Courtesy of the Segars Collection – 2006

St. Thomas’ Parish was also created in 1706, and the first parish church built in 1708 on the neck of land between Wando and Cooper Rivers, about two miles from the village of Wando, formerly known as Cainhoy. However, Pompion Hill Chapel had been built in 1703 in what became St. Thomas’ Parish. Dalcho termed it the first church built in the province outside the city of Charles Town. Later research has indicated that the first chapel at Goose Creek was erected some years prior to this, perhaps as early as 1680. The first chapel at Pompion Hill was erected soon after the arrival of the Rev. Samuel Thomas, first missionary to Carolina from the newly organized Church of England Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts. Created in 1701, they sent the Rev. Mr. Thomas to Carolina in 1702. He was the third missionary sent to America and served the people of the Cooper River from Goose Creek to Pompion Hill, making his home at Silk Hope, the plantation of the Governor, Sir Nathaniel Johnson. Writing from “Sir N. Johnson’s Study” in 1705 to the Society in London, Mr. Thomas said, “Here is one church already erected since my arrival by the peculiar direction and religious care of Sir Nathaniel Johnson and at the charge of the parish.” Pompion Hill Chapel on the eastern side of the east branch of the Cooper River took its name from the plantation on the river which it adjoined. The local pronunciation is Punkin, or as Judge H. A. M. Smith wrote “the contemporaneous spelling of Pumpkin is Pompion.” The plantation was written as Ponkin Hill or Ponkinhill Plantation in some deeds before the name was extended to cover the larger tract of plantation which was aggregated by the Rev. Thomas Hasell. He was the first rector of St. Thomas’ Parish, appointed in 1709 after the creation of the Parish in 1706. He married Elizabeth Ashby, daughter of John Ashby, the Second Cassique of nearby Quinby Barony. When the Rev. Mr. Hasell died in 1744, he had served the parish of St. Thomas’ and Pompion Hill Chapels of Ease for thirty-five years. Pompion Hill Plantation of 1540 acres was inherited by his eldest son, Thomas Hasell. In 1750 it was purchased by Samuel Thomas, grandson of the first SPG mis-sionary of that name, and who was the son-in-law of Rev. Thomas Hasell, since Samuel Thomas, II, had married Elizabeth Ashby, II. Before 1784, Pompion Hill Plantation became the property of the Parish, either through purchase or gift from Samuel Thomas. In later years after 1823 Pompion Hill Plantation was owned by Alfred Huger and its name was changed to Longwood, and the name Pompion Hill restricted to the bluff above the river of ten or twelve acres on which the fine old Chapel stands. (Information from: Names in South Carolina by C.H. Neuffer, Published by the S.C. Dept. of English, USC)