Panel of the Sacred Corridor: Conservation of Taveau Church at Mepkin Abbey

Location: Charleston Library Society

Address: 164 King Street, Charleston, SC 29401

Date: 10 Oct

About Taveau Church:

Taveau Church is an unusual example of early nineteenth century church architecture. It is a small clapboard Classical Revival structure on a low brick pier foundation and has a gable roof with boxed cornice. The front façade is located on the gable side of the roof and features a small pedimented portico supported by four slender wooden Doric columns. A wooden bell tower with a hipped roof rises at the front of the gable roof. The foundations and steps of the portico are brick, although the area between the brick has been filled with concrete block. Both side facades feature a central double-door entrance flanked by two windows on each side. These entrances also feature a 12-light double row transom. All windows are 16/16 with paneled shutters. Taveau Church was constructed ca. 1835 for Martha Caroline Swinton Taveau, on lands of the former Clermont Plantation. After her death in 1847, a black Methodist congregation used the church. In the 1930s Clermont Plantation became part of the larger Mepkin Plantation and the owners of Mepkin, the Luce family, donated the church to the Taveau Methodist Church congregation. A cemetery is included within the acreage of Taveau Church.

In the words of Bill Fitzpatrick:

A decade or so ago, when I happened to photograph the dilapidated and 50-year closed Taveau Church in rural Berkeley County, I felt it special. When I became board chair of Preservation South Carolina in 2021, and with a love of our state’s rural and historic churches, my mind snapped to Taveau. Is it still standing? Could it be preserved? Knowing its essential history—it was built by Martha Caroline Swinton Ball Taveau (Barbara’s great-great-great-grandmother!) in 1835 as a Presbyterian church, only to convert to use by Black Methodists after she died in 1847, I returned to Taveau. What I saw made me sick. This essential piece of Black, Cooper River history, built on land that was once owned by Henry Laurens and the Ball family, was about to collapse. Not acceptable. How can you tell the history of this area, once 80% Black, without a Black landmark?

The Post & Courier even wrote its requiem.

But in June 2022, when I happened to connect with Cynthia Gibbs (Post & Courier video), we managed to do what seemed impossible: To not just preserve this monument to Black history, but to have it take its rightful place in this Sacred Corridor. On this isolated stretch of land along the Cooper River there are but three places to visit, all sacred, including Mepkin Abbey, Taveau Church, and Strawberry Chapel (long associated with the Ball family). And each of the entities I have mentioned, wish to see this Black church restored, and create a Sacred Corridor for today, and tomorrow.

Well, no more of my words—if you have a second, you might enjoy these two short unedited videos that I shot at Mepkin Abbey on Sunday night. In the first, Father Joe, Mepkin’s acting Abbot, is sharing the importance of Taveau to the local Black community. In the second, the Black community sings one of their traditional songs. This is South Carolina at its best.