Built in 1772, it was home to Thomas Heyward, Jr., a signer of the United States Declaration of Independence, and was where George Washington stayed during his 1791 visit to the city.

[2][3] Built in 1772, this Georgian-style double house was the town home of Founding Father Thomas Heyward, Jr., one of four South Carolina signers of the Declaration of Independence.

A patriot leader and artillery officer with the South Carolina militia during the American Revolutionary War, Heyward was captured when the British took Charleston in 1780.

Heyward sold the house in 1794 to John F. Grimké, also a Revolutionary War officer and father of Sarah and Angeline Grimke, the famous abolitionists and suffragettes.

Tobias Trott died unexpectedly in 1863, and with the Union bombardment of Charleston at the onset of the Civil War, Elizabeth fled to the upstate with her three young children.