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Photograph of Union Church of Port Royal
Photograph by Bill Fitzpatrick, CC BY-SA 3.0. Via Wikimedia Commons.

Union Church of Port Royal

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2010.

From the record

“Union Church of Port Royal, also known as Port Royal White Union Church, 11th Street Tabernacle, and Free Church of Port Royal, is a historic church located at Port Royal, Beaufort County, South Carolina. It was completed in 1878, and consists of a one-story, wood frame, brick-piered building with a central entry and portico.”

Wikipedia article Union Church of Port Royal, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 62 National Register listings published here for Beaufort County · listed in 2010 · category: Building.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

  • What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 1 building as contributing to the listing.
  • Address. 1004 11th St, Port Royal, 29935
  • When was it listed? November 2010
  • Category. building
  • Census division. Beaufort-Port Royal
  • National Register reference number. 10000931 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

93 since 1992

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 93 fires within 5 miles of Union Church of Port Royal between 1992 and 2020, burning about 328 acres in total. 1 started naturally. 21 were recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause Fires
Debris and open burning38
Arson/incendiarism21
Missing data/not specified/undetermined20
Misuse of fire by a minor9
Recreation and ceremony2
Natural1
Equipment and vehicle use1
Fireworks1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

DateCause SizeReported by Name on the report
9 August 2002Debris and open burningunder an acreSouth Carolina Forestry Commissionnot named
7 August 1999Arson/incendiarism2.0 acresSouth Carolina Forestry Commissionnot named
5 August 2008Debris and open burningunder an acreSouth Carolina Forestry Commissionnot named
2 August 2001Debris and open burning8.0 acresSouth Carolina Forestry Commissionnot named
5 July 1993Missing data/not specified/undetermined1.0 acresSouth Carolina Forestry Commissionnot named
29 July 2006Debris and open burning1.0 acresSouth Carolina Forestry Commissionnot named
16 July 1997Natural1.0 acresSouth Carolina Forestry Commissionnot named
10 July 2012Arson/incendiarism1.0 acresSouth Carolina Forestry Commissionnot named

Every fire recorded in Beaufort County

Storms near this property

30 since 1994

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Port Royal, the town this property stands in, in 30 storm reports between 1994 and 2025: 16 thunderstorm wind, 5 hail, 5 lightning, 3 flash flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

