicholas G. Roosevelt acquired the plantation. He introduced a herd of Guernsey cattle whose "Gippy" milk was still available as of 1987. The Roosevelts restored and enlarged the house (3, p. 95-96).
- 1972 – The estate of Nicholas G. Roosevelt sold Gippy Plantation to Percy Hauglie, Jim Daniel, and Manuel Cohen. The plantation's property was divided into business use and residential housing developments (3, p. 96).
- 1982 – Gippy was selected for the filming of several scenes for the movie Lords of Discipline (3, p. 96).
- 2016 – The Gippy Plantation house, which sits on a 4.81-arce lot, was for sale with an asking price of $1.2 million.
Land
- Number of acres – 1,875 in 1821; 1,846 in 1859 consisting of approximately 45 acres of swamp planted in rice, 600 acres of high land of which 300 acres was planted in cotton, 200 acres uncleared inland swamp, and 1,000 acres of pine; 4.81 in 2016 (3) (5)
- Primary crop – Rice, cotton, pine
Slaves
- Number of slaves – ?
- Nancy Wigfall was a slave woman from the Midwest. She was a full-blooded Cherokee Indian and was emancipated in 1865 (4).
References & Resources
- Overview of African Place Names in the United States, Joseph E. Holloway, Ph.D., California State University Northridge
- William P. Baldwin Jr., Plantations of the Low Country
(Westbrook, ME: Legacy Publishing, 1994)
- J. Russell Cross, Historic Ramblin's through Berkeley
(Columbia, SC: R.L. Bryan Company, 1985)
Order Historic Ramblin's through Berkeley - Information contributed by Barry A Walker, Sr.
- Information contributed by John Strobel.
- South Carolina Industrial Data for Gippy Plantation - PDF - 1969 report generated by the South Carolina State Development Board in cooperation with the Coastal Plains Regional Commission
- Information contributed by Brandon Coffey.
(Westbrook, ME: Legacy Publishing, 1994)
