Mary Catherine Brisbane Hickox 1832 - 1913 wrote a memoir of her childhood, as she explained it "thinking that after I am gone my children may want to know some thing about their relations when there is no one to tell them".   She had two children, but only one grand child and this grand daughter, Zillah Keese Hickox 1892 - 1975, would herself die unmarried.   Mary Catherine's memoir lives on, however, and includes many delightful reminiscences of her kinsfolk including the one below.   Thanks are due to Zillah Keese Hickox who ensured the preservation of the text and to Tom Tucker who brought it to the compiler's attention.

My grandfather, John Stanyarne Brisbane [John Stanyarne Brisbane ca.1773 – 1840], was the youngest son of James [James Brisbane 1735 – 1794].  [He was not!]   James [James Brisbane 1735 – 1794] was the grandson of the old William Brisbane [William Brisbane 1670 – 1733]  who was the first of the name to come to America and he owned a great deal of land in Charleston, near the East Battery, and was a rich man, but being a tory, he fled the country during the revolution.   He went to Bermuda [?probably she’s thinking of The Bahamas] where he afterwards became governor of the island and I do not know that he ever returned to America.   [He is buried in Nassau, so probably he did not return to America.]   At any rate, his lands were all confiscated.

My grand father, John Stanyarne, James Brisbane’s youngest (sic) son, although too young to have been moved by patriotic motives, still did not wish to leave home so escaped from the vessel and effectively hid himself until his parents, being themselves fugitives, were forced to sail without him.   There might have been some collusion in the case, because he was soon established in the house of one of his aunts and was brought up and always lived in Charleston.

 He [John Stanyarne Brisbane ca. 1773 – 1850] was a plain man in appearance as was my grandfather Lowndes [James Lowndes  1769 – 1838]  and being brought up at the same time and at the same school, they had very much the same opinions on most subjects.   They were both sceptical and never accepted the idea of the inspiration of the Bible and I take it for granted that their political views were similar although I was too young to understand much about that.   I remember, however, standing aghast at hearing them argue against the absurdity of believing that Jonah could ever have lived inside of a whale for three days, or that Joshua could have made the sun stand still.   I believed it all firmly in those days, but times have changed and I with them.   I should argue about the miracles now just as my grandfather did so long ago.

 Grandpa Brisbane was not as tall as Grandpa Lowndes, but had a better figure and was very graceful.   When I knew him he had only a little thin  grey hair, in fact he was almost bald.   The upper part of his face was good, being lighted by bright, expressive hazel eyes and his nose was Roman.   His mouth was his worst feature, a few stray teeth and thick lips making it almost repulsive.   His manners were courtly and his conversation unusually agreeable, but he and Grandpa Lowndes dressed equally badly.   When taken to task for his shabby appearance, he would say “where everybody knows me my clothes do not matter.  Where I am not known, why bother to dress”.   Poor old gentleman, he died at eighty years of age of a cancer of the lower lip, which lasted for years and I suppose his sufferings were excruciating.   Aunt Elizabeth [Elizabeth Brisbane 1807 – 1867]  kept house for him and nursed him through all his long illness, a faithful daughter.

 The night that Grandpa died, I was sent for to stay with Aunt Elizabeth while Aunt Maria [Maria Hall Brisbane 1802 – 1864]  was in the next room and I shall never forget the horror of a small incident of that night.   Of course, it was all strange and dreadful to me and I was very nervous.   Aunt Elizabeth lay down and I beside her and I suppose we both must have dropped asleep, when suddenly I woke up with such a start that I knocked a hartshorn bottle to the floor and it smashed, breaking the stillness with what seemed to my overwrought nerves like an explosion.   Aunt Maria rushed in to know what was the matter and Aunt Elizabeth hurried to throw a cloth over the bottle to stop the stifling evaporation, while I, overcome by shame and confusion, sat up for the rest of the dreadful night.

 Grandpa was a rice planter and although a very intelligent and well read man, had, I believe, no profession.   He lived on Ashley River, his last place and the only one I remember, was directly on the river in a beautiful situation and called Attaraxy.   Uncle Abbott [Abbott Hall Brisbane 1804 – 1861] and Aunt Adeline, after my grand father’s death, spent much of their time there with Aunt Elizabeth and many happy visits I paid to the old home, from first to last.   The land that they owned there is the same that is now yielding such rich beds of phosphates and is bringing immense returns to the present owners.   It was sold for a song just before the Civil War and alas, for us, another chance for making millions slipped through our fingers.

 Grandpa Brisbane was very fond of what were called calico horses and always rode one in summer, wearing a nankeen suit, rather shrunken from much washing and presenting a very comical and somewhat Quixotic appearance as he rode through the streets or about his grounds.   He always lived on his plantation in winter and summer, having country or malarial fever every year, and we supposed that the disease of which he died was caused by the incessant poisoning.   I do not know what a medical opinion would be in these days of new theories and when mosquitoes are held responsible for much of the carrying and transmitting of diseases of the blood.   Even in this twentieth century, I suppose that medicine is still in its infancy.