WhenEvent Place namedHarm What the report says
July 2021Tornado (EF1)Port Royal$1,000,000A National Weather Service (NWS) storm survey team determined that an EF-1 tornado occurred near Port Royal in Beaufort County. This tornado was likely part of the same storm that hit Parris Island just to the south. It began near 11th Street, between Paris and London Avenues, where it snapped several trees including one tree that hit a home on 11th Street. The tornado continued northward across 14th and 15th Streets, close to Paris Avenue. Many hardwood trees and large limbs were snapped in this area, which also took down some powerlines along Paris Avenue. The tornado then moved across the southern portion of Paris Avenue West, snapping more trees and limbs with some falling on a few homes and buildings. Finally, the tornado crossed Ribaut Road, ending just north of the intersection of Ribaut and Royal Palms Roads. All total, the tornado damaged at least 44 buildings in Port Royal and caused an estimated one million dollars in damage. The maximum strength of the tornado was estimated to be EF-1, with peak winds of 95 mph.
July 2019Thunderstorm WindPort Royal$20,000Beaufort County Emergency Management reported a tree down on power lines at 16th Street and Old Shell Road. There were also two trees down on a residence on 17th Street.
August 2009Thunderstorm WindPort Royal$12,000Broadcast Media relayed a report of trees down on a house and power lines on Paris Avenue in Port Royal, South Carolina.
June 1994Thunderstorm WindPort Royal$5,000no account filed
July 2006Thunderstorm WindPort Royal$2,000Powerlines down.
June 2021Thunderstorm WindPort Royal$1,250A Beaufort County emergency manager reported live power lines down near the 1600 block of Edinburgh Avenue.
July 2025Thunderstorm WindPort Royal$1,000Beaufort County Emergency Management reported a tree down on Stuart Towne Lane.
August 2022LightningPort Royal$1,000The Beaufort County 911 Call Center reported a lightning striking a tree and igniting a small fire near the Navy Hospital.
June 2021Thunderstorm WindPort Royal$1,000A Beaufort County emergency manager reported a tree down near the intersection of Richard Avenue and 15th Street in Port Royal.
July 2019LightningPort Royal$1,000Beaufort County dispatch reported that lightning struck a building on Richmond Avenue.
August 2019LightningPort Royal$1,000An emergency manager reported lightning struck a home. The extent of damage was minor, but one individual was displaced.
August 2019LightningPort Royal$1,000An emergency manager reported a residence struck by lightning, resulting in minor damage.
August 2025Flash FloodPort Royal-The Beaufort County 911 Call Center reported a car stalled on West Paris Avenue due to a flooded roadway.
August 2022Flash FloodPort Royal-The Beaufort County 911 Call Center reported water in a residence on Stuart Towne Lane.
January 2021Thunderstorm WindPort Royal-A trained spotter reported several large tree limbs down near Ballard Circle. The largest of the limbs was approximately 8 feet in length and 4 inches in diameter.
June 2021Thunderstorm WindPort Royal-A Beaufort County emergency manager reported a tree down on Bay Drive.
June 2016Thunderstorm WindPort Royal-Law enforcement reported a tree through the roof of Port Royal Elementary School. Trees also fell onto residences along Ribaut Road and Ridenour Place in Port Royal.
July 2015Thunderstorm WindPort Royal-Multiple trees were reported down in the Port Royal area.
June 2014Thunderstorm WindPort Royal-Law enforcement reported trees down.
August 2011Thunderstorm WindPort Royal-A tree fell on a vehicle on Waddel Road.
March 2011HailPort Royal-The Public reported golf ball size hail in Port Royal, South Carolina.
March 2011HailPort Royal-The Public reported quarter size hail in Port Royal, South Carolina.
March 2011HailPort Royal-A trained weather spotter reported dime to nickel size hail with a few golf ball size hail stones at the South Carolina National Golf Club, 2 miles east-northeast of Parris Island, South Carolina.
March 2011HailPort Royal-The Public reported quarter to tennis ball size hail in Port Royal, South Carolina.
June 2003LightningPort Royal-Lightning struck a power line and traveled through the line to a Coca-Cola bottling plant in Port Royal. Two fires were started which caused some damage to the building.
July 2003Flash FloodPort Royal-Several hours of very heavy rainfall dropped 4 to 6 inches of rain across parts of the county. In Port Royal, many roads were flooded, several cars were swamped, and a restaurant took in 2 to 4 feet of water
June 2001Thunderstorm WindPort Royal-Power lines down.
July 1998Thunderstorm WindPort Royal-Powerlines down.
April 1998HailPort Royal-no account filed
June 1994Thunderstorm WindPort Royal-no account filed

Every storm recorded in Beaufort County

Newspapers printed here

433 digitised pages

3 papers published in this town, digitised by the Library of Congress and free to read: 108 issues, 433 pages. Every page is searchable, so a name or a street can be looked for directly in what the town printed about itself at the time.

NewspaperPublished
The Palmetto Herald1864
Port Royal Commercial and Beaufort County Republican1873 to 1874
The New South1862 to 1867

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Listed places nearby

6 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Photograph PropertyDistance Listed
F.W. Scheper Store0.1 miles2004
Port Royal School0.2 miles2014
Parris Island Drydock and Commanding Generals House2.2 miles1978
Seacoast Packing Company3.2 miles2008
Lady's Island Bridge3.7 miles2023
Isaac Fripp House Ruins3.9 miles1988

Sources for this property

National Archives recordThe nomination case file for reference 10000931 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia articleCommunity-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Beaufort CountyAll 62 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

  • Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
  • Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
  • How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
  • Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
  • Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.