October 12, 2025 • 50 mins
For over 180 years, a 200 acre plot of land was home to the South Carolina State Hospital that went through many name changes. Intent on being a humane way to treat and house the mentally ill, it was for some the last stop before a cruel death. We will examine testimony, stories from former employees and patients, give an overview of the history, and the cruelty that occurred in the heart of our capitol city.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
For over three hundred and fifty years, the state of
South Carolina has been the setting for some of the
most horrendous crimes ever committed. Some have gained global notoriety,
some have been forgotten, and others have been swept under
the rug completely. Now, two South Carolina natives and true
(00:25):
crime enthusiasts have teamed up to examine these heinous acts
in detail, giving their perspective of the evil that has
resided in the Palmetto State. You're listening to Carolina Crimes.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
And welcome back to Carolina Crimes, episode two forty three.
I'm one of your hosts, Matt Hyres, along.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
With Danielle Myers, and we're over the.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Moon thrill that you joined us here for this episode
of Carolina Crimes. A full moon this week, Yeah, chicanery.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
Going on that It's been a weird week for a
lot of people.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
And I'm like, there's was it a supermoon?
Speaker 2 (01:08):
I think so. Yeah. We saw the high tides down
in the lower part of the state, especially around Fripp Island.
Saw some pictures of that. I don't know if you
got to set those on the family group chat or not,
but I did not. YEA lots of intermittent flooding, and
I don't think any damage was done, but in those
low lying areas, I know that can be a pain
(01:29):
from having to go gone to school down in Charleston.
I know anytime it rains real hard, you're gonna have
some water backing up on the streets, backing up everywhere.
But thank you for joining us here this week. Thank
you for surviving the full moon or super moon or
whatever we call it, but I saw it a couple
of times. Beautiful, beautiful out there this week. Thank you
(01:50):
so much for all your feedback from last week's episode,
episode two for two with Julian Williams and just a horrific,
horrific tale. It was a man that was taking advantage
of Yea and.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
I described it.
Speaker 4 (02:04):
We kind of determined it could be like a cautionary
tale of talking to but it's still just.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
It was, Yeah, no fault of his own, but you've
got to be wary of people and their intentions and
going somewhere without telling anybody really where you're going. But
that was that was horrific. And still praying for his family.
That's that's awful. This week, we're gonna do a little
something special for October, as we usually do, We're gonna
(02:35):
have a couple of these. I think next week's episode,
Danielle's already kind of clued me in, and that's gonna
be one that revolves around Halloween and spooky season as well.
But before we get started, just wanted to say you
take care of a little bit of housekeeping, as we
always do. If you're not already following us on social media,
check us out over on Facebook at Carolina Crimes Podcast.
(02:58):
Also over on Twitter at sc crimes pod. If you're
looking to support the show, you can do so for free,
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us a five star review. If you're looking listening to
us on Apple iTunes or Apple Podcasts, you can throw
us a five star review. Mash that purple subscribe button
and write a little something you like about the show.
(03:20):
We're gonna have some very special thank yous at the
end of the show, actually some personal thank yous people
that I ran into. I ran into actually two spouses, okay,
and they came up and they were like, hey, you
do that crime podcast. I was like, yes, I do.
You need to listen to it? And they're like oh,
our wife's love it and big fans and ran into
them with all my getting out and about town this week.
(03:42):
So thank you, thank you. We'll give those special thank yous. Also,
the weather is getting cooler. As Danielle noticed today, I
have pants on.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
Yeah, yes, well you usually long pants.
Speaker 3 (03:55):
Okay, I say, can you clarify that usually?
Speaker 4 (03:57):
He's always He's kind of like my husband in the senses,
it doesn't matter the temperatures.
Speaker 3 (04:02):
He's always wearing shorts. And I was like, you've got
jeans on today.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
Yeah, well it's comfortable I can wear. I'm in a
position I can wear shorts to work. I enjoy that.
So yeah, I rocked the shorts most of the time
until it gets a little cooler. And I guess with
old age too came up on this week that uh, yeah,
I'm getting cold at I had to put an extra
blanket on the bed. Oh your blood, Ashley said, you're old.
(04:30):
You're old man. So, uh, if you are looking for
some warm weather clothing some hoodies. Looking to support the show,
head on over to Carolina crimestore dot com. We would
greatly appreciate it. So, as I mentioned, this episode is
going to be a little different something special for October,
(04:50):
for the Halloween it's looming here at the end of
the month. And usually we start with the setting, but
the story itself is going to be the setting for
this one. And go ahead and give a little disclaimer
at the beginning. This episode deals with some antiquated ideas,
(05:13):
some antiquated terminology, mainly focusing around mental health and the
setting itself, as I mentioned, is the story it itself
has been a house of horrors for over one hundred
thousand South Carolinians. It's the definition of captivity, place where
(05:42):
countless abuses occurred, home for some of the most terrifying
of South Carolina's criminals, being permanent or temporary, and it's
arguably believed to be one of our state's most haunted locales.
If you believe in that sort of thing, and it's
a place of legend, and where I'm talking about you
(06:05):
figured it out, I can tell by your grin. It's
twenty one hundred Bull Street, the South Carolina State Hospital,
as it was finally named after a couple variations of names,
it was originally called the South Carolina Lunatic Asylum.
Speaker 3 (06:26):
Oh okay, when it was.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
First created, And this is a place that I'd heard
about most of my life. And I watched a little
bit of a documentary on this as well in one
of our local county my County Council when he was
actually on there, and he said, yeah, he said the
same thing. You know, our parents, if we were acting up,
(06:48):
they'd say, hey, we're going to take you to Bull
Street and you're going to straighten up real quick. And
I was like, uh, okay, whatever. I didn't think it
was a real place, kind of like we're going to
send you to Camden Military School. I didn't think that
was a real place either.
Speaker 4 (07:01):
But making stuff or like in my mom, you know,
she would say, you y'all are about to send.
Speaker 2 (07:08):
Me to Bull Street and it we at for.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
A young age.
Speaker 4 (07:13):
I didn't know the specifics of it, but it was
just what we knew about it.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Yes, And so this week we're going to tell you
all about the facility itself. Some of the atrocities that
happened there rather documented or rumored or told through testimony
or interviews. There's very little documentation, of course. Most of
(07:40):
the early documentation has been destroyed from the South Carolina
Lunatic Asylum destroyed by war weather age everything floods then
with hippolaws coming into play, there's not a whole lot.
There's there's some testimony, but we we have gathered together
(08:02):
several stories that paint a picture of exactly what life
was like inside this place. And they are criminal a
lot of the things there. So that's why it's included
in Carolina crimes. We're just not throwing off to throw
one off. Yeah, Well, the asylum concept, it was born
(08:24):
in England in the seventeen nineties, really brought into prominence
by Quakers. The intent of asylums were a place for
humane treatment for the mentally ill, what we call people
with mental health issues now, but they called them insane
(08:45):
or crazy or anything like that. They believed in moral
treatment of folks with mental issues, and they sought that
mental that moral treatment through communication. Well, here in the
state of South Carolina, the South Carolina Lunatic Asylum. It
(09:11):
was the brainchild of a state legislator, a man named
by the name of Samuel Farrow out of Spartanburg, who
was an attorney. Now on his way from Spartanburg to
Columbia for legislative sessions, he would pass almost every time
in the small community. A woman that was tied to
(09:34):
a post outside of home, just screaming what yes, just
screaming at the heavens, screaming at anybody passing by, thrashing
around violently. And if you think about that time we
were talking about the eighteen tens, eighteen teens, the people
(09:59):
that live there, you know, that was probably a sister
or a child that they really didn't know how to handle.
They weren't able to get any work done and be
it in their fields or in their home. Having the
care and watch after what this young lady did.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
And taking care of other children.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
She may be a threat to other children or her
parents or herself. Yeaheah. So as inhumane as it was,
what they were probably doing was putting her out in
the yard. And hey, we got to tie you to
a post.
Speaker 3 (10:41):
It's like how you treat animals or.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
No, you treat animals better than that.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
Well how some people treat animals.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
Now, I don't, Yeah, like put them on a run
or a chain, and I hate him, Yeah, I don't
like them. So this legislature, Samuel Farrow, he made emotion
to make plans for South Carolina's Lunatic Asylum. And they
began to take shape. Construction of the facility itself started
(11:10):
in eighteen twenty one and they commissioned famed architect Robert Mills,
who we've talked about a ton on this show. He
was an architect of several buildings in Washington, d C.
Around the Columbia area. The Mills House, probably the greatest
architect of his time, and he was put in charge
(11:31):
of the design and construction of this mental hospital now
the Lunatic Asylum, I hate saying that, but that's what
it was called back then. It was the second public
and i'm doing air quotes here public asylum to be
built in the United States. The first was in Virginia. Now,
(11:55):
the construction it took place between eighteen twenty one and
eight eight, and that's when the first and most iconic building,
which was named the Mills Building, was constructed. Now, you
think about the skyline, you think about Bull Street as
it used to be, and you remember that twelve sided
(12:18):
dome up on top of one of the buildings that
was kind of the focal point on the skyline of Columbia.
