Two days before Thanksgiving worked out well for a visit to the ACE Basin, the Lowcountry treasure of vast wilderness and wildlife. With the Donnelley and Bear Island state nature preserves closed for seasonal hunting I made the 50-mile drive to the Ernest F. Hollings National Wildlife Refuge, which prohibits hunting.
This refuge near Hollywood and Meggett was established in 1990. It consists of 11,815 acres. The ACE in ACE Basin stands for three rivers- the Ashepoo, Combahee and Edisto that run and drain through a protected system of 350,000 acres representing one of the largest undeveloped wetland ecosystems remaining on America’s East Coast. Ernest Hollings (1922-2019) of Charleston was a longtime and colorful political figure as a South Carolina governor and U.S. senator. Among the features is the Grove Plantation house that was built in 1828 by George Washington Morris (1799-1834), grandson of Lewis Morris, a signer of the Declaration of Independence. The late Federal-style structure is one of the few antebellum mansions in the region to survive the Civil War. Today it serves as offices for U.S. Fish and Wildlife staffers who maintain the vast property.
The front of the house faces toward the Edisto River. Back then the river was a key mode of transportation and transport so when friends, family, or business associates arrived by boat they would see the front of the home.
