James Gordon House
87 East Bay Street • c. 1792
87 East Bay Street
This is a Charleston single house of unusual height and width. It is one-room wide with a central stair hall in the middle and rooms to either side. The private entrance is off the street, on the left side of the building.
It is not a typical single house, but it is an important example of how, in the 18th century, the back of buildings (in this case the right-hand side) were left almost wholly blank—without windows or doors—so that another building could be built next to it.
Single houses were typically built on a front corner of a lot. Legally, anyone who owned an adjacent lot had the right to tie into the back wall. Although construction costs could be saved by sharing a wall, most builders after the fire of 1740 preferred to build houses as far apart as possible so as to leave fire breaks in between each building. Even then they often kept the back wall blank, or nearly blank, as a fire wall.
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back of 87 East Bay
In a city were ventilation was a major concern in homes, windows were added to the back of these buildings when there was enough space between buildings for it to be relatively safe. Often, as in this example, only stair windows were placed on back walls, to minimize the possibility that a fire would spread to a brick house through a window.
In 1792, James Gordon acquired this lot which had been vacant since the fire of 1778. He slightly enlarged it for this building. The front initially had a full-width balcony which was moved to 68 South Battery. •
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