Everybody loves the State Flag of South Carolina. It has been voted the most popular state flag in the United States and continues to be worn on everything you see including car stickers, coffee mugs, apparel and hundreds of other things, while also flying from the front porches of hundreds of local homes.
However, a common misconception is that the flag depicts a crescent moon and a palmetto tree, laid against a field of indigo.
This isn’t correct and to clear that up, we decided to give you a brief history of the famous flag of the Palmetto State.
Truth be told, the South Carolina State flag has been in transition ever since Colonel William Moultrie assembled a banner of dark blue with a crescent shape in the upper left corner of a flag in 1775.
The color was from the patriot uniforms and the crescent was from a similar shape worn on the caps of soldiers with the word “LIBERTY” inscribed.
Going back even further, the deep blue color came about from the indigo dye industry. The indigo plant adapted well to South Carolina’s coast, and soon made our local growers very wealthy with a bounty from the British. This was the first lucrative industry for this area. The dark blue color was chosen for the military uniforms of our Revolutionary patriot soldiers and, from it, for our state flag.