1 Broad Street, Harper’s Weekly. East Bay Street to the left, Broad Street to the right.

An handsome 1853 structure designed and built by Edward C. Jones and Francis Lee, prominent Charleston architects in the Italian Renaissance Revival style. It is faced with Connecticut brownstone at a cost of $100,000 for the State Bank of South Carolina.

During the War Between the States, the building sustained damage by Federal shelling and was purchased and rehabilitated by George A. Trenholm, infamous Charleston blockade runner and former Treasurer of the Confederacy. Trenholm was sued by the Federal government after the War for the import duties on his illegal blockade goods and was forced to liquidate the building.   

An engraving showing the Bank of the State of South Carolina building in Charleston from a bank stock certificate.

In 1875 the building was purchased by another former blockade runner, George W. Williams, who founded the Carolina Savings Bank in the structure. By 1897 the bank was on the first floor while the second floor housed the offices for Southern Bell, the new established phone company. The third floor housed the local office of the U.S. Weather Bureau.

Throughout the 20th century, the building housed a series of banks. It is currently vacant.

1 Broad Street, looking down East Bay, circa 1910. The row of buildings stretching down East Bay is the now-famous Rainbow Row