1859 State Bank, South Carolina, 10 Dollars

Toward the end of the Civil War John W. Moran was at Augusta, Georgia.  This $10 bank note was probably part of his last pay from the Confederacy.  The note is signed by Benjamin M. Lee, a cashier at the State Bank of South Carolina and the president of the bank, Edward Sebring.

Sebring was a transplanted New Yorker to South Carolina.  In addition to other architectural endeavors, he built an amazingly beautiful Greek Revival style home in Charleston between 1838 and 1846.  In addition to being the President of the State Bank of South Carolina during the Civil War, his tombstone proclaims that he was one of the founders of Magnolia Cemetery and its first president.  At the time of his death he was president of E. Sebring and Company, an insurance and brokerage firm.  His first wife was Caroline Secress Miller.  In 1863 he married Gertrude Richards Jessep.

Benjamin Markley Lee was born in Charleston about 1809.  His tenure with the Bank of South Carolina was a long one.  He seems to have begun as an "outdoor clerk and porter" in 1836 and worked his way up to Cashier.  He married Eliza Broome in 1852.  Lee died in 1871 and like Sebring, is buried in Magnolia Cemetery. Cemetery.

Robert Barnwell Rhett

Today in Moran history.....

Robert Barnwell Rhett, the great-grandfather of Margaret Rhett Cuthbert Ezzell, died September 14, 1876 in St. James Parrish near New Orleans.  R. Barnwell Rhett was a staunch secessionist and passionate defender of states rights. He was born December 21, 1800 in South Carolina.  

He had an illustrious career in politics as an attorney general in South Carolina, a U.S. Representative and as a U.S. Senator. He was a leading fire-eater at the Nashville Convention of 1850.

He is buried in Magnolia Cemetery in Charleston South Carolina.  

John Moran Ezzell, Sewanee Class of '31

John Moran Ezzell was the youngest of three children born to Fanny Lemira Moran and James Battle Ezzell.  He was born in 1909 and died in 1988.  He married Margaret Rhett Cuthbert of South Carolina September 30, 1939.  However before getting married he attended Sewanee, The University of the South.  He graduated in 1931 with a bachelor of science degree.  The commencement booklet was found at Moran Place along with many other items belonging to Fanny Moran Ezzell.