You could see it. And the facility itself was placed
on over two hundred acres.
Speaker 3 (12:32):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
So it was huge and sprawling. And the first time
I saw Bull Street in person was in December and
nineteen eighty nine. I was with a friend and his parents.
They were taking me to a ball game down there,
and they passed just these I mean, it's probably half
a mile of brick fencing, high high brick fences. I'm
(12:55):
talking twelve fourteen feet high. And they were like, oh,
that's Bull Street. And I was like, oh, my god,
the place is real.
Speaker 3 (13:02):
My parents weren't lying.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
Oh, they weren't lying to me, that's yes. And the
concept for the asylum was to be a city within
a city, Okay, so they really wanted to make a
place to live for these people experiencing mental problems. Now,
(13:23):
I said in quotes public earlier, but at first it
was only paying patients that could pay out of pocket,
so some of the aristocracy of the state. And then
they realized that, you know, they're indigent people that need
to be admitted as well, people that can't pay for treatment.
(13:46):
So that's when the government actually started paying for their treatment,
really to get these people that they deemed insane off
the streets. Now, again the public in quotation marks, of course,
it was for only Caucasian people. The first African Americans
(14:08):
and even some slaves began being admitted in eighteen forty
eight into segregated, segregated accommodations. Okay, there is a story
about one man. He was a slave. His name was Anthony,
and Anthony was committed. This is horrible. He was committed
(14:32):
to the South Carolina Lunatic Asylum and around eighteen fifty.
But they didn't really have separate facilities for African Americans.
So what they did was kept him in a shed
out in the yard, just isolated and locked up in
the ship.
Speaker 4 (14:53):
Because anybody with a mental disability, that's going to make
that better by doing that.
Speaker 2 (14:58):
Right, I mean, And again going back to the whole
asylum theory, it was supposed to be humane treatment through communication.
You're not getting not a lot of people visiting the
shed now to give you communication. So that's one of
the first atrocities we're going to talk about with Bull Street.
(15:19):
Fifteen years after that, well really eleven years after that,
the Civil War broke out the area there on Bull Street.
It served as a prisoner of war camp for Union
captives from October of eighteen sixty four through February of
eighteen sixty five when it was liberated by Sherman's capture
(15:41):
of Columbia. The name of the camp camp asylum. If
you've delved any into Civil War history, looked at these
prisoner of war camps. They were notorious for their filth,
for rampant disease, malnourishment at this point in the war.
(16:06):
This was in the waning days. It ended in eighteen
sixty five. So here at the end of eighteen sixty
four beginning of eighteen sixty five, the Confederates were barely
able to feed their own soldiers, much less Union captives
they had here. Several perished while in captivity at this
(16:30):
prisoner of war camp, and it was not a very
nice place to be. I mean, there were way worse
you think about Andersonville and Georgia, but several noted awful
prisoner I don't know of one good prisoner of war camp.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
Oh, I mean, I don't think so.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
But these were borderline concentration camps. Yeah, I mean, if
you think about recent memory. Well, construction after the war
continued at the South Carolina State Hospital for the Insane,
as it was now called the Babcock Building, which became
a center and one of the focal points with the
(17:08):
large pillars in front. It was finally completed in eighteen
eighty five, and it had four phases of construction, again
with the focus on the city within a city concept.
Wards were built where multiple patients, i'll call them patients
(17:30):
and the virtually inmates were kept in these wards. They
all had different classifications of who was housed where they
had the men's wards, the women's wards. But around this
time there was also constructed a crematory on site. Okay
(17:51):
for those that died will end while in the care
of the state.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
There would they those remains not go back to the family. Okay,
some of.
Speaker 2 (18:05):
Them did not want them, and we'll go we'll go
over that a little bit later. But the crematory having
to have one on site, that's that's an omen that
we're going to get into a little bit later. But
we've talked about the history of this place. It obviously
sounds brutal, but now we're going to talk about when
(18:27):
we come back from this quick break, what exactly made
this place so cruel. Okay, and folks will be right
back after this quick word from our sponsors. Hi friends,
(18:47):
Matt Hire's here One of my favorite parts of bringing
you Carolina Crimes each week is spotlighting the many wonderful
towns and communities within our great state. And today I'm
proud to encourage you all to check check out one
of my personal favorites. Rather on a road trip or
a weekend getaway, discover Mullins. Once a vibrant depot town
(19:09):
and the former tobacco capital of South Carolina, Mullins is
a hidden treasure in the PD region. Explore our offerings
by savoring a cup of coffee at our delightful coffee shop,
enjoying lunch at any of our charming restaurants, visiting Old
Brick Square, and shopping at our quaint retail stores, which
include an antique market located in a repurposed tobacco warehouse.
(19:33):
Your visit would not be complete without a stop at
the South Carolina Tobacco Museum, situated in the historic train
depot in downtown Mullens, South Carolina. Here you can explore
various exhibits such as models of tobacco plants at each
growth stage, a blacksmith shop, a log tobacco barn filled
with cure tobacco, a farmhouse kitchen, showcasing vintage equipment and
(19:57):
a photo gallery highlighting contemporary tobacco practices. The Mullins Room
honors our town's origins and its swift growth driven by
the railroad and the tobacco industry. Additionally, in late June
twenty twenty five, the Reverend Daniel Simmons Museum will open
its doors to the public. Within the Tobacco Museum, Reverend
(20:18):
Simmons was one of the victims of the Mother Emmanuel
nine tragedy, and he spent his childhood in Mullins and
worked in its tobacco warehouses. Thanks to a generous loan
from his daughter Rose, we will exhibit many of his
personal belongings, including his beloved Bible. The documentary of his life,
One Last Breath, will be continuously streamed in the museum.
(20:40):
Rather it's for a road trip or a weekend getaway,
Mullins is a perfect place to visit and a place
to call home. Visit Mullins, South Carolina, and welcome back
(21:17):
to Carolina Crimes Episode two forty three. In this special
episode about one of the most horrific settings in the
state of South Carolina, and that's Bull Street. The South
Carolina State Hospital it's called the South Carolina State Lunatic
Asylum in the early days, south Carolina State Hospital for
(21:38):
the insane, and then finally the South Carolina State Hospital
before it had to close its doors. Now, before we
left off of the break, we were talking about the
awful conditions in this place. Now. Of course, the intentions
were good when the bill was passed to start construction
on the place, but soon it became over routed, it
(22:01):
became underfunded, and cruel tactics were put into place in
place of treatment by communication and moral treatment and therapy.
Speaker 4 (22:13):
Yeah, really trying to get to the root of problem.
And I was thinking about this. So we've talked about
this before, where people anything, especially a long time ago,
anything that was deemed different than what everyone should do
is was considered you know, abnormal or.
Speaker 3 (22:30):
Something was wrong with you, whether it be you have
I guess what's now, like add or something.
Speaker 4 (22:35):
But it's like, well, you're acting a little bit differently
than everybody else.
Speaker 3 (22:39):
Were there people that.
Speaker 4 (22:40):
Were committed here off of that basis that probably didn't
genuinely have Oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:45):
Okay, oh and we'll get into that. One's a horrible story. Okay,
but sorry, you kind of think too, and I guess
I'm playing devil's advocate here. The people in the eighteen
hundreds didn't know, they don't know what we know now.
They didn't have the different brain study, the different you know,
mental health studies. I'm no physician, I'm no psychiatrist or
(23:08):
anything like that. But they didn't know what to do
with folks like that. They didn't know how to help. Yeah,
and they they did the best they could, which was
an actuality more harm than good. We'll talk about the
early patients first. At the facility. They were subjected to
(23:32):
restraints rather strapped to gurnees, beds, chained to the walls, chairs.
They were also subjected to induced vomiting to try to
heal them, electro shock therapy.
Speaker 4 (23:51):
Maybe like get out this bad quote unquote demon that's
in you.
Speaker 2 (23:57):
Or maybe this will make you feel better or act better.
Blood letting was a practice like having them bleed out,
kind of like with leeches and that you hear about those.
Speaker 4 (24:09):
Isn't there something that they did I don't want to
say like medieval times, but kind of in that area
where you would like someone got a sickness and they
didn't know how to heal it so they would be like, oh, well,
you need to bleed it out. Yeah, and they ultimately
died from blood loss.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
Yeah, yeah, they did bleed out. But blood letting was
a common practice here. Also isolation. Folks were left in
dark rooms, sometimes for a month or more. There was
an account by one of the early patients. Her name
was Mary Austen, and this sentence it strikes me, but
(24:48):
one of the excerpts of what she wrote, she said,
my poor weak, shattered nerves are truly harassed and tortured
by being in a madhouse. I would rather suffer the
most excruciating death than to be confined here.
Speaker 3 (25:07):
Wow, so.
