Hunter's Volunteers was an African American militia established on James Island by 1877. Part of the S.C. National Guard, the unit maintained an enlistment of 30-40 men tasked with helping preserve civil order, and most were farmers or laborers. The unit was disbanded in 1891 after trying to stop the arrest of a Black man in Charleston but was reinstated in 1892. In 1897, a year after being disarmed by the state, members chartered the Hunter Volunteer Charitable Society. In 1899, the Volunteers bought the site from Sarah Grimball and Henry Grimball. Over time, the unit became more of a mutual aid society and social club than a military outfit, and a two-story wooden building razed in the 1960s served as their lodge and may have originally been an armory.