THE STORY
Reported Haunting
The Hermitage is closely associated with the famous Lowcountry legend of Alice Flagg. According to folklore, Alice's disapproving brother took her secret engagement ring and threw it into the marsh shortly before her death. Her ghost is said to leave the house clutching her chest, wandering toward the marsh or All Saints Cemetery as though still searching for the missing ring.
The Hermitage is a historic nineteenth-century home in Murrells Inlet closely associated with Alice Flagg, whose tragic love story became one of the South Carolina Lowcountry's best-known ghost legends. According to traditional accounts, Alice fell in love with a young lumberman whom her family considered socially unsuitable. Her brother, Dr. Allard Flagg, strongly opposed the relationship and reportedly sent Alice away to boarding school. Alice later became gravely ill, traditionally said to have been malaria, and returned home. The legend says her brother discovered that Alice had secretly kept her lover's engagement ring tied around her neck beneath her clothing. He removed the ring and threw it into the nearby marsh. Alice died shortly afterward. Her spirit is said to remain restless because she was buried without the ring. Witnesses and generations of local storytellers have described Alice walking from The Hermitage toward her grave, wandering through the marsh, or clutching at her chest where the ring once rested. The historic house was moved a short distance from its original creekfront setting in 1990 and now stands on Chandler Avenue. It remains private residential property and should not be entered or approached without permission.