history question

Try googling for a Charleston Historical society.

I found this one, http://www.historiccharleston.org/ I'm sure there will be others. Tell them you're a novelist doing research. They're usually glad to help.

Google for art of the area. Sometimes they'll have a drawing/painting of important buildings and their surroundings. If cobbled (or brick) streets were in place, the city would want to boast about it.

I've done plenty of research by checking out contemporary paintings. They offer a snapshot of what people were wearing and doing.

This looks like a good link:

http://walledcitytaskforce.org/faqs/

You are probably going to need to know all about the fortifications, and there is a form to submit questions on the site.

I dealt with this question pertaining to NYC, and I found the main streets paved, and the small streets and alleyways unpaved.

A good book that will help you with the info you need for your setting is CITIES IN REVOLT: urban life in America, 1743-1776 by Carl Bridenbaugh. This book includes detail on Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Newport and Charleston, and has a whole chapter on paving.

Hope that helps!



Hope that helps.

"Chalmers Street

Chalmers Street, the longest remaining Cobblestone Street, has had various names. The block from Union (now State) to Church was early called Union Alley, and after he purchased property on it in 1757, was called Chalmers Alley after Dr. Lionel Chalmers. Dr. Chalmers (1715-1777), a Scot, studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh before settling in South Carolina where he became one of the leading physicians and was associated with Dr. John Lining (see 106 Broad). He was a scientist who, like Lining, recorded weather observations and published the results in London in 1776. His work on tetanus was published in the Transactions of the Medical Society of London (1754) and his Essay on Fevers was published in Charles Town (1767). He corresponded with leading European scientists, as did Lining and Dr. Alexander Garden of Charles Town. The great fire of 1778 destroyed Chalmers’ residence in the alley. It was on the north side; otherwise its location is uncertain. The continuation of the thoroughfare, from Church Street to Meeting was Beresford Alley, named for Richard Beresford, a Wando River planter who in 1715 left his large estate for the establishment of a free school. The fund continues to provide scholarships for needy students. Forty years after the Revolution, the two alleys were widened, paved and merged into one street under the name Chalmers Street."
The above quote is from:
http://www.scottishritecalifornia.org/charleston_street%27s.htm

Perhaps this might help?

I remembered a tour we took in Charleston about fifteen years ago, and the description of the streets and pathways as "the crunch of tabby" underfoot, here is a source that confirms my 'back-of-my-crowded-mind-memory' about oyster shell streets. I do believe the cobblestones would have been red Charleston brick, for rounded stones would have had to come from a far ways, but they may have used ballast rock from the many ships which docked at the Charleston Harbor.

I have no source, but from the caverns of my mind, or perhaps, John Jakes' "Charleston." Ballast rock would help to balance a ship that was not completely loaded, and then the rocks were removed when sufficient cargo was stowed.

source:
http://www.discovercharleston.com/cuisine/food-flair.htm

"Food Fact: A Historic Pearl
In season, oysters are practically a Charleston staple. In fact, White Point Gardens, also known as the Battery, got its name from the large mounds of white oyster shells that once covered the point of Charleston's peninsula. They were present in such large quantities that crushed oyster shells once made up the streets and sidewalks of Charleston."