Communities and Towns

Red Bank

Red Bank, located on SC Hwy 6 south of Lexington, first gained notoriety as a health resort. The property where the Red Bank Mill stood was owned by Dr. Frederick William Green prior to the Civil War. Green built a "mosquito cottage" on the property which he used to escape the malarial condition that plagued Columbia during the summer.

The Green family continued to live in Red Bank after the Civil War. In 1869 Green built a textile mill on the banks of Red Bank Creek, the first in Lexington County. The original wooden structure burned down in the early 1890s, but a new stone building was erected in 1895. In the early 1900s a brick addition was constructed.

Historians are not sure whether the town was named in honor of Robert Hilton of Red Bank, New Jersey, who was hired as an assistant supertendent of the mill in the 1890s, or whether it was a reference to the red clay creek bank that ran along side of the mill. After coming to work at the mill, Hilton married Irene Klapman and named the new community in honor of her. Many local residents, however, preferred the name Red Bank.

The Red Bank Mill continued to play a prominent role in the community's history. On 28 June 1994, torrential rains caused the mill pond dam to break, starting a chain reaction that broke dams at Crystal Lake and Durham Pond and flooded a considerable portion of Red Bank and downstream neighborhoods.