Speaker 2 (25:09):
Pretty serious. I don't think with the amount of people
that were put in there, some of the conditions that
these people may have been experiencing, like what we know
today is to be schizophrenia mm hm, you know, bipolar,
maybe Tourette syndrome. You think about the noise factor, the shouting,
(25:30):
the the manic episodes that some people may have.
Speaker 4 (25:34):
And they have these like sensory issues where it's like
it could be a lot of noise creates, right, you know,
these things to come up in you and you probably
do need to be not out in a public area
where there's a bunch of people screaming.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
And if you're in these wards with so many other patients,
you're not going to get any sleep. And then sleep
deprivation leads to more mental problems, more you know, I
guess impatience with other people, and then by hallucinating, right,
it just starts compounding and getting worse and worse. Now
(26:12):
at the facility able bodied patients, they were used for labor,
for landscaping, for laundry, and for any general manual labor
that they had around that needed to be done. That
really the employees they didn't have time for. I mean,
I hate to keep kind of taking their side, but
(26:34):
you got two hundred acres to take care of, you know,
you understanding all these yeah, all these patients to take
care of in their needs, you're gonna need a little
bit of help and say, hey, you know this guy,
he's okay eighty percent of the time. You know, he
he behaves like we think he should behave Hey, man,
you help us out with some laundry. At least get
(26:55):
out of your cell, get a change of scenery or
out of your ward and get a change the scenery.
And more than will to do it absolutely. As you
mentioned before, not all patients at this facility were mentally ill,
and this is horrible. We're going to talk about a
ten year old boy named Samuel Abel. He's gonna come
(27:19):
up later in the story too. This is in the
eighteen hundreds, late eighteen hundreds. His mother died early, his father.
They lived in Lexington County. His father was a veteran.
But you see, Samuel, he was a little boy that
(27:41):
was born with a cleft palate. As we're all aware,
that's a abnormality in the roof of your mouth, your lip.
He wasn't able to speak well, of course, due to
his condition, and he placed in the South Carolina Hospital for.
Speaker 4 (28:04):
The Insane, even for I would say, a speech impediment
off of a yes, you know, a birth abnormality.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
Yes. Again, his only sin was that he couldn't speak well,
his only symptom, I should say. He was described as
a mischievous, normal ten year old boy. He ended up
dying at the facility. Uh, never got to go home.
(28:36):
And this was right around the turn of the century,
in the nineteen hundreds.
Speaker 4 (28:41):
And how scary that had that would that have to be? Yeah,
just being taken from your home and put into this
facility with adults who probably not all but most have
legit issues. And you don't have your parents, right, you
don't know. Yeah, I mean that had been terrifying.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
I like that. They said he was just a mischievous.
Speaker 3 (29:06):
Like every other boy.
Speaker 2 (29:08):
Every other ten year old boy, but he was put
into this asylum. Others were put into the asylum for
personal revenge or financial gain. There was a film that
came out a few years ago. It was entitled Bull
(29:28):
Street by a lady named Lynn Dale, and I encourage
everybody to take a look at that. The film is fictional,
but it was really based the exact story concept on
her great grandmother. She is here from the Upstate around
this area. Now Lynn's great grandmother. She had a dispute
(29:50):
with a local sheriff who in turn said, uh, yeah,
this lady is insane. We need to go ahead and
have her comedmitted to the state.
Speaker 4 (30:00):
Hospital because a sane person wouldn't talk back, that's right,
wouldn't argue with.
Speaker 2 (30:06):
The law, or a sane late And they were African American,
and a sane African American Lane would never talk to
a sheriff that way. So let's go ahead and have
her put in the hospital, which in turn resulted in
her property being taken, seized and sold at sheriff sales.
Speaker 3 (30:25):
So that's convenient.
Speaker 2 (30:29):
Yeah, But there were several stories like that about family
members with aging heirs getting their wills changed. Then all
of a sudden, I think they have what nowadays be
dementia or maybe Alzheimer's, and well, we were gonna have
to commit them. They can no longer, they are no
longer a sound mind, they cannot change their will. And huh,
(30:49):
guess what. They left everything to me.
Speaker 4 (30:51):
And I'm not a doctor, but I am in my
right to make this termination.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
Yes, yes, and let's go ahead and have mom or
dad or grandma and dad. Let's go ahead and have
them committed. That's what's best. Yes. So overcrowding in the
state hospital here it accelerated deaths. The population at some
(31:16):
points grew close to eight thousand. It was not it
was way over capacity. I could never get a good
handle on exactly what they said capacity was at certain
years in the nineteen sixties, it was sixty six hundred
at one point. But the disturbing point is the patients
(31:38):
there had a thirty percent mortality rate every year. Wow,
meaning thirty percent of the patients in their care died.
Speaker 3 (31:53):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
We talked about the lack of staffing, it being under funded,
and we're talking about this asylum and you say, well,
you know, maybe it's due to abuse. All those people
were abuse. No, it wasn't. The main cause of death
was due to disease, in particular a disease called polagra.
(32:21):
I had never heard of this.
Speaker 3 (32:23):
I have not.
Speaker 2 (32:25):
Uh, polagra is a lack of vitamin B three or
niosin Okay, And I was like, well, am I getting
enough nias? And what hasn't got a research? Now do
I have this? I am a web MD whore. I mean,
I am all about it. But I was like, I
(32:45):
might have some palagra myself.
Speaker 4 (32:46):
You're you're the spokesperson for the doctors when they say
do not google your symptoms, and that's like, I.
Speaker 3 (32:53):
Will be doing that.
Speaker 2 (32:54):
So vitamin B three and niosin it comes from meat, lagoons, nuts,
the needs, whole grains, eggs, milk. I'll get plenty of that.
So I think I think I'm in the clear. But
what this did? This disease pelagra? The symptoms where it
started with diarrhea, skin discoloration. Get this. One of the
(33:21):
major symptoms was mental confusion and dementia. So due to
their malnourishment, the patients huh, exhibited malnourishment or I'm sorry,
mental confusion and dementia, which later compounded. You know, Oh,
they really do need to belong They do belong here,
(33:43):
but you're not feeding them. Well that's why.
Speaker 4 (33:45):
Chances are and chances are you they would they wouldn't
be having this mental confusion if they had a proper
diet right right, medicines correct.
Speaker 2 (33:55):
And then eventually pelagra leads to multi organ failure, which
is a very cruel gest So the crematory came into
play quite a bit back in those days. And like
I said, thirty percent of the patients died every year
at Bull Street. In the early nineteen hundreds, they dropped
(34:19):
the insane part of the hospital name and they changed
it to the South Carolina State Hospital. The wards. There
was a former nurse that was interviewed. She said, a
ward was for those patients we kept under medication or sedation.
She said, a ward was your zombies, ones that would
(34:43):
just sit in chairs stare at the wall. Twenty four
to seven not speak. Yeah, yes, Ward C was kind
of for the rowdy bunch. They had chain link fencing
from Florida Sea and it wasn't really a ward. It
(35:03):
was more of a collection of cells the hospital touted,
which is very false. They said, you know, we've heard
about the cruel and unusual tactics of lobotomies and sterilization
(35:24):
of patients and some of these asylums, and we do
none of that. Well, for those of you that don't know,
a lobotomy, it's the removal of the frontal lobe of
your brain. That frontal lobe. It controls your thinking, your memory,
your self control, and your motor control. So they really
want to complete and utter control over these folks that
(35:46):
these lobotomies were performed on. But again the state hospital said,
we don't do that.
Speaker 4 (35:50):
It sounds like it would they it would turn those
people into the a where it's the zombies.
Speaker 2 (35:55):
Correct, that was the that was the intent. Now, well,
the nurse that was interviewed her just went by nurse mclamb.
She was a nurse in the fifties, sixties, maybe early seventies.
That timeline wasn't clear, but she said that whole no lobotomy.
Thing was complete and utter bs. She witnessed lobotomies. There
(36:18):
were lobotomy chairs there with restraints that they had them
sitting up in when these doctors operated and removed portions
of the patient's brains. She told a story about a
female patient, and this is one that I'll share. This
lady she was able to go out on the yard,
(36:42):
walk around. I don't know if it's called the yard.
It's kind of like prison terms, but able to go
outside the building. One spring, she found a frog. For
reasons unknown, she wanted to bring the frog back inside
with her. She knew it was not allowed, so she
put the frog into her body cavity. The frog died.
(37:09):
It was discovered by physicians who got it out and
they said, okay, this is definitely not normal. What we
need to do. Sign you you need to get a
lobotomy right now. So they went ahead and performed that
on her. Nurse mclamb also said there was a woman
that was put in isolation for misbehavior for a night,
(37:35):
but the nurses forgot about her and she was left
there for over a week and when they finally remembered
or went to put someone else in that isolation cell
she had perished.
Speaker 4 (37:47):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (37:50):
There's a multitude of allegations against the staff, against doctors,
physical abuse, folks being restrained, possible sexual abuse, and questions
as time went on, started to arise about Bull Street
(38:11):
in the seventies and in the early eighties. In nineteen
eighty three, State Senator Arthur Revenel, who the bridge is
named after in Charleston, he decided he was going to
organize a visit to this place. You know, he had
heard enough. I need to check this out with my
own eyes. And you would think with a state senator
(38:32):
coming to check you out, I don't think it was unannounced.
