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"M" is for Mordecai, Moses Cohen (1804-1888)

South Carolina From A to Z
SC Public Radio

"M" is for Mordecai, Moses Cohen (1804-1888). Merchant, ship owner, legislator, civic leader. Mordecai was antebellum Charleston’s most prominent Jewish citizen. His firm, Mordecai & Company, was among the city’s most successful importers and ship owners, conducting an extensive trade in fruit, sugar, coffee, and tobacco from the West Indies. He later operated a steamship line between Charleston and Havana. Mordecai represented Charleston in both houses of the South Carolina General Assembly. He was a co-owner of the Southern Standard, a Unionist newspaper that rejected secession and promoted cooperation with other Southern states. Once South Carolina seceded, however, he supported the Confederacy. His steamer, the Isabel, became a famous blockade runner. Broken by the war, Moses Cohen Mordecai moved to Baltimore, re-established his company, and operated a steamship line between that city and Charleston.

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Dr. Walter Edgar has two programs on South Carolina Public Radio: Walter Edgar's Journal, and South Carolina from A to Z. Dr. Edgar received his B.A. degree from Davidson College in 1965 and his Ph.D. from the University of South Carolina in 1969. After two years in the army (including a tour of duty in Vietnam), he returned to USC as a post-doctoral fellow of the National Archives, assigned to the Papers of Henry Laurens.