"Lancaster County and its county seat of Lancaster were named for Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. The county was formed in 1785, and it was originally part of Camden District. A part of Lancaster County was removed in 1791 to form Kershaw County. Scotch-Irish settlers from Pennsylvania began moving into this upstate region in the 1750s. The Waxhaws settlement on the border with North Carolina was thebirthplace of President Andrew Jackson (1767-1845). During the Revolutionary War British Lt. Col. Banastre Tarleton earned his nickname of "Bloody" Tarleton by massacring American troops in this area on May 29, 1780; the battle of Hanging Rock was also fought in the county later the same year. Although Lancaster County has been primarily agricultural, gold mining began there in the 1820s and textile manufacturing sprang up following the Civil War. Governor and U. S. Senator Stephen Decatur Miller (1787-1838), surgeon J. Marion Sims (1813-1883), industrialist Elliott White Springs (1896-1959), and astronaut Charles M. Duke, Jr. were all Lancaster County residents."

South Carolina State Library

University of South Carolina
South Caroliniana Library
University South Caroliniana Society
Manuscript Collections

Two manuscripts, 1754 and 1807, relating to site of Waxhaw Presbyterian Church, consisting of the original North Carolina colonial plat surveyed in 1754 and also the 1807 Lancaster County deed for an additional 4½ acres of land purchased by Waxhaw Presbyterian Church.

The original North Carolina colonial plat documents John Barnet's 599 acres surveyed in 1754. In 1757, Barnet deeded the land to Robert Miller [and wife Jean Pickens], minister of Waxhaw Church. On 9 March 1758, Miller conveyed from his 599 acre holdings the 4½ acres tract of land on with the Presbyterian Meeting House stood to the trustees of the Congregation of the Waxhaws "for the good will & affection...& every of their greater advantages & conveniency in attending upon divine worship at all stated or occasional times...conform[able] to the practice of the Church of Scotland." The original Anson County, N.C., deed was signed by Andrew Pickens as one of the witnesses. [filed as P -- John Barnet -- 1754]

Waxhaw is reputed to be the oldest Presbyterian church in upper South Carolina. It had a meeting house in use as early as 1755. The diary of an itinerant preacher recorded that date, and Thomas Sumter's correspondence later documented that in 1781 the British army burned the original building.

On 23 December 1807, the trustees of the Waxhaw Congregation purchased an additional 4½ acres adjoining the original tract from Robert Thompson. This conveyance, recorded in Lancaster, S.C., was for the use of the Congregation "they remaining and being in Profusion of the principles and Doctrines and Practice...agreeably to the Rules prescribed and established by the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church in the United States." [Filed as Pob — Robert Thompson — 23 Dec. 1807]

By the early 1800s, boundary line commissioners had established that the church property was in South Carolina, not North Carolina.

*This entry corrected as per letter, 11 Aug. 1997, from donor which included an additional letter-sized plat, 17 Oct. 1806, of the additional 4.5 acres purchased in 1807 (filed with Robert Thompson manuscript).
[Revised Feb. 2003 and corrects description as it appears in the printed program, p. 48].