The Civil War’s Enduring Influence on the Gullah People The end of the Civil War marks the beginning of isolation for the freedmen of the Sea Islands. The individuals emancipated from the coastal islands of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida are now called Gullah. During Reconstruction those on the Sea Islands rarely saw visitors imposed on their isolated space. Many of the residents would travel to the mainland to take care of various aspects of business, but few outsiders came to visit them. The survival of Gullah culture and language is fully dependent on the Civil War. It is a mistake to think of slavery as having a single origin point or homogenous experience from one slave to the next. Experiences of slaves on the Sea Islands, and throughout South Carolina, significantly differed from other slave experiences in the South. Gullah culture emerged from the interactions between Africans, African Americans, Native Americans, and Europeans combining different cultures, tradit...