He was named for his uncle Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, who was a delegate to the Constitutional Convention.

[6] Thomas Pinckney, a brother of Charles, built his summer home "Altamont" in Pendleton.

[7] In 1852, Charles Pinckney sold Woodburn to David S. Taylor, who resold it to John Bailey Adger.

It was bought by Augustine T. Smythe in 1881, who developed it into a model livestock farm with purebred cattle and race horses.

[5][7] William Frederick Calhoun Owen purchased the land in 1911, but he lost it through mortgage foreclosure in 1930.

[7] Jane Edna Hunter, an African-American social worker, was born in 1882 to sharecropper parents on the Woodburn Plantation.

[8][9][10] Woodburn is now a museum home run by the Pendleton Historic Foundation.

[13] The full basement has a warming kitchen and a dining room that is relatively cool on hot summer days.