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Print Title: EXCHANGE__CHARLESTON Description:
Engraving by W. G. Mason after drawing by Joshua Shaw first published 1823.
Engraving inscribed at lower left of the scene Drawn by J. Shaw, at lower right Engd. by W. G. Mason and beneath the title, Published for the Philadelphia Album Moris & Kenny 1828.
As Charleston became the South's largest port, the Exchange and Custom House was built between 1767 and 1771 to serve the expanding shipping industry, but also as a public market and meeting place. After a protest meeting against the Tea Act, confiscated tea was stored here in 1774. The Provincial Congress of South Carolina met here the following year. During the Revolutionary War, the British used the building for barracks and the basement as a military prison. The State Legislature met here in 1788, after the Statehouse was destroyed. When George Washington visited Charleston on his southern tour of 1791, a grand ball was held for him on the second floor. The structure was badly damaged by Union artillery fire during the Civil War and again by the great earthquake of 1886. Repaired after each occasion the Exchange was used for Federal office purposes until 1913 when an act of Congress deeded the building to the Daughters of the American Revolution in and of the State of South Carolina to be preserved by them as a historical monument.
Print Source:
First published in 1823 by J. C. Kayser in Commercial Information Relative to the State of South Carolina, this small vignette of the Exchange in Charleston, was re-published as a Frontispiece in The Philadelphia Album & Ladies Literary Gazette, published in Philadelphia by Morris & Kenney in 1828.
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