February 10
1863: In a letter bearing this date, President Abraham Lincoln authorizes that part of a 64-acre tract known as Polly’s Grove Plantation be used for Beaufort National Cemetery. The land had been acquired by U.S. Army Gen. David Hunter for $75 at an 1863 tax sale of properties confiscated by the federal government. After the Civil War, 29 acres of the parcel was retained for the cemetery.
February 11
1926: James Edwin McTeer is appointed sheriff of Beaufort County after the death of his father, also James Edwin McTeer, before his term in office expired. The younger McTeer would serve as sheriff until his retirement in 1963, McTeer was widely known as a root doctor and an expert on witchcraft, according to the Beaufort Gazette.
February 15
1519: Pedro Menendez de Aviles – founder of Santa Elena, the first colonial capital of Spanish Florida on Parris Island in the Port Royal Sound – is born in Spain. Menendez de Aviles was the first Governor of Florida and the first European man to convert native Americans to Christianity.
2016: Beaufort author Pat Conroy announces publicly on his Facebook page that he was battling pancreatic cancer.
– Compiled by Mike McCombs
