Have been unable to determine who Blanche's parents were. She's listed on the 1900 census living with her grandparents, James and Mary E. Grady in Lillington, Harnett, North Carolina.
CHARLESTON - Charleston's Goat Woman is dead - a victim of winter cold. The body of the frail hermit, Mrs. Blanch Hollaway, was discovered yesterday afternoon by a visiting pastor to her island home. She died as she had lived - alone.
Mrs. Hollaway died sometime Wednesday night., when a numbing 23 degree low hit the area of her Big Goat Island retreat, across the Intracoastal Waterway from the Isle of Palms.
She had suffered exposure , and probably died of pneumonia said County Coroner Jennings Cauthen. The Rev. R. L. Turner, Presbyterian minister of Sullivan's Island, was bringing food to the Goat Woman when he found her body on the floor of her one room plywood shack.
Mr. Cauthen and Sullivan's Island Police Chief, Joseph H. James, brought her body from the island by launch. "I saw her only last Saturday, just after she had another fire in her home and had scorched her face. She was in very bad shape," Chief James said.
"I asked her to let me take her to the hospital, but she refused. She said she had too many things to do."
John Leo Truesdale, water works superintendent on Sullivan's Island, who helped in the recovery of the body, was with Chief James last Saturday. They may have been the last people to see Mrs. Hollaway alive.
Chief James paid weekly visits to the old woman after the death last Dec. 23 of her husband, Henry E. Holloway, who was known throughout the Lowcountry and to waterway travelers as the Goat Man. The last time Mrs. Hollaway left Goat Island was to attend the funeral of her husband.
Apart from the visits by the police chief and Sullivan's Island coastguardsmen, the Goat Woman lived alone and isolated. Wjen the island's few summer residents left this fall, Mrs. Hollaway had an island to herself. She enjoyed solitude.
Seeking "peace and quiet," Mr. and Mrs. Hollaway settled in a jungle-like area of the Isle of Palms in 1931. But when the island started to flourish as a residential area in 1940, the recluses crossed the waterway to Big Goat Island. There they lived a Robinson Crusoe existence, their home a makeshift dwelling of old lumber, wire and old clothes. A little plywood house was built for them in 1960.
Mrs. Hollaway claimed her husband decided to move where he could raise and butcher his own meat without having to worry about abattoirs. The Goat Man once owned a butcher stall in the city market. But with Mrs. Holloway's death, a secret is sealed, what really motivated the Goat Man and Goat Woman to shun society and become hermits.
The herd of goats which they kept earned them their nicknames. At one time they had between 200 and 250 goats on the island. The Goat woman once remarked that her husband drank "only goat milk and rain water from heaven."
Mrs. Holloway, in an interview last April, said she was born August 12, 1886 in Raleigh, NC. Mr. Holloway was born in Georgia in 1876.
Mr. Turner was making arraignments last night to have Mrs. Holloway buried next to her husband's plot in Mount Pleasant Cemetery. Her last resting place is to be the mainland she shunned in life.
Published in the News and Courier, December 1963
CHARLESTON - Charleston's Goat Woman is dead - a victim of winter cold. The body of the frail hermit, Mrs. Blanch Hollaway, was discovered yesterday afternoon by a visiting pastor to her island home. She died as she had lived - alone.
Mrs. Hollaway died sometime Wednesday night., when a numbing 23 degree low hit the area of her Big Goat Island retreat, across the Intracoastal Waterway from the Isle of Palms.
She had suffered exposure , and probably died of pneumonia said County Coroner Jennings Cauthen. The Rev. R. L. Turner, Presbyterian minister of Sullivan's Island, was bringing food to the Goat Woman when he found her body on the floor of her one room plywood shack.
Mr. Cauthen and Sullivan's Island Police Chief, Joseph H. James, brought her body from the island by launch. "I saw her only last Saturday, just after she had another fire in her home and had scorched her face. She was in very bad shape," Chief James said.