But he saw first hand abuse. He saw the botomy chairs,
he saw teens strapped down, as young as the age
of twelve, strapped to their beds, screaming for help, just
awful stuff. And what he saw there it spurred a
(38:55):
state level hearing in nineteen eighty five. And we're going
to take a short break and come back and continue
with exactly the fate and what's going on now at
the site of the old South Carolina Let's see South
Carolina Lunatic Asylum South Carolina or State Hospital for the
(39:15):
insane and finally, the State Hospital of South Carolina. Folks
will be right back after this quick word from our sponsors,
and welcome back to Carolina Crimes episode two forty three,
(39:38):
about the South Carolina State Hospital, one of the most
atrocious places in the history of the state of South Carolina.
Really we talked about right before the break, how some
questions started to be raised, Investigations were brought up, and
in nineteen eighty five at the state level, the State
(39:59):
of South Carolina said we need to look into this place,
and they heard from Senator Arthur Ravenel. He testified about
the abuse that was going on there, the conditions that
the Bull Street facility they put forth, and I could
not find any criminal charges that were filed, but reforms
(40:24):
that were ordered to be The more that reforms came up,
the more society started looking at these asylums and saying,
you know this, this may have been considered humane in
the eighteen twenties, but in the nineteen eighties nineteen nineties,
it is not. They slowly started to chip away and
(40:45):
start closing down sections. Eventually, in the late nineteen nineties,
the facility itself as the State Hospital of South Carolina
did close. The buildings were then used for impatient services
by the South Carolina State Department of Mental Health. Other
(41:08):
buildings on the two hundred acre campus were used for storage.
Everything really started closing down. The state said, okay, we
need to clean this place up. And around twenty fourteen
is when everything really ceased well. The place started to
(41:30):
stay abandoned, vacant. It was a place of legend and
lore for lukie loose who wanted.
Speaker 3 (41:39):
To go in, especially at night.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
Oh yeah, and I mean I admit I was one
of those teenagers young adults that liked the spooky stuff
and oh let's I never went there, but I could
see how kids were like, Okay, let's go check it out.
Let's see if we hear a ghost.
Speaker 3 (41:58):
Or see anything.
Speaker 4 (42:00):
Walk on the grounds and like a group of friends,
like you dare someone to go in?
Speaker 2 (42:04):
Like I dare you, Yeah, tar, you go on that building.
Or maybe people want to sneak in there and take
the devil's lettuce or something like that, you know, just
to get somewhere where nobody was around. But that always
leads to chicanery and people making some poor decisions. The
state it started to sell off parcels of the land,
(42:27):
and in January of twenty twenty one, one hundred percent
of the facility had been sold to private investors, so
it no longer belonged to the state. Now it is
a various uses. Yeah, where Bull Street used to be,
(42:48):
and we'll get into that. But going back to its
sitting vacant. In twenty twenty, there was a very noteworthy
fire at the Babcock building. Of course, it was trespasser
that went into there set fire to the building. Actually
the shell and the facades still stayed intact. And uh,
(43:12):
it was made into apartment homes.
Speaker 3 (43:15):
No, m I thank you.
Speaker 2 (43:20):
I don't want to get sued by the owner. And
I'm sure they're very fine apartments, but that's where you're living.
Speaker 3 (43:28):
I'm not interested in being a tenant.
Speaker 2 (43:30):
Yes, while the vacant property stayed there. Of course, we
mentioned the extreme vandalization, and there are videos on YouTube
go or one dude flew a drone over the place
and that was that was kind of spooky but cool
looking at it from an aerial view. But people would
break into their trustpass, spray paint everything, stupid stuff, cus words, whatever.
(43:56):
But while it's set empty, some of the reports that
came back, and this ties into October spooky season. They
said on several accounts say to hear disembodied screams, they
would hit cold spots if you look at any of them,
the ghost hunter shows in any of that atmospheric pressure
(44:18):
changes shadow figures. And one of the most recurring reports
was of a woman that went by the name of Mary.
She is allegedly a patient that died in the eighteen
fifties and she appears as rather a mist. And several
(44:38):
reports have come forth, I mean from several different sources
at different times, saying it was a full body apparition.
Now where the South Carolina State Hospital sat, it's home
to Segra Park, home of the Columbia fire Flies. There
(45:01):
last weekend, uh Page, Ellington Park, Merrill Garden's Senior living
facility is there, Tupelo Honey, Iron City Brewing, and even
even a Starbucks now sits on this land.
Speaker 3 (45:17):
And there's a public hope.
Speaker 2 (45:19):
I don't know what that means.
Speaker 4 (45:20):
It's like a tex Mex restaurant right by Sacred Part,
kind of like.
Speaker 2 (45:24):
A fancy Chipotle. Yes, okay, sounds exactly right. And of
course the Babcock building still stands. It was burned, gutted
and made into these apartments. In the future, Uh, the
University of South Carolina would like to see their health
sciences campus move to that location as well. Now we're
(45:46):
going to go back to the young man Samuel Abel
we talked about, Okay, and we're going to tie a
bow on this. There's a foundation called Abel South Carolina
that has been formed in his memory, along with the
memory of all the other patients that could have perished
or been wrongfully imprisoned here. And what they're doing is
(46:10):
trying to get a museum. Really, the South Carolina State
Hospital Museum continue tributes of the to the former patients,
to tell their stories and to bring to light some
of the awful things that happened there. And of course,
Able South Carolina is named for ten year old Samuel Abel,
(46:34):
the boy with the cleft palette that was admitted to
the asylum.
Speaker 4 (46:39):
I love that keep his memory alive. And also, yes,
you know, not to sweep anything under the rug. And
you know, I don't know if you've ever seen one
of the shows I.
Speaker 3 (46:52):
Like to watch. Since they've had the series of American
Horror Stories, you heard of it, I've heard of it.
Speaker 4 (46:57):
Okay, the very first one is called asylum, and it
makes me think a lot about this where it's like
headed up by nuns and they help these people who
may or may not have legit mental issues, and a
place where everybody thinks it's good, and there's people who
are being mistreated. They have a crematorium on site, they
(47:19):
have lobotomies that are performed, people are strapped down.
Speaker 3 (47:23):
So there is.
Speaker 4 (47:25):
That's exactly a lot of it that I think is
based in reality, and it's just it's interesting because that's
that's what it made me think about.
Speaker 2 (47:35):
Yeah, well, it was certainly an awful place. I mean,
if there were sounds like tons of criminal charges could
have occurred here, but again some may have, but they
weren't brought to light. They weren't in records. Of course,
a lot of documentation has been rather destroyed or swept
under the rug from this place. But the ghost factor,
(47:58):
the horrific things that went on here that I thought
it was worth covering here, especially this month. Well, we
appreciate you listening to us, appreciate you listening to this one.
We want to say thank you to several people, those
that went over to Carolina crimestore dot com got some
sweet swag. Thank you to Madison Bowlin, Christy Vinson, and
Jaden Howell. Also thank you to those that went over
(48:21):
on Apple iTunes or Apple Podcast through us a five
star review and subscribed. Thank you to d W Drummer
Brad e Oh we got a soft spot for drummers.
My brother, your cousin, or your husband. Not my brother,
my brother, your husband. Quite the drummer all region timpany
(48:44):
action going on. Thank you to s Rabin four four two.
To Sarah Margaret Porter. Quite the impressive young lady. I
think it's the same Sarah Margaret Porter that I know
her family and I am so proud of her. Went
(49:04):
to Duke University. Just a brilliant young lady. Gonna be
an attorney.
Speaker 3 (49:09):
Oh she's the bomb.
Speaker 2 (49:11):
Thank you Sarah Margaret. If that's still the same Sarah
Margare Reporter, could might not be. Thank you to Salt
Blooded as well. Thank you to Melissa Justice, to Andy Hendrix,
to Ray McDaniel, to Margaret Bailey, Ashley Cato, and a
special special thanks to Kelly Chavis. I got to hang
out with your husband Tuesday night at National Night Out.
(49:33):
He's fantastic. He serves with the Rocky Hill Police Department,
the PIO there, awesome people. She's a teacher, so you
know she's close to my heart. They do yeoman's work
out there, trying to help our young folks. Also, thank
you to Catherine Woolridge. Is that a football game that
i'd finished broadcasting bringing down all the equipment from on
(49:55):
top of the stadium in the press box and her
husband stopped me and said a crime podcast. I said, yeah,
I do, and my wife loves it, and I was like, well,
you should listen to man slapping in your butt. End all,
But thank you to Catherine Woolridge and her husband over
at rock Hill High. Thank you everyone for the birthday
(50:16):
wishes as well this week. I really appreciate it. And
here's to your forty six. Yeah, and until next time,
we'll see you here on Carolina Crimes.
