Shealy shares theory on the history of the name ‘Newberry’

NEWBERRY – Ernest Shealy, noted historian in the City of Newberry, spoke during Newberry City Council’s April meeting on a working theory on the history of the origin of Newberry’s name.

Mayor Foster Senn said a few weeks prior, he attended a tour led by Shealy of Newberry where he shared his theory on the origin of where Newberry obtained its name.

“I thought it was very interesting,” Senn said. “It’s always been a question and I asked him to share his theory with us.”

Senn shared that last week, ETV’s “letter of the month” was the letter “N,” and that it stood for Newberry County. In that, Senn said they talked about the origin of Newberry County’s name was uncertain, although it had been suggested that early settlers thought the area was “as pretty as a new berry.”

Shealy said there were two other working theories, one of Charlie Senn who used to say we (Newberry) were named for a new variety of berry.

“The fruit in question,” Shealy said, “was not a berry and it was not by any means, new.”

Other suggestions, Shealy said, were that Newberry may have been named for revolutionary war officers/events. However, he said there weren’t any Newberrys in this area, with the closest one being in what is now, Florence.

Shealy said he had an alternative theory, attributing the name of Newberry to the Quakers.

“The Quakers were a sect of Puritans that began settling in what became Newberry in the 1740s-50s,” he said. “They were coming down from Pennsylvania along what is commonly known as the Carolina Road.”

After the French and Indian War in the early 1760s, Shealy said that road became much more available.

People were coming down from the middle part of Pennsylvania, Maryland and Northern Virginia and spilling out into the middle of South Carolina. Among them, Quakers, Shealy said.

“The Quakers were a sect of Puritans that were established in a Suburb of London that coincidentally had the name of Newberry,” Shealy said. “There was also a suburb of London, Shealy said that had the name Newbury, but lesser known was Newberry and the Quakers seemed to have come from there.”

They then moved to central Pennsylvania, Shealy said, where there’s a Newberry Township.

“People from Newberry Township and the surrounding area move down to South Carolina and suddenly when we have an opportunity to name something here, we have a Newberry.”

Shealy said the Quakers were very much opposed to slavery. In the first decade of the 19th century, a traveling preacher came through, Shealy said, giving a fire and brimstone speech about anyone associated with slavery. It was at this time, he said, that the Quakers decided they needed to leave South Carolina because they felt war was imminent.

“They left Newberry and went west to Ohio and Indiana,” Shealy said. “There’s a Newberry Township in Ohio where Quakers from Newberry settled.”

Shealy said there was also a town named Newberry in Indiana, where more settlers from Newberry, S.C. were established.

“You can sort of follow the name Newberry all across the Western United States, as the Quakers kept moving west,” he said. “So, that’s my theory that Newberry is a Quaker name. They brought it to us and then took it with them.”

Senn said he found Shealy’s theory interesting and discussed the Bush River Quaker Meeting historical marker that can be found on Dennis Dairy Road in Newberry.

The marker states that: settled by Quakers in the 1760s, it was a monthly meeting 1770-1822 and a quarterly meeting with jurisdiction over all meetings in South Carolina and Georgia from 1791-1808. Opposing slavery, the members moved west and settled Quaker meetings in Illinois, Indiana and Ohio.

Not far from the historical marker, Newberry is home to a Quaker Road as well as a Friend Street. Shealy said it has long been known by local historians that we get Friend Street from society of friends, the other name for the Quakers.

“I think perhaps our old slogan, the City of Friendly Folks may have come from our having a Friend Street,” Shealy said.

Councilperson Carlton Kinard spoke on behalf of a classmate from Newberry College, with the last name of Newberry. Kinard said that his classmate was from a town approximately 12 miles outside of Newberry, Pennsylvania and that some of his ancestors were Quakers.

Senn thanked Shealy for researching that information and bringing it before council.