“H” is for Huguenots

“H” is for Huguenots. Huguenots are French Calvinists. In 1685, French King Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes in 1685 and outlawed Calvinism in France. Faced with a painful choice to convert to Catholicism or flee, between 160,000 and 200,000 fled France. The Huguenot migration to South Carolina is part of a larger diaspora, traditionally known as le Refuge, which stretches from the late 1670s to the early 1710s. The overwhelming majority opted to settle in France’s Protestant neighboring countries. About 2,500 relocated in British North America (500 to South Carolina). In the eighteenth century additional groups of Huguenots and Swiss Calvinists settled in South Carolina where they founded the Purrysburg(and Hillsborough townships, the latter sometimes referred to as New Bordeaux. The Huguenot experience in South Carolina was characterized by a rapid and complete integration into Anglo-American society.