"I asked her to let me take her to the hospital, but she refused. She said she had too many things to do."
John Leo Truesdale, water works superintendent on Sullivan's Island, who helped in the recovery of the body, was with Chief James last Saturday. They may have been the last people to see Mrs. Hollaway alive.
Chief James paid weekly visits to the old woman after the death last Dec. 23 of her husband, Henry E. Holloway, who was known throughout the Lowcountry and to waterway travelers as the Goat Man. The last time Mrs. Hollaway left Goat Island was to attend the funeral of her husband.
Apart from the visits by the police chief and Sullivan's Island coastguardsmen, the Goat Woman lived alone and isolated. Wjen the island's few summer residents left this fall, Mrs. Hollaway had an island to herself. She enjoyed solitude.
Seeking "peace and quiet," Mr. and Mrs. Hollaway settled in a jungle-like area of the Isle of Palms in 1931. But when the island started to flourish as a residential area in 1940, the recluses crossed the waterway to Big Goat Island. There they lived a Robinson Crusoe existence, their home a makeshift dwelling of old lumber, wire and old clothes. A little plywood house was built for them in 1960.
Mrs. Hollaway claimed her husband decided to move where he could raise and butcher his own meat without having to worry about abattoirs. The Goat Man once owned a butcher stall in the city market. But with Mrs. Holloway's death, a secret is sealed, what really motivated the Goat Man and Goat Woman to shun society and become hermits.
The herd of goats which they kept earned them their nicknames. At one time they had between 200 and 250 goats on the island. The Goat woman once remarked that her husband drank "only goat milk and rain water from heaven."
Mrs. Holloway, in an interview last April, said she was born August 12, 1886 in Raleigh, NC. Mr. Holloway was born in Georgia in 1876.
Mr. Turner was making arraignments last night to have Mrs. Holloway buried next to her husband's plot in Mount Pleasant Cemetery. Her last resting place is to be the mainland she shunned in life.
Published in the News and Courier, December 1963
Have been unable to determine who Blanche's parents were. She's listed on the 1900 census living with her grandparents, James and Mary E. Grady in Lillington, Harnett, North Carolina.
CHARLESTON - Charleston's Goat Woman is dead - a victim of winter cold. The body of the frail hermit, Mrs. Blanch Hollaway, was discovered yesterday afternoon by a visiting pastor to her island home. She died as she had lived - alone.
Mrs. Hollaway died sometime Wednesday night., when a numbing 23 degree low hit the area of her Big Goat Island retreat, across the Intracoastal Waterway from the Isle of Palms.
She had suffered exposure , and probably died of pneumonia said County Coroner Jennings Cauthen. The Rev. R. L. Turner, Presbyterian minister of Sullivan's Island, was bringing food to the Goat Woman when he found her body on the floor of her one room plywood shack.
Mr. Cauthen and Sullivan's Island Police Chief, Joseph H. James, brought her body from the island by launch. "I saw her only last Saturday, just after she had another fire in her home and had scorched her face. She was in very bad shape," Chief James said.
"I asked her to let me take her to the hospital, but she refused. She said she had too many things to do."
John Leo Truesdale, water works superintendent on Sullivan's Island, who helped in the recovery of the body, was with Chief James last Saturday. They may have been the last people to see Mrs. Hollaway alive.
Chief James paid weekly visits to the old woman after the death last Dec. 23 of her husband, Henry E. Holloway, who was known throughout the Lowcountry and to waterway travelers as the Goat Man. The last time Mrs. Hollaway left Goat Island was to attend the funeral of her husband.
Apart from the visits by the police chief and Sullivan's Island coastguardsmen, the Goat Woman lived alone and isolated. Wjen the island's few summer residents left this fall, Mrs. Hollaway had an island to herself. She enjoyed solitude.
