FIGHTING FOR REVIVAL - Clemson University

emerged.” 28 This duality allowed Edgefield to develop a political culture that was at
once characteristic of broader South Carolina and Southern culture while at the same time
a historically unique crossroads of time, place, politics and personalities.
At that crossroads was the ethic of honor. This ethic was understood at all class
levels of Southern society but it manifested itself in different ways which were tied to
class. Regardless of class status these manifestations took the form of violence and
physical confrontation. Bertram Wyatt-Brown perhaps best sums up the ethic of honor
when he says that “. . . honor is reputation. Honor resides in the individual as his
understanding of who he is and where he belongs in the ordered ranks of society.” 29 Men
of honor conceived of themselves in this way, but true honor was not found in this inner
conception alone, but beckoned a public recognition of these honorable qualities.
Publicly claiming and asserting one’s honor was a prerequisite, and a general
understanding of this notion of honor was pivotal in the establishment of the code of
honor across the South. 30
A tendency toward violence has been one of the character traits most
frequently attributed to southerners. In various guises, the image of the
violent South confronts the historian at every turn: dueling gentlemen and
masters whipping slaves, flat-boatmen indulging in rough-and-tumble
28 Orville Vernon Burton, In My Father’s House, 19-21.
29 Bertram Wyatt-Bro wn, Honor and Violence in the Old South (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1986), 14.
30 Bertram Wyatt-Bro wn, Honor and Violence in the Old South, 14-15; Bertram Wyatt-
Brown, Southern Honor: Ethics and Behavior in the Old South (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1982); Edward L. Ayers, Vengeance and Justice: Crime and
Punishment in the 19 t h -Century American South (New York: Oxford Univeristy Press,
1984), 12-25.
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