Francis Marion National Forest

The Francis Marion is a forest literally steeped in history. Indeed, the wet boots of Revolutionary War soldiers under the command of Francis Marion himself splashed through the swamps of the present-day national forest, protected only by the certainty of their enemy’s fear of alligators and snakes. Marion, dubbed “Swamp Fox” by the British troops whose supply lines he disrupted with surprise attacks from the swamps, adapted the fighting techniques of the Cherokee Indians to thwart the British in coastal South Carolina.

Prehistoric Indians occupied the area long before Marion and the British would tangle in its swamps. A 4,000-year-old shell ring near the salt marsh remains as a monument to their culture. It is the northernmost of a number of coastal shell middens along the Florida, Georgia and South Carolina coasts.