For over three hundred and fifty years, the state of
South Carolina has been the setting for some of the
most horrendous crimes ever committed. Some have gained global notoriety,
some have been forgotten, and others have been swept under
the rug completely. Now, two South Carolina natives and true
(00:25):
crime enthusiasts have teamed up to examine these heinous acts
in detail, giving their perspective of the evil that has
resided in the Palmetto State. You're listening to Carolina Crimes.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
And welcome back to Carolina Crimes, episode two forty three.
I'm one of your hosts, Matt Hyres, along.
Speaker 3 (00:49):
With Danielle Myers, and we're over the.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
Moon thrill that you joined us here for this episode
of Carolina Crimes. A full moon this week, Yeah, chicanery.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
Going on that It's been a weird week for a
lot of people.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
And I'm like, there's was it a supermoon?
Speaker 2 (01:08):
I think so. Yeah. We saw the high tides down
in the lower part of the state, especially around Fripp Island.
Saw some pictures of that. I don't know if you
got to set those on the family group chat or not,
but I did not. YEA lots of intermittent flooding, and
I don't think any damage was done, but in those
low lying areas, I know that can be a pain
(01:29):
from having to go gone to school down in Charleston.
I know anytime it rains real hard, you're gonna have
some water backing up on the streets, backing up everywhere.
But thank you for joining us here this week. Thank
you for surviving the full moon or super moon or
whatever we call it, but I saw it a couple
of times. Beautiful, beautiful out there this week. Thank you
(01:50):
so much for all your feedback from last week's episode,
episode two for two with Julian Williams and just a horrific,
horrific tale. It was a man that was taking advantage
of Yea and.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
I described it.
Speaker 4 (02:04):
We kind of determined it could be like a cautionary
tale of talking to but it's still just.
Speaker 2 (02:11):
It was, Yeah, no fault of his own, but you've
got to be wary of people and their intentions and
going somewhere without telling anybody really where you're going. But
that was that was horrific. And still praying for his family.
That's that's awful. This week, we're gonna do a little
something special for October, as we usually do, We're gonna
(02:35):
have a couple of these. I think next week's episode,
Danielle's already kind of clued me in, and that's gonna
be one that revolves around Halloween and spooky season as well.
But before we get started, just wanted to say you
take care of a little bit of housekeeping, as we
always do. If you're not already following us on social media,
check us out over on Facebook at Carolina Crimes Podcast.
(02:58):
Also over on Twitter at sc crimes pod. If you're
looking to support the show, you can do so for free,
absolutely free. If you're listening on Spotify, you can throw
us a five star review. If you're looking listening to
us on Apple iTunes or Apple Podcasts, you can throw
us a five star review. Mash that purple subscribe button
and write a little something you like about the show.
(03:20):
We're gonna have some very special thank yous at the
end of the show, actually some personal thank yous people
that I ran into. I ran into actually two spouses, okay,
and they came up and they were like, hey, you
do that crime podcast. I was like, yes, I do.
You need to listen to it? And they're like oh,
our wife's love it and big fans and ran into
them with all my getting out and about town this week.
(03:42):
So thank you, thank you. We'll give those special thank yous. Also,
the weather is getting cooler. As Danielle noticed today, I
have pants on.
Speaker 4 (03:51):
Yeah, yes, well you usually long pants.
Speaker 3 (03:55):
Okay, I say, can you clarify that usually?
Speaker 4 (03:57):
He's always He's kind of like my husband in the senses,
it doesn't matter the temperatures.
Speaker 3 (04:02):
He's always wearing shorts. And I was like, you've got
jeans on today.
Speaker 2 (04:06):
Yeah, well it's comfortable I can wear. I'm in a
position I can wear shorts to work. I enjoy that.
So yeah, I rocked the shorts most of the time
until it gets a little cooler. And I guess with
old age too came up on this week that uh, yeah,
I'm getting cold at I had to put an extra
blanket on the bed. Oh your blood, Ashley said, you're old.
(04:30):
You're old man. So, uh, if you are looking for
some warm weather clothing some hoodies. Looking to support the show,
head on over to Carolina crimestore dot com. We would
greatly appreciate it. So, as I mentioned, this episode is
going to be a little different something special for October,
(04:50):
for the Halloween it's looming here at the end of
the month. And usually we start with the setting, but
the story itself is going to be the setting for
this one. And go ahead and give a little disclaimer
at the beginning. This episode deals with some antiquated ideas,
(05:13):
some antiquated terminology, mainly focusing around mental health and the
setting itself, as I mentioned, is the story it itself
has been a house of horrors for over one hundred
thousand South Carolinians. It's the definition of captivity, place where
(05:42):
countless abuses occurred, home for some of the most terrifying
of South Carolina's criminals, being permanent or temporary, and it's
arguably believed to be one of our state's most haunted locales.
If you believe in that sort of thing, and it's
a place of legend, and where I'm talking about you
(06:05):
figured it out, I can tell by your grin. It's
twenty one hundred Bull Street, the South Carolina State Hospital,
as it was finally named after a couple variations of names,
it was originally called the South Carolina Lunatic Asylum.
Speaker 3 (06:26):
Oh okay, when it was.
Speaker 2 (06:27):
First created, And this is a place that I'd heard
about most of my life. And I watched a little
bit of a documentary on this as well in one
of our local county my County Council when he was
actually on there, and he said, yeah, he said the
same thing. You know, our parents, if we were acting up,
(06:48):
they'd say, hey, we're going to take you to Bull
Street and you're going to straighten up real quick. And
I was like, uh, okay, whatever. I didn't think it
was a real place, kind of like we're going to
send you to Camden Military School. I didn't think that
was a real place either.
Speaker 4 (07:01):
But making stuff or like in my mom, you know,
she would say, you y'all are about to send.
Speaker 2 (07:08):
Me to Bull Street and it we at for.
Speaker 3 (07:12):
A young age.
Speaker 4 (07:13):
I didn't know the specifics of it, but it was
just what we knew about it.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Yes, And so this week we're going to tell you
all about the facility itself. Some of the atrocities that
happened there rather documented or rumored or told through testimony
or interviews. There's very little documentation, of course. Most of
(07:40):
the early documentation has been destroyed from the South Carolina
Lunatic Asylum destroyed by war weather age everything floods then
with hippolaws coming into play, there's not a whole lot.
There's there's some testimony, but we we have gathered together
(08:02):
several stories that paint a picture of exactly what life
was like inside this place. And they are criminal a
lot of the things there. So that's why it's included
in Carolina crimes. We're just not throwing off to throw
one off. Yeah, Well, the asylum concept, it was born
(08:24):
in England in the seventeen nineties, really brought into prominence
by Quakers. The intent of asylums were a place for
humane treatment for the mentally ill, what we call people
with mental health issues now, but they called them insane
(08:45):
or crazy or anything like that. They believed in moral
treatment of folks with mental issues, and they sought that
mental that moral treatment through communication. Well, here in the
state of South Carolina, the South Carolina Lunatic Asylum. It
(09:11):
was the brainchild of a state legislator, a man named
by the name of Samuel Farrow out of Spartanburg, who
was an attorney. Now on his way from Spartanburg to
Columbia for legislative sessions, he would pass almost every time
in the small community. A woman that was tied to
(09:34):
a post outside of home, just screaming what yes, just
screaming at the heavens, screaming at anybody passing by, thrashing
around violently. And if you think about that time we
were talking about the eighteen tens, eighteen teens, the people
(09:59):
that live there, you know, that was probably a sister
or a child that they really didn't know how to handle.
They weren't able to get any work done and be
it in their fields or in their home. Having the
care and watch after what this young lady did.
Speaker 3 (10:20):
And taking care of other children.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
She may be a threat to other children or her
parents or herself. Yeaheah. So as inhumane as it was,
what they were probably doing was putting her out in
the yard. And hey, we got to tie you to
a post.
Speaker 3 (10:41):
It's like how you treat animals or.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
No, you treat animals better than that.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
Well how some people treat animals.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
Now, I don't, Yeah, like put them on a run
or a chain, and I hate him, Yeah, I don't
like them. So this legislature, Samuel Farrow, he made emotion
to make plans for South Carolina's Lunatic Asylum. And they
began to take shape. Construction of the facility itself started
(11:10):
in eighteen twenty one and they commissioned famed architect Robert Mills,
who we've talked about a ton on this show. He
was an architect of several buildings in Washington, d C.
Around the Columbia area. The Mills House, probably the greatest
architect of his time, and he was put in charge
(11:31):
of the design and construction of this mental hospital now
the Lunatic Asylum, I hate saying that, but that's what
it was called back then. It was the second public
and i'm doing air quotes here public asylum to be
built in the United States. The first was in Virginia. Now,
(11:55):
the construction it took place between eighteen twenty one and
eight eight, and that's when the first and most iconic building,
which was named the Mills Building, was constructed. Now, you
think about the skyline, you think about Bull Street as
it used to be, and you remember that twelve sided
(12:18):
dome up on top of one of the buildings that
was kind of the focal point on the skyline of Columbia.
