Grave of Swanson Lunsford
Buried
1799
Original marker
Installed 1837
Funded by daughter and son-in-law, Mrs. M.L. and Dr. John Douglass
Current marker (encases original)
Installed 1953
Funded by great-great-granddaughter, Mary Craig Baker
Produced by Bruns Monumental Company
-
Grave of Swanson Lunsford, 2018. Historic Columbia collection
-
Inscription of Lunsford's original tombstone. Reprinted from The State, October 9, 1899.
Swanson Lunsford, a Revolutionary War captain and civic leader in eighteenth-century Columbia, is the only person buried on the South Carolina State House grounds. He died of yellow fever in 1799 and was buried on what was then the southwest corner of the State House grounds. City officials were likely worried about the spread of the deadly disease and decided that this was a safer place than a public or church cemetery for Lunsford’s burial. His descendants placed the first marker at the site in 1837. In 1927, the marker attracted attention after being reported "stolen," when Lunsford's great-grandson temporarily removed the marker and had it cleaned by Bruns & Davis. His great-great-granddaughter installed the current gravestone, which encloses the original and repeats its inscription, in 1953.