Cockfield Plantation – White Hall – Colleton County

Basic Information

• Location – Cuckolds Creek (a branch of the Combahee River), White Hall, St. Bartholomew's Parish, Colleton County

  Located off White Hall Road (SC 119)
  

• Origin of name – John Cockfield was an early owner.

• Other names – ?

• Current status – Privately owned

Timeline

• 1733 – Earliest known date of existence

  John Page was issued a grant for the property on April 5, 1733 (3, p. 143).
  

• ? – John Andrew purchased the property from Page (3, p. 143).
  

• ? – John's son, Israel Andrew, inherited the property from his father (3, p. 143).
  

• ? – Mary Andrew Broadbelt, Israel's daughter, received the property upon her father's death (3, p. 143).
  

• 1759 – John Cockfield purchased 419 acres from John Broadbelt, Mary's husband (3, p. 143).
  

• 1791 – It is recorded Thomas Radcliffe owned Cockfield this year (3, p. 143).
  

• ? – House built

  There was a house at Cockfield during Radcliffe's ownership, but we don't know when the house was built. If you know, please tell us.
  

• 1806 – Radcliffe died leaving Cockfield to his nephew, Thomas Radcliffe Sheppard (3, p. 143).
  

• 1814 – Sheppard passed away leaving his holdings to be divided between his wife, Sophia Francis Perry Sheppard, and their only child, Sophia Francis Sheppard (3, p. 143).
  

• 1823 – The Radcliffe heirs sought a division of the late Thomas Radcliffe's estate. Cockfield was auctioned off. Sophia Sheppard's husband, Alexander B. Wilson, purchased it for $10,000 (3, p. 143-144).
  

• 1840 – Wilson died and the plantation once again belonged to Sophia Francis Sheppard Wilson, his wife (3, p. 144).
  

• Circa 1870 – The executors of Sophia Francis Sheppard Wilson's estate divided the holdings. Cockfield was sold to J. Bennett Bissell (3, p. 144).
  

• ? – Bissell didn't own the plantation very long as it was sold by the sheriff to C.H. Claussen due to a judgement levied against Bissell (3, p. 144).
  

• 1878 – James Campbell purchased Cockfield from C.H. Claussen (3, p. 144).
  

• 1880 – Campbell sold the plantation to Joseph Marvin (3, p. 144).
  

• ? – Wilmot D. Porcher bought the property from Joseph Marvin (3, p. 144).
  

• 1896 – Porcher passed Cockfield to Samuel L. Marvin (3, p. 144).
  

• 1902 – A Victorian style farm house was built at Cockfield Plantation (4, p. 4)
  

• 1915 – Duncan Clinch Heyward's Combahee Corporation was owner of record (3, p. 144).
  

• 1920s – Cockfield passed back into the hands of the Marvin family (3, p. 144).
  

• 1990s – Cockfield was still owned by the Marvin family (3, p. 144).
  

• 2002 – Mr. and Mrs. Mark O'Brien owned the plantation and placed a conservation easement on the land through the Beaufort County Open Land Trust (4, p. 4).
  

Land

• Number of acres – 419 in 1759; 456¾ in 1823; 856 in 2002 (3, p. 143) (4, p. 4)
  

• Primary crop – Rice
  

  As of 2002, the rice mill, which was built around 1850 and moved to Cockfield Plantation in 1882, was still standing on the plantation and was reported to be the only mill constructed prior to the Civl War remaining in the Lowcountry (4, p. 4).
  

Slaves

• Number of slaves – 64 in 1806 (3, p. 143)
  

References & Resources

1. Lucius G. Fishburne, Plantation Notes, St. Bartholomew's Parish, 1960, held by the South Carolina Historical Society
   

2. Carolina W. Todd and Sidney Wait, South Carolina: A Day at a Time (Orangeburg, SC: Sandlapper Publishing Company, 2008)
   
   

3. Suzanne Cameron Linder, Historical Atlas of the Rice Plantations of the ACE River Basin - 1860 (Columbia, SC: South Carolina Department of Archives and History, 1995), pp. 143-144.
    Order Historical Atlas of the Rice Plantations of the ACE River Basin - 1860
   

4. Information contributed by Cyndi Shull from:
   Lowcountry Open Land Trust Easements - PDF - SCDNR ACE Basin Newsletter, p. 4