You could see it. And the facility itself was placed
on over two hundred acres.
Speaker 3 (12:32):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
So it was huge and sprawling. And the first time
I saw Bull Street in person was in December and
nineteen eighty nine. I was with a friend and his parents.
They were taking me to a ball game down there,
and they passed just these I mean, it's probably half
a mile of brick fencing, high high brick fences. I'm
(12:55):
talking twelve fourteen feet high. And they were like, oh,
that's Bull Street. And I was like, oh, my god,
the place is real.
Speaker 3 (13:02):
My parents weren't lying.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
Oh, they weren't lying to me, that's yes. And the
concept for the asylum was to be a city within
a city, Okay, so they really wanted to make a
place to live for these people experiencing mental problems. Now,
(13:23):
I said in quotes public earlier, but at first it
was only paying patients that could pay out of pocket,
so some of the aristocracy of the state. And then
they realized that, you know, they're indigent people that need
to be admitted as well, people that can't pay for treatment.
(13:46):
So that's when the government actually started paying for their treatment,
really to get these people that they deemed insane off
the streets. Now, again the public in quotation marks, of course,
it was for only Caucasian people. The first African Americans
(14:08):
and even some slaves began being admitted in eighteen forty
eight into segregated, segregated accommodations. Okay, there is a story
about one man. He was a slave. His name was Anthony,
and Anthony was committed. This is horrible. He was committed
(14:32):
to the South Carolina Lunatic Asylum and around eighteen fifty.
But they didn't really have separate facilities for African Americans.
So what they did was kept him in a shed
out in the yard, just isolated and locked up in
the ship.
Speaker 4 (14:53):
Because anybody with a mental disability, that's going to make
that better by doing that.
Speaker 2 (14:58):
Right, I mean, And again going back to the whole
asylum theory, it was supposed to be humane treatment through communication.
You're not getting not a lot of people visiting the
shed now to give you communication. So that's one of
the first atrocities we're going to talk about with Bull Street.
(15:19):
Fifteen years after that, well really eleven years after that,
the Civil War broke out the area there on Bull Street.
It served as a prisoner of war camp for Union
captives from October of eighteen sixty four through February of
eighteen sixty five when it was liberated by Sherman's capture
(15:41):
of Columbia. The name of the camp camp asylum. If
you've delved any into Civil War history, looked at these
prisoner of war camps. They were notorious for their filth,
for rampant disease, malnourishment at this point in the war.
(16:06):
This was in the waning days. It ended in eighteen
sixty five. So here at the end of eighteen sixty
four beginning of eighteen sixty five, the Confederates were barely
able to feed their own soldiers, much less Union captives
they had here. Several perished while in captivity at this
(16:30):
prisoner of war camp, and it was not a very
nice place to be. I mean, there were way worse
you think about Andersonville and Georgia, but several noted awful
prisoner I don't know of one good prisoner of war camp.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
Oh, I mean, I don't think so.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
But these were borderline concentration camps. Yeah, I mean, if
you think about recent memory. Well, construction after the war
continued at the South Carolina State Hospital for the Insane,
as it was now called the Babcock Building, which became
a center and one of the focal points with the
(17:08):
large pillars in front. It was finally completed in eighteen
eighty five, and it had four phases of construction, again
with the focus on the city within a city concept.
Wards were built where multiple patients, i'll call them patients
(17:30):
and the virtually inmates were kept in these wards. They
all had different classifications of who was housed where they
had the men's wards, the women's wards. But around this
time there was also constructed a crematory on site. Okay
(17:51):
for those that died will end while in the care
of the state.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
There would they those remains not go back to the family. Okay,
some of.
Speaker 2 (18:05):
Them did not want them, and we'll go we'll go
over that a little bit later. But the crematory having
to have one on site, that's that's an omen that
we're going to get into a little bit later. But
we've talked about the history of this place. It obviously
sounds brutal, but now we're going to talk about when
(18:27):
we come back from this quick break, what exactly made
this place so cruel. Okay, and folks will be right
back after this quick word from our sponsors. Hi friends,
(18:47):
Matt Hire's here One of my favorite parts of bringing
you Carolina Crimes each week is spotlighting the many wonderful
towns and communities within our great state. And today I'm
proud to encourage you all to check check out one
of my personal favorites. Rather on a road trip or
a weekend getaway, discover Mullins. Once a vibrant depot town
(19:09):
and the former tobacco capital of South Carolina, Mullins is
a hidden treasure in the PD region. Explore our offerings
by savoring a cup of coffee at our delightful coffee shop,
enjoying lunch at any of our charming restaurants, visiting Old
Brick Square, and shopping at our quaint retail stores, which
include an antique market located in a repurposed tobacco warehouse.
(19:33):
Your visit would not be complete without a stop at
the South Carolina Tobacco Museum, situated in the historic train
depot in downtown Mullens, South Carolina. Here you can explore
various exhibits such as models of tobacco plants at each
growth stage, a blacksmith shop, a log tobacco barn filled
with cure tobacco, a farmhouse kitchen, showcasing vintage equipment and
(19:57):
a photo gallery highlighting contemporary tobacco practices. The Mullins Room
honors our town's origins and its swift growth driven by
the railroad and the tobacco industry. Additionally, in late June
twenty twenty five, the Reverend Daniel Simmons Museum will open
its doors to the public. Within the Tobacco Museum, Reverend
(20:18):
Simmons was one of the victims of the Mother Emmanuel
nine tragedy, and he spent his childhood in Mullins and
worked in its tobacco warehouses. Thanks to a generous loan
from his daughter Rose, we will exhibit many of his
personal belongings, including his beloved Bible. The documentary of his life,
One Last Breath, will be continuously streamed in the museum.
(20:40):
Rather it's for a road trip or a weekend getaway,
Mullins is a perfect place to visit and a place
to call home. Visit Mullins, South Carolina, and welcome back
(21:17):
to Carolina Crimes Episode two forty three. In this special
episode about one of the most horrific settings in the
state of South Carolina, and that's Bull Street. The South
Carolina State Hospital it's called the South Carolina State Lunatic
Asylum in the early days, south Carolina State Hospital for
(21:38):
the insane, and then finally the South Carolina State Hospital
before it had to close its doors. Now, before we
left off of the break, we were talking about the
awful conditions in this place. Now. Of course, the intentions
were good when the bill was passed to start construction
on the place, but soon it became over routed, it
(22:01):
became underfunded, and cruel tactics were put into place in
place of treatment by communication and moral treatment and therapy.
Speaker 4 (22:13):
Yeah, really trying to get to the root of problem.
And I was thinking about this. So we've talked about
this before, where people anything, especially a long time ago,
anything that was deemed different than what everyone should do
is was considered you know, abnormal or.
Speaker 3 (22:30):
Something was wrong with you, whether it be you have
I guess what's now, like add or something.
Speaker 4 (22:35):
But it's like, well, you're acting a little bit differently
than everybody else.
Speaker 3 (22:39):
Were there people that.
Speaker 4 (22:40):
Were committed here off of that basis that probably didn't
genuinely have Oh yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:45):
Okay, oh and we'll get into that. One's a horrible story. Okay,
but sorry, you kind of think too, and I guess
I'm playing devil's advocate here. The people in the eighteen
hundreds didn't know, they don't know what we know now.
They didn't have the different brain study, the different you know,
mental health studies. I'm no physician, I'm no psychiatrist or
(23:08):
anything like that. But they didn't know what to do
with folks like that. They didn't know how to help. Yeah,
and they they did the best they could, which was
an actuality more harm than good. We'll talk about the
early patients first. At the facility. They were subjected to
(23:32):
restraints rather strapped to gurnees, beds, chained to the walls, chairs.
They were also subjected to induced vomiting to try to
heal them, electro shock therapy.
Speaker 4 (23:51):
Maybe like get out this bad quote unquote demon that's
in you.
Speaker 2 (23:57):
Or maybe this will make you feel better or act better.
Blood letting was a practice like having them bleed out,
kind of like with leeches and that you hear about those.
Speaker 4 (24:09):
Isn't there something that they did I don't want to
say like medieval times, but kind of in that area
where you would like someone got a sickness and they
didn't know how to heal it so they would be like, oh, well,
you need to bleed it out. Yeah, and they ultimately
died from blood loss.
Speaker 2 (24:22):
Yeah, yeah, they did bleed out. But blood letting was
a common practice here. Also isolation. Folks were left in
dark rooms, sometimes for a month or more. There was
an account by one of the early patients. Her name
was Mary Austen, and this sentence it strikes me, but
(24:48):
one of the excerpts of what she wrote, she said,
my poor weak, shattered nerves are truly harassed and tortured
by being in a madhouse. I would rather suffer the
most excruciating death than to be confined here.
Speaker 3 (25:07):
Wow, so.
Speaker 2 (25:09):
Pretty serious. I don't think with the amount of people
that were put in there, some of the conditions that
these people may have been experiencing, like what we know
today is to be schizophrenia mm hm, you know, bipolar,
maybe Tourette syndrome. You think about the noise factor, the shouting,
(25:30):
the the manic episodes that some people may have.
