St. Helena's Episcopal Church
Founded in 1712 with its sanctuary built in 1724, this brick church sits at the heart of Beaufort's historic district, its walled graveyard shaded by ancient live oaks. During the Civil War occupation, Union forces used the church as a hospital and reportedly laid flat gravestones across the pews as operating tables. The graveyard's most retold legend belongs to Dr. Perry, a planter-physician who treated yellow fever patients in the mid-1800s and lived in terror of being buried alive, since fever victims often slipped into deathlike comas. He instructed his family that if he died, he should be entombed with a jug of wine, a loaf of bread, and a pickaxe, so that should he wake, he could eat, drink, and dig his way out. When he died in 1845, he was placed in an above-ground brick vault stocked exactly as he asked. After a waiting period with no sign of life, the vault was finally bricked shut. His tomb still stands behind the church among the moss-hung graves.
📍 505 Church Street, Beaufort, SC 29902, Beaufort, SC · Get directions