In an effort to preserve a piece of our local Lowcountry history, a fence has been erected around the ruins of the Old Sheldon Church.
If you’ve been on Facebook last weekend, you may have seen that lots of folks were shocked to see it as they drove up to enjoy the site.
The fence was erected this past week after the historic sites owner, the Parish Church of St. Helena, looked for ways to help preserve the rapidly decaying ruins that sit in a high traffic area right along side of the road. The site has drawn quite a growing number of people over the years and the church has been concerned.
Also, in an article published on June 18th by the Beaufort Gazette, further plans for the site were outlined for visitors to again walk among the brick archways and columns once restoration work is complete and visitors can be supervised.
The additional changes include having docents to be on site to open the new gate and lead tours on new walking paths within the structure. Grass within and around the church walls will be replaced with a material that doesn’t threaten to degrade the bricks.
In 2016, the church reached out to the Preservation Society of Charleston and the Clemson Restoration Institute to come up with a comprehensive plan for conserving what is left of the church building as well as its peaceful setting.
In recent years, the site has seen a host of vandalism including spray-painted graffiti, broken headstones and people carving their names into the bricks.
Some of the bricks have even been removed, or stolen, by folks who wanted a souvenir.
According to reports, the church has two long-term goals for the site: to minimize the impact of human activity on the site but also to harness the public’s interest in it to raise more money for its ongoing care.
The reports said that the church has come up with plans including removing it from Google Maps and adding fencing and periodically closing it to reinforce the reality that it’s not a public park. Other ideas included adding signs to explain that it’s a consecrated, private site as well as creating a plan to encourage online donations and to explore raising money from special events and creating a nonprofit to help support it.
Officials at the Parish Church were unavailable for comment this weekend.
