350-year-old Port Royal giant tops a must-see list of amazing oaks in Beaufort County
It has witnessed more than three centuries of American history, including the Revolutionary and Civil wars, and countless hurricanes. The gravestone of a woman who died as a slave, in 1848, is located in the shadow of its mighty frame and shaggy, Spanish moss-draped canopy.
In 2023, the 55-foot-tall Cherry Hill Oak, as it’s known, the biggest and oldest live oak tree in Beaufort County, is still standing tall in Port Royal, a stone’s throw from Parris Island Gateway, one of the area’s busiest roads. Beaufort County is turning the location into a park, which will give the general public access to the historic tree for the first time.
Beaufort County, which owns the land, is now removing hazard trees and mowing the grounds around the hardy oak that dwarfs its wooded surroundings along Battery Creek. The work comes in preparation for a yet-to-be-determined public unveiling of the park and tree that was once threatened by development, said Hannah Nichols, a public information officer.
“We’re thrilled with the acquisition,” said Nichols.
In September, Beaufort County announced that it had purchased the 11.22-acre Cherry Hill Oak property from Merryland Investments Battery Creek LLC for $1.5 million, using public conservation money set aside in the Rural and Critical Land Preservation Program to save the ancient oak and the history it holds in its massive girth and canopy.
The area had been slated for apartment development before residents, led by neighbor Hope Cunningham and arborist Michael Murphy, rallied to protect it from the encroaching housing plans. The county described the price as a “bargain-sale.” Merryland Investments contributed $50,000 for future maintenance.
The Town of Port Royal has agreed to maintain the passive park once it is ready for the public. A private fund for future maintenance costs has been set up by the Friends of Cherry Hill Oak.
The Cherry Hill Oak’s 114-foot canopy spread is nothing to sneeze at but it’s the 113-inch (9.4 feet) diameter that makes it the largest live oak in Beaufort County. The diameter is the imaginary straight line passing through its center from one side to the other. It’s circumference, or the distance around its trunk, is 30 feet, 1 inch. Calculations place its age between 300 to 350 years, which also makes it the county’s oldest live oak, Murphy says.
It’s not guesswork
In 2009, Murphy launched an investigation to find the area’s largest and/oldest live oak tree. It coincided with the city of Beaufort’s Tricentennial Anniversary on Jan. 17, 2011.
Many people think live oaks are older than they are and dating them is difficult, Murphy says. To date a tree, you need a core sample to study the rings. But that’s difficult with live oaks. One reason is the hardness of the wood, which makes it difficult to obtain coring samples. Live oaks also put out false rings, and their ring structures tend to decline over time. Getting an accurate age requires fine sanding techniques and microscopes.
Large live oaks today are survivors
In the 1700s and 1800s, many live oaks were cut down to build ships. It was called “live oaking.” The trees also were used as fuel in cotton gins, Murphy said. “It was kind of a wholesale removal of all the trees that were of any size,” Murphy says.
Some large live oaks seen today actually grew from multiple stumps that remain from the live oaking period, but not the Cherry Hill Oak.
During Murphy’s study of lives oaks for the tricentennial anniversary, he solicited input from the public, and considered only trees at least 60 inches in diameter and those with interesting characteristics or history. He came up with a top 10 lists of sorts. It isn’t necessarily a list of the largest or oldest, although the trees on the list are large and old. Most of the trees, he says, are noteworthy also have an interesting characteristic, history or story.
Here’s Murphy’s list of the Top 10 most notable historic live oaks in Beaufort County. Not all of them are publicly accessible.
1. Cherry Hill Oak
It’s located on Oakview Drive off of Parris Island Gateway. The tree’s 114-foot canopy spread may not seem like a broad canopy for a tree with such a large trunk, says Murphy. But the tree that stands before us today is actually only one half of the original: Hurricane Gracie destroyed the other half in 1959.
What makes the tree even more compelling is what is located underneath its canopy: The gravestone of Mary Pope. The property was once part of the Cherry Hill Plantation. Pope was an enslaved women who died in 1848.