Speaker 4 (25:34):
And they have these like sensory issues where it's like
it could be a lot of noise creates, right, you know,
these things to come up in you and you probably
do need to be not out in a public area
where there's a bunch of people screaming.
Speaker 2 (25:50):
And if you're in these wards with so many other patients,
you're not going to get any sleep. And then sleep
deprivation leads to more mental problems, more you know, I
guess impatience with other people, and then by hallucinating, right,
it just starts compounding and getting worse and worse. Now
(26:12):
at the facility able bodied patients, they were used for labor,
for landscaping, for laundry, and for any general manual labor
that they had around that needed to be done. That
really the employees they didn't have time for. I mean,
I hate to keep kind of taking their side, but
(26:34):
you got two hundred acres to take care of, you know,
you understanding all these yeah, all these patients to take
care of in their needs, you're gonna need a little
bit of help and say, hey, you know this guy,
he's okay eighty percent of the time. You know, he
he behaves like we think he should behave Hey, man,
you help us out with some laundry. At least get
(26:55):
out of your cell, get a change of scenery or
out of your ward and get a change the scenery.
And more than will to do it absolutely. As you
mentioned before, not all patients at this facility were mentally ill,
and this is horrible. We're going to talk about a
ten year old boy named Samuel Abel. He's gonna come
(27:19):
up later in the story too. This is in the
eighteen hundreds, late eighteen hundreds. His mother died early, his father.
They lived in Lexington County. His father was a veteran.
But you see, Samuel, he was a little boy that
(27:41):
was born with a cleft palate. As we're all aware,
that's a abnormality in the roof of your mouth, your lip.
He wasn't able to speak well, of course, due to
his condition, and he placed in the South Carolina Hospital for.
Speaker 4 (28:04):
The Insane, even for I would say, a speech impediment
off of a yes, you know, a birth abnormality.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
Yes. Again, his only sin was that he couldn't speak well,
his only symptom, I should say. He was described as
a mischievous, normal ten year old boy. He ended up
dying at the facility. Uh, never got to go home.
(28:36):
And this was right around the turn of the century,
in the nineteen hundreds.
Speaker 4 (28:41):
And how scary that had that would that have to be? Yeah,
just being taken from your home and put into this
facility with adults who probably not all but most have
legit issues. And you don't have your parents, right, you
don't know. Yeah, I mean that had been terrifying.
Speaker 2 (29:03):
I like that. They said he was just a mischievous.
Speaker 3 (29:06):
Like every other boy.
Speaker 2 (29:08):
Every other ten year old boy, but he was put
into this asylum. Others were put into the asylum for
personal revenge or financial gain. There was a film that
came out a few years ago. It was entitled Bull
(29:28):
Street by a lady named Lynn Dale, and I encourage
everybody to take a look at that. The film is fictional,
but it was really based the exact story concept on
her great grandmother. She is here from the Upstate around
this area. Now Lynn's great grandmother. She had a dispute
(29:50):
with a local sheriff who in turn said, uh, yeah,
this lady is insane. We need to go ahead and
have her comedmitted to the state.
Speaker 4 (30:00):
Hospital because a sane person wouldn't talk back, that's right,
wouldn't argue with.
Speaker 2 (30:06):
The law, or a sane late And they were African American,
and a sane African American Lane would never talk to
a sheriff that way. So let's go ahead and have
her put in the hospital, which in turn resulted in
her property being taken, seized and sold at sheriff sales.
Speaker 3 (30:25):
So that's convenient.
Speaker 2 (30:29):
Yeah, But there were several stories like that about family
members with aging heirs getting their wills changed. Then all
of a sudden, I think they have what nowadays be
dementia or maybe Alzheimer's, and well, we were gonna have
to commit them. They can no longer, they are no
longer a sound mind, they cannot change their will. And huh,
(30:49):
guess what. They left everything to me.
Speaker 4 (30:51):
And I'm not a doctor, but I am in my
right to make this termination.
Speaker 2 (30:55):
Yes, yes, and let's go ahead and have mom or
dad or grandma and dad. Let's go ahead and have
them committed. That's what's best. Yes. So overcrowding in the
state hospital here it accelerated deaths. The population at some
(31:16):
points grew close to eight thousand. It was not it
was way over capacity. I could never get a good
handle on exactly what they said capacity was at certain
years in the nineteen sixties, it was sixty six hundred
at one point. But the disturbing point is the patients
(31:38):
there had a thirty percent mortality rate every year. Wow,
meaning thirty percent of the patients in their care died.
Speaker 3 (31:53):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
We talked about the lack of staffing, it being under funded,
and we're talking about this asylum and you say, well,
you know, maybe it's due to abuse. All those people
were abuse. No, it wasn't. The main cause of death
was due to disease, in particular a disease called polagra.
(32:21):
I had never heard of this.
Speaker 3 (32:23):
I have not.
Speaker 2 (32:25):
Uh, polagra is a lack of vitamin B three or
niosin Okay, And I was like, well, am I getting
enough nias? And what hasn't got a research? Now do
I have this? I am a web MD whore. I mean,
I am all about it. But I was like, I
(32:45):
might have some palagra myself.
Speaker 4 (32:46):
You're you're the spokesperson for the doctors when they say
do not google your symptoms, and that's like, I.
Speaker 3 (32:53):
Will be doing that.
Speaker 2 (32:54):
So vitamin B three and niosin it comes from meat, lagoons, nuts,
the needs, whole grains, eggs, milk. I'll get plenty of that.
So I think I think I'm in the clear. But
what this did? This disease pelagra? The symptoms where it
started with diarrhea, skin discoloration. Get this. One of the
(33:21):
major symptoms was mental confusion and dementia. So due to
their malnourishment, the patients huh, exhibited malnourishment or I'm sorry,
mental confusion and dementia, which later compounded. You know, Oh,
they really do need to belong They do belong here,
(33:43):
but you're not feeding them. Well that's why.
Speaker 4 (33:45):
Chances are and chances are you they would they wouldn't
be having this mental confusion if they had a proper
diet right right, medicines correct.
Speaker 2 (33:55):
And then eventually pelagra leads to multi organ failure, which
is a very cruel gest So the crematory came into
play quite a bit back in those days. And like
I said, thirty percent of the patients died every year
at Bull Street. In the early nineteen hundreds, they dropped
(34:19):
the insane part of the hospital name and they changed
it to the South Carolina State Hospital. The wards. There
was a former nurse that was interviewed. She said, a
ward was for those patients we kept under medication or sedation.
She said, a ward was your zombies, ones that would
(34:43):
just sit in chairs stare at the wall. Twenty four
to seven not speak. Yeah, yes, Ward C was kind
of for the rowdy bunch. They had chain link fencing
from Florida Sea and it wasn't really a ward. It
(35:03):
was more of a collection of cells the hospital touted,
which is very false. They said, you know, we've heard
about the cruel and unusual tactics of lobotomies and sterilization
(35:24):
of patients and some of these asylums, and we do
none of that. Well, for those of you that don't know,
a lobotomy, it's the removal of the frontal lobe of
your brain. That frontal lobe. It controls your thinking, your memory,
your self control, and your motor control. So they really
want to complete and utter control over these folks that
(35:46):
these lobotomies were performed on. But again the state hospital said,
we don't do that.
Speaker 4 (35:50):
It sounds like it would they it would turn those
people into the a where it's the zombies.
Speaker 2 (35:55):
Correct, that was the that was the intent. Now, well,
the nurse that was interviewed her just went by nurse mclamb.
She was a nurse in the fifties, sixties, maybe early seventies.
That timeline wasn't clear, but she said that whole no lobotomy.
Thing was complete and utter bs. She witnessed lobotomies. There
(36:18):
were lobotomy chairs there with restraints that they had them
sitting up in when these doctors operated and removed portions
of the patient's brains. She told a story about a
female patient, and this is one that I'll share. This
lady she was able to go out on the yard,
(36:42):
walk around. I don't know if it's called the yard.
It's kind of like prison terms, but able to go
outside the building. One spring, she found a frog. For
reasons unknown, she wanted to bring the frog back inside
with her. She knew it was not allowed, so she
put the frog into her body cavity. The frog died.
(37:09):
It was discovered by physicians who got it out and
they said, okay, this is definitely not normal. What we
need to do. Sign you you need to get a
lobotomy right now. So they went ahead and performed that
on her. Nurse mclamb also said there was a woman
that was put in isolation for misbehavior for a night,
(37:35):
but the nurses forgot about her and she was left
there for over a week and when they finally remembered
or went to put someone else in that isolation cell
she had perished.
Speaker 4 (37:47):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (37:50):
There's a multitude of allegations against the staff, against doctors,
physical abuse, folks being restrained, possible sexual abuse, and questions
as time went on, started to arise about Bull Street
(38:11):
in the seventies and in the early eighties. In nineteen
eighty three, State Senator Arthur Revenel, who the bridge is
named after in Charleston, he decided he was going to
organize a visit to this place. You know, he had
heard enough. I need to check this out with my
own eyes. And you would think with a state senator
(38:32):
coming to check you out, I don't think it was unannounced.
