The Peronneaus: First and Gratest of Everything?!

Henry Peronneau
via findagrave.com

Henry Peronneau. As I was scrolling through findagrave.com, I came across this man and his family and I was surprised about what I found! 

He came from France and combines almost everything I learned in the FYE-class, so it is a perfect final research post! So enjoy as I will lead you through his life!

Henry Peronneau was born on May 28^th, 1667 in Rochel in France, as I read in the book Historic Gravestone Art in Charleston, South Carolina. He immigrated to Charleston in the summer of 1687, at a time when a lot of French Huguenots fled to America after the French King revoked their religious right in their country. 

John Mood - He Must Not Be Forgotten

Rev. John Mood green-wood.com

Rev. John Mood. A name I have never heard before but just seeing the picture of his silver cutlery got me excited right away! I had seen it so many times before!

I see this kind of decoration on silverware called “French Thread Pattern” basically every day. In my home country Germany, it is a very common type of flatware and can be found in many households and we have it at our house as well! 

Cutlery in French Thread Pattern
Left: John Mood marks4antiques.com
Right: From My Home

Surprisingly, there actually is a connection between John Mood and Germany as I found out on findagrave.com. His father Johan Peter Muth emigrated from Germany Württemberg Westphalia in 1750. He was a silversmith and became significant with his work in Charleston as well. Later, his two sons John Mood and Peter Mood Jr. learning this craft from him and took over his business.

Under the name of Mood & Sons, John did not only sell silverware but also created slave badges. I found this out reading a very informative post about the Mood brothers, shared as a contribution for Black History Month. They made all slave badges for the years 1832 and 1835 for just a little extra money.

Slave Tag Made By John Mood
green-wood.com

As the post explained, every slave with an owner had to always wear one of these batches visible, otherwise, they would get arrested and had to pay fines.

But this is not the only connection between John Mood and the black population of Charleston at that time!

Even though John Mood was born a Lutheran, he converted to Methodism and became a Methodist minister, as the post let me know. During that time, slaves and the black population overall were segregated and suppressed in every way; they were not allowed to write and read. However, the Methodist church was against this doing and so was John Mood!

The post further explained that he fought against the suppression by breaking the strict laws of South Carolina helping the black community. He taught black people how to read and write and even built a Sunday school for black people in 1832. He ran it by himself and continued to do so despite threats! 

The post even expanded further, telling a little story of how John Mood and his son managed to buy a slave to supposedly set him free after he did “the secret Masonic sign of distress”.

J. Mood´s Ledger
findagrave.com

It can be seen how much he fought for the good. Knowing that he stood up for the black community in Charleston is something special and I think it even makes his silverware a little bit more special as well. 

His firm even went bankrupt after an employee robbed it in 1841, as I found out reading an entry of the Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts. But John Mood built it back up by himself while his brother went to New York to start a new life there.  

Today he is buried at the Bethel Unitel Methodist Church Cemetery. 

I think it is nice to see that he and his actions have not been completely forgotten yet, at least in small parts. Especially the post about him and his brother as a contribution to Black History Month shows his influence and he certainly deserves this kind of recognition!

Little Video On My Research Process

The History Of My Great-Grandfather

Left to Right: Wife Elli née Steinhagen,
Daughter Inge Ortmann, William Worthey

Finding something out about your ancestors is something very special. You do not just get to know your family better, you also get an insight into history. You get to know how your family or one person of it lived ages ago, during a different time under different circumstances.

In my case, I got to know the life of my great grandfather William Worthey, the father of my grandmother Inge Marianne Ortmann née Worthey. I have not really heard much about my grandparent

´s life and certainly not about their parent´s life. Reading this blog, you will also get to know why no one ever really liked to talk about this history.

Where A Gravestone Meets A Campus

Memorial at Cougar Mall

Students of the College of Charleston, including me, walk by the Cougar Mall in between Robert Scott Small Building and Maybank Hall probably at least once a week.

And even though we all would say that we are very familiar with that place, I could guess that pretty much no one realized the gravestone standing there alone. So what does a Gravestone have to do on a college campus?

Grave Symbols And Their Meaning

Gravestones are something we seem to only know a little bit about. We know that they are in each graveyard, some look alike, some are simple, and others are very extravagant. We know that they will tell us the name and the dates of birth and death of the deceased.
But beyond this regular seeming information, they are also often decorated with beautiful carvings of symbols! And today we are going to find out what a few of these symbols mean!

Old Bethel Church

For this research, we visited the Bethel United Methodist Church Graveyard on 57 Pitts St. After taking a closer look at the history, I was surprised at what I found!

The first church in this place was a wooden church build in 1797. Only 55 years later it got relocated westwards for the new and bigger sanctuary we see today.
Astonishingly, in 1882 the wooden church got moved again, all the way to the other side of the street! To be found on 222 Calhoun Street, it is now known as Old Bethel Church.

Bethel United Methodist Church

History of Circular Congregational Church

Circular Congregational Church

Additionally to my post about my favorite churches here in Charleston, my group members and I also did some more research about the Circular Congregational Church on 150 Meeting Street. It was quite interesting to find out more about the history and graveyard of the church. So if you are interested in learning a little bit more about this church as well, just check out the blog post of my group member!