Community Hospital

Front inscription

Community Hospital opened at this site in 1949. The 40-room brick facility was built for African Amerian residents of Sumter and outlying areas who were underserved by white-owned Tuomey Hospital, which had a segregated wing for Black patients. At the time of Community Hospital’s construction, this area was outside the Sumter city limits and known as Shot Pouch after the nearby creek. An addition was later made to the front of the building.

Reverse inscription

Land for the hospital was provided by Rev. Harry Bowman Brown. Brown was founder and president of the Sons and Daughters of Job, a local benevolent society that raised the $100,000 cost to build the hospital. The facility had a full-time nursing staff who worked with visiting doctors and surgeons. The hospital became Community Nursing Home in 1964. It later housed a residential care facility. The building caught fire in 2022. It was abandoned at that time.