But he saw first hand abuse. He saw the botomy chairs,
he saw teens strapped down, as young as the age
of twelve, strapped to their beds, screaming for help, just
awful stuff. And what he saw there it spurred a
(38:55):
state level hearing in nineteen eighty five. And we're going
to take a short break and come back and continue
with exactly the fate and what's going on now at
the site of the old South Carolina Let's see South
Carolina Lunatic Asylum South Carolina or State Hospital for the
(39:15):
insane and finally, the State Hospital of South Carolina. Folks
will be right back after this quick word from our sponsors,
and welcome back to Carolina Crimes episode two forty three,
(39:38):
about the South Carolina State Hospital, one of the most
atrocious places in the history of the state of South Carolina.
Really we talked about right before the break, how some
questions started to be raised, Investigations were brought up, and
in nineteen eighty five at the state level, the State
(39:59):
of South Carolina said we need to look into this place,
and they heard from Senator Arthur Ravenel. He testified about
the abuse that was going on there, the conditions that
the Bull Street facility they put forth, and I could
not find any criminal charges that were filed, but reforms
(40:24):
that were ordered to be The more that reforms came up,
the more society started looking at these asylums and saying,
you know this, this may have been considered humane in
the eighteen twenties, but in the nineteen eighties nineteen nineties,
it is not. They slowly started to chip away and
(40:45):
start closing down sections. Eventually, in the late nineteen nineties,
the facility itself as the State Hospital of South Carolina
did close. The buildings were then used for impatient services
by the South Carolina State Department of Mental Health. Other
(41:08):
buildings on the two hundred acre campus were used for storage.
Everything really started closing down. The state said, okay, we
need to clean this place up. And around twenty fourteen
is when everything really ceased well. The place started to
(41:30):
stay abandoned, vacant. It was a place of legend and
lore for lukie loose who wanted.
Speaker 3 (41:39):
To go in, especially at night.
Speaker 2 (41:41):
Oh yeah, and I mean I admit I was one
of those teenagers young adults that liked the spooky stuff
and oh let's I never went there, but I could
see how kids were like, Okay, let's go check it out.
Let's see if we hear a ghost.
Speaker 3 (41:58):
Or see anything.
Speaker 4 (42:00):
Walk on the grounds and like a group of friends,
like you dare someone to go in?
Speaker 2 (42:04):
Like I dare you, Yeah, tar, you go on that building.
Or maybe people want to sneak in there and take
the devil's lettuce or something like that, you know, just
to get somewhere where nobody was around. But that always
leads to chicanery and people making some poor decisions. The
state it started to sell off parcels of the land,
(42:27):
and in January of twenty twenty one, one hundred percent
of the facility had been sold to private investors, so
it no longer belonged to the state. Now it is
a various uses. Yeah, where Bull Street used to be,
(42:48):
and we'll get into that. But going back to its
sitting vacant. In twenty twenty, there was a very noteworthy
fire at the Babcock building. Of course, it was trespasser
that went into there set fire to the building. Actually
the shell and the facades still stayed intact. And uh,
(43:12):
it was made into apartment homes.
Speaker 3 (43:15):
No, m I thank you.
Speaker 2 (43:20):
I don't want to get sued by the owner. And
I'm sure they're very fine apartments, but that's where you're living.
Speaker 3 (43:28):
I'm not interested in being a tenant.
Speaker 2 (43:30):
Yes, while the vacant property stayed there. Of course, we
mentioned the extreme vandalization, and there are videos on YouTube
go or one dude flew a drone over the place
and that was that was kind of spooky but cool
looking at it from an aerial view. But people would
break into their trustpass, spray paint everything, stupid stuff, cus words, whatever.
(43:56):
But while it's set empty, some of the reports that
came back, and this ties into October spooky season. They
said on several accounts say to hear disembodied screams, they
would hit cold spots if you look at any of them,
the ghost hunter shows in any of that atmospheric pressure
(44:18):
changes shadow figures. And one of the most recurring reports
was of a woman that went by the name of Mary.
She is allegedly a patient that died in the eighteen
fifties and she appears as rather a mist. And several
(44:38):
reports have come forth, I mean from several different sources
at different times, saying it was a full body apparition.
Now where the South Carolina State Hospital sat, it's home
to Segra Park, home of the Columbia fire Flies. There
(45:01):
last weekend, uh Page, Ellington Park, Merrill Garden's Senior living
facility is there, Tupelo Honey, Iron City Brewing, and even
even a Starbucks now sits on this land.
Speaker 3 (45:17):
And there's a public hope.
Speaker 2 (45:19):
I don't know what that means.
Speaker 4 (45:20):
It's like a tex Mex restaurant right by Sacred Part,
kind of like.
Speaker 2 (45:24):
A fancy Chipotle. Yes, okay, sounds exactly right. And of
course the Babcock building still stands. It was burned, gutted
and made into these apartments. In the future, Uh, the
University of South Carolina would like to see their health
sciences campus move to that location as well. Now we're
(45:46):
going to go back to the young man Samuel Abel
we talked about, Okay, and we're going to tie a
bow on this. There's a foundation called Abel South Carolina
that has been formed in his memory, along with the
memory of all the other patients that could have perished
or been wrongfully imprisoned here. And what they're doing is
(46:10):
trying to get a museum. Really, the South Carolina State
Hospital Museum continue tributes of the to the former patients,
to tell their stories and to bring to light some
of the awful things that happened there. And of course,
Able South Carolina is named for ten year old Samuel Abel,
(46:34):
the boy with the cleft palette that was admitted to
the asylum.
Speaker 4 (46:39):
I love that keep his memory alive. And also, yes,
you know, not to sweep anything under the rug. And
you know, I don't know if you've ever seen one
of the shows I.
Speaker 3 (46:52):
Like to watch. Since they've had the series of American
Horror Stories, you heard of it, I've heard of it.
Speaker 4 (46:57):
Okay, the very first one is called asylum, and it
makes me think a lot about this where it's like
headed up by nuns and they help these people who
may or may not have legit mental issues, and a
place where everybody thinks it's good, and there's people who
are being mistreated. They have a crematorium on site, they
(47:19):
have lobotomies that are performed, people are strapped down.
Speaker 3 (47:23):
So there is.
Speaker 4 (47:25):
That's exactly a lot of it that I think is
based in reality, and it's just it's interesting because that's
that's what it made me think about.
Speaker 2 (47:35):
Yeah, well, it was certainly an awful place. I mean,
if there were sounds like tons of criminal charges could
have occurred here, but again some may have, but they
weren't brought to light. They weren't in records. Of course,
a lot of documentation has been rather destroyed or swept
under the rug from this place. But the ghost factor,
(47:58):
the horrific things that went on here that I thought
it was worth covering here, especially this month. Well, we
appreciate you listening to us, appreciate you listening to this one.
We want to say thank you to several people, those
that went over to Carolina crimestore dot com got some
sweet swag. Thank you to Madison Bowlin, Christy Vinson, and
Jaden Howell. Also thank you to those that went over
(48:21):
on Apple iTunes or Apple Podcast through us a five
star review and subscribed. Thank you to d W Drummer
Brad e Oh we got a soft spot for drummers.
My brother, your cousin, or your husband. Not my brother,
my brother, your husband. Quite the drummer all region timpany
(48:44):
action going on. Thank you to s Rabin four four two.
To Sarah Margaret Porter. Quite the impressive young lady. I
think it's the same Sarah Margaret Porter that I know
her family and I am so proud of her. Went
(49:04):
to Duke University. Just a brilliant young lady. Gonna be
an attorney.
Speaker 3 (49:09):
Oh she's the bomb.
Speaker 2 (49:11):
Thank you Sarah Margaret. If that's still the same Sarah
Margare Reporter, could might not be. Thank you to Salt
Blooded as well. Thank you to Melissa Justice, to Andy Hendrix,
to Ray McDaniel, to Margaret Bailey, Ashley Cato, and a
special special thanks to Kelly Chavis. I got to hang
out with your husband Tuesday night at National Night Out.
(49:33):
He's fantastic. He serves with the Rocky Hill Police Department,
the PIO there, awesome people. She's a teacher, so you
know she's close to my heart. They do yeoman's work
out there, trying to help our young folks. Also, thank
you to Catherine Woolridge. Is that a football game that
i'd finished broadcasting bringing down all the equipment from on
(49:55):
top of the stadium in the press box and her
husband stopped me and said a crime podcast. I said, yeah,
I do, and my wife loves it, and I was like, well,
you should listen to man slapping in your butt. End all,
But thank you to Catherine Woolridge and her husband over
at rock Hill High. Thank you everyone for the birthday
(50:16):
wishes as well this week. I really appreciate it. And
here's to your forty six. Yeah, and until next time,
we'll see you here on Carolina Crimes.
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