Ridgeville, in what was then Colleton County before Dorchester County was founded in 1897, dates from 1831 and was one of the first stations on the S.C. Rail Road from Charleston to Hamburg. The area was called Ridgeville as early as 1820 for its location on a ridge between Four Holes Swamp and Cypress Swamp. From the 1840s to the Civil War, it was a popular destination for pleasure parties taking day trips from Charleston on the S.C. Rail Road. Town lots were laid out and sold in 1849, and the town became a planters' summer retreat and a center of trade. One antebellum visitor called Ridgeville "a very pleasant, healthy village" and its citizens "industrious, prosperous and hospitable." It was incorporated in 1875 with limits extending a half-mile radius from the depot, was centered along Railroad Ave. and Main St., and its timber and turpentine industries flourished into the 20th century.