Judge John Faucheraud Grimke started building this house in 1815 at which time he was living at 321 East Bay Street with his many children; Grimke is the father of the famous abolitionist sisters, Sarah and Angelina Grimke. However, it appears that the Grimkes never lived at 95 Rutledge. Grimke sold it to Thomas Bannister Seabrook who completed the construction around 1826.

Tom Seabrook was a wealthy cotton planter from Edisto Island; his plantation house there, called “Sea Cloud”, burned around 1940. The ruins of Sea Cloud are now part of the Botany Bay Preserve on Edisto.

Seabrook built an earlier townhouse at 104 Rutledge Avenue; this section of Charleston was especially popular for sea island cotton planters from Edisto to build their townhouses. In a post several months ago, I wrote about the mansion at 94 Rutledge Avenue which was built by Isaac Jenkins Mikell, another wealthy planter from Edisto.

95 Rutledge is an example of a Charleston single house (one room wide, two rooms deep). There are three and one-half floors, totaling over 4000 square feet. The house has been modified with the first floor currently converted into an apartment, and there is a kitchen house dependency in the back. The exterior is stucco over brick with decorative molding around the pediment. The interior retains fine federal style mantlepieces; one in particular has the eagle in the center, a patriotic motif used after the Revolutionary war.

Tom Seabrook was the great grandson of Robert Seabrook from Dunstable, England. Robert was in Charles Town by 1680 and later owned and sold Lot 159 which became part of the graveyard of St. Michael’s Episcopal Church at the Four Corners of Law.

In 1989 my friend, John Bennett, owned 95 Rutledge. John was the grandson of John Bennett, one of the founders of the “Charleston Renaissance” (a cultural renaissance between the two World Wars) and author of Master Skylark and various short stories of the Gullah culture. John graciously offered me the opportunity to have my first art exhibition at his home because of my Edisto and Seabrook heritage. While not a direct descendent of Tom Seabrook, I am a direct descendent of his great grandfather Robert. Thanks to John, 95 Rutledge was a special venue to launch my first reception and art exhibition in March 1989!

Next week, we continue exploring Charleston through her structures.