Operational between 1802 and 1939, the jail held many notable figures, among them Denmark Vesey, Union officers and Colored Troops during the American Civil War, and high-seas pirates.
[3] John and Lavinia Fisher, and other members of their gang, convicted of highway robbery in the Charleston Neck region were imprisoned here in 1819 to 1820.
[citation needed] Tradition holds that Vesey spent his last days in the Jail before being hanged, although no extant document indicates this.
[citation needed] William Moultrie, General during the American Revolution and later Governor of South Carolina, allegedly spent a short time in debtor's prison at the Jail.
[3] Most notably were numerous African American soldiers from the 54th Massachusetts Regiment captured after their assault on Fort Wagner in July 1863.