34.4348° N, 81.0284° W

CHARLESTON

Most Famous People Born in Charleston, United States

Notable people
749
Peak decade
1940s
Median birth year
1920
Most distinctive
Baseball 4.5×

Charleston's profile is frozen in antebellum amber: an outsized Lawyer and Judge class built by the planter bar that dominated South Carolina politics from secession through Reconstruction, with an Officer bench propped up by the Citadel and the Confederate officer corps. The smaller, stranger note is the Novelist thread — Charleston Renaissance writers like DuBose Heyward, whose Porgy became the seed for American opera.

Through the Decades

One face per decade — the most globally famous figure born in Charleston during each.

Notable Births by Decade

Click a decade to filter the list below. Peak: 1940s with 63 notable births.

What Charleston Is Known For

Click any row to filter the list of people below.

Politician is Charleston's biggest profession — 22% of all notables (166).

Charleston over-indexes on baseball4.5× the global rate.

Charleston under-produces writer — only 0.6× the global rate.

  1. Politician166
  2. Football58
  3. Lawyer52
  4. Actor48
  5. Baseball38
  6. Basket27
  7. Painter19
  8. Music18
  1. Baseball384.5×
  2. Lawyer524.0×
  3. Judge123.4×
  4. Novelist103.4×
  5. Officer153.0×
  6. Basket272.9×
  7. Politician1661.9×
  8. Music181.7×
  1. Writer150.6×

Profession Mix Over Time

Each band shows a profession family's share of Charleston's notable births by decade. Hover the chart for the breakdown at any decade.

1700175018001850190019502000
  • Politics & Law
  • Sports
  • Film & TV
  • Music
  • Writing
  • Science
  • Other
All749
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Showing 30 of 749 notable people

0017 MILITAR

Wade Hampton III

1818 - 1902

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0088 POLITICIAN

Stephen A. Hurlbut

1815 - 1882

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0139 PRIEST

Daniel Payne

1811 - 1893

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0149 PAINTER

Solomon Nunes Carvalho

1815 - 1897

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0170 JUDGE

Andrew Gordon Magrath

1813 - 1893

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0220 ARMY

Lucius B. Northrop

1811 - 1894

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0239 WRITER

Louisa Susannah Cheves McCord

1810 - 1879

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0245 POLITICIAN

William Waters Boyce

1818 - 1890

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0260 ABOLITIONIST

Robert Purvis

1810 - 1898

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0273 BOTANIST

Lewis Reeve Gibbes

1810 - 1894

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0316 CHEMIST

Jakob August Lorent

1813 - 1884

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0332 PRESBYTER

Benjamin M. Palmer

1818 - 1902

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0357 CHEMIST

St. Julien Ravenel

1819 - 1882

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0368 OFFICER

Percival Drayton

1812 - 1865

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0374 PHYSICIAN

Samuel P. Moore

1813 - 1889

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0392 POLITICIAN

Francois P. Giraud

1818 - 1877

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0402 LAWYER

Raphael J. Moses

1812 - 1893

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0432 JUDGE

Edwin Warren Moïse

1810 - 1868

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0439 LAWYER

Benjamin Cudworth Yancey Jr.

1817 - 1891

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0445 HISTORIAN

Alexander Smith Taylor

1817 - 1876

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0475 OFFICER

Thomas Saltus Lubbock

1817 - 1862

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0491 PHYSICIAN

Mitchell Campbell King

1815 - 1901

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0513 PAINTER

Thomas Wightman

1811 - 1888

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0537 PRIEST

Thomas Grace (Bishop of Saint Paul)

1814 - 1897

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0563 POLITICIAN

William Dennison Porter

1810 - 1883

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0659 ENGINEER

W. Hasell Wilson

1811 - 1902

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0666 LAWYER

Solomon Heydenfeldt

1816 - 1890

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0687 NAVY

Edward Middleton

1810 - 1883

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0729 POLITICIAN

William W. Sale

Born 1819

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0738 LAWYER

Isaac Stockton Keith Ogier

1819 - 1861

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