2. Liberty Oak
Hilton Head developer and conservationist Charles Fraser is laid to rest under its grandiose bows at 147 Lighthouse Road in Sea Pines. A plaque dedicated to Charles Fraser, and a bust of his image lie under its shade of the Liberty Oak, memorializing the Hilton Head visionary. The majestic live oak was once thought to be over 350 years old, but later research showed it was not that old, Murphy said. Its age and diameter has yet to be definitively determined, Murphy said.
3. Bluffton Secession Oak
It’s 87 inches in diameter and located off of May River Road in Bluffton. Although the tree is on private property, it can be seen clearly from the road. Lore has it that in July of 1844, under this tree, the first organized political movement with the express goal of South Carolina’s independent secession from the Union was born. The “Bluffton Movement,” as it became known, was a call to secession if the South was not guaranteed its rights to slavery, a lower tariff and states’ rights. The tree collapsed during a storm in 2021.
4. King’s Grant Live Oak
This tree is on private property off of Broad River Bluff in Burton and is not accessible the public. It is 107-inches in diameter. Three other oaks on this site are 97, 91 and 81 inches in diameter. In 1705 William Hazzard came from England and received a King’s Grant of 500 acres of land southwest of Beaufort on a high bluff overlooking the Broad River. After serving as a colonel in the Beaufort militia he died and was buried on his plantation. This tree is a visual example of reaction wood that healthy trees produce to compensate for structural defects. Reaction wood is five times stronger than normal wood.
5. Squire Pope Live Oak
It’s 96-inches in diameter and located on the northeast corner of Squires Pope Road and Highway 278 near a Hilton Head Land Trust easement. It is one of the eight largest diameter trees in Beaufort County. The furrows and undulations of its trunk circumference are telltale signs that this tree could actually be made up of multiple trunk sprouts that re-grew from the cut stump, hundreds of years ago, after the original tree was cut down for shipbuilding purposes.
6. Tailbird Live Oak
Possibly the oldest tree on Hilton Head Island, the 64-inches-in-diameter tree is located on Outterbridge Circle on Hilton Head.
In 1781, a royal militia on Daufuskie Island was instructed to burn the homes of known patriots between Beaufort and Savannah. When they arrived at Tailbird Plantation, Tailbird’ s 9-month pregnant wife faced the officer in charge who was her brother-in-law. He allowed her to move all the household goods out of the plantation house and place them under the spreading branches of the giant live oak about 100 yards from the main house before burning the house down.
7. Okatie Corners Oak
It’s located at the southeastern area of the intersection of Highway 170 and Highway 278 in Bluffton, which is also known as McGarvey’s Corner.
This area was once known as “Land’s End,” or the end of the paved road system in old Bluffton. Children of the era gathered under this tree on election day to watch for the sheriff to come to town, as he had one of the few motor cars of the day.
8. Pope Hunting Club Oak
It’s located on private property once known as the Pope Hunting Club on the east side of Highway 170 between Davis Road and the Okatie River in Bluffton.
While it has no specific history, the tree, at 93-inches, is one of the eight largest single-trunked trees in Beaufort County.
9. 1st Presbyterian Church of Hilton Head
The tree, which is 78 inches in diameter, is in the parking lot of the church at 540 William Hilton Parkway on Hilton Head Island. It may be the largest single-trunked tree on Hilton Head Island. This tree has old interior burn scars possibly set by early resident raccoon hunters to smoke out their prey. Also an excellent example of how a tree creates reaction wood around weakened trunk areas. Reaction wood is five times stronger than normal wood.
10. Rose Hill Trading Tree
The tree, which is 66 inches in diameter, is on private property but can be seen from the street where North Lake Road ends into Hidden Lakes Circle on Hidden Lake Drive on Rose Hill Plantation in Bluffton.
There are the remnants of an old tabby wall underneath the tree, which is known as the “Trade Tree” because slaves were traded underneath its canopy for the working plantations of Rose Hill and Belfair.