Seeking "peace and quiet," Mr. and Mrs. Hollaway settled in a jungle-like area of the Isle of Palms in 1931. But when the island started to flourish as a residential area in 1940, the recluses crossed the waterway to Big Goat Island. There they lived a Robinson Crusoe existence, their home a makeshift dwelling of old lumber, wire and old clothes. A little plywood house was built for them in 1960.
Mrs. Hollaway claimed her husband decided to move where he could raise and butcher his own meat without having to worry about abattoirs. The Goat Man once owned a butcher stall in the city market. But with Mrs. Holloway's death, a secret is sealed, what really motivated the Goat Man and Goat Woman to shun society and become hermits.
The herd of goats which they kept earned them their nicknames. At one time they had between 200 and 250 goats on the island. The Goat woman once remarked that her husband drank "only goat milk and rain water from heaven."
Mrs. Holloway, in an interview last April, said she was born August 12, 1886 in Raleigh, NC. Mr. Holloway was born in Georgia in 1876.
Mr. Turner was making arraignments last night to have Mrs. Holloway buried next to her husband's plot in Mount Pleasant Cemetery. Her last resting place is to be the mainland she shunned in life.
Published in the News and Courier, December 1963
CHARLESTON - Charleston's Goat Woman is dead - a victim of winter cold. The body of the frail hermit, Mrs. Blanch Hollaway, was discovered yesterday afternoon by a visiting pastor to her island home. She died as she had lived - alone.
Mrs. Hollaway died sometime Wednesday night., when a numbing 23 degree low hit the area of her Big Goat Island retreat, across the Intracoastal Waterway from the Isle of Palms.
She had suffered exposure , and probably died of pneumonia said County Coroner Jennings Cauthen. The Rev. R. L. Turner, Presbyterian minister of Sullivan's Island, was bringing food to the Goat Woman when he found her body on the floor of her one room plywood shack.
Mr. Cauthen and Sullivan's Island Police Chief, Joseph H. James, brought her body from the island by launch. "I saw her only last Saturday, just after she had another fire in her home and had scorched her face. She was in very bad shape," Chief James said.
"I asked her to let me take her to the hospital, but she refused. She said she had too many things to do."
John Leo Truesdale, water works superintendent on Sullivan's Island, who helped in the recovery of the body, was with Chief James last Saturday. They may have been the last people to see Mrs. Hollaway alive.
Chief James paid weekly visits to the old woman after the death last Dec. 23 of her husband, Henry E. Holloway, who was known throughout the Lowcountry and to waterway travelers as the Goat Man. The last time Mrs. Hollaway left Goat Island was to attend the funeral of her husband.
Apart from the visits by the police chief and Sullivan's Island coastguardsmen, the Goat Woman lived alone and isolated. Wjen the island's few summer residents left this fall, Mrs. Hollaway had an island to herself. She enjoyed solitude.
Seeking "peace and quiet," Mr. and Mrs. Hollaway settled in a jungle-like area of the Isle of Palms in 1931. But when the island started to flourish as a residential area in 1940, the recluses crossed the waterway to Big Goat Island. There they lived a Robinson Crusoe existence, their home a makeshift dwelling of old lumber, wire and old clothes. A little plywood house was built for them in 1960.
Mrs. Hollaway claimed her husband decided to move where he could raise and butcher his own meat without having to worry about abattoirs. The Goat Man once owned a butcher stall in the city market. But with Mrs. Holloway's death, a secret is sealed, what really motivated the Goat Man and Goat Woman to shun society and become hermits.
The herd of goats which they kept earned them their nicknames. At one time they had between 200 and 250 goats on the island. The Goat woman once remarked that her husband drank "only goat milk and rain water from heaven."
Mrs. Holloway, in an interview last April, said she was born August 12, 1886 in Raleigh, NC. Mr. Holloway was born in Georgia in 1876.
Mr. Turner was making arraignments last night to have Mrs. Holloway buried next to her husband's plot in Mount Pleasant Cemetery. Her last resting place is to be the mainland she shunned in life.
Published in the News and Courier, December 1963
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