Charleston, Arizona
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Charleston is a ghost town in Pima County, Arizona.
It was occupied from the 1870s into the 1890s. The main commerce was milling silver ore mined in nearby Tombstone, Arizona.
It is located at 31.629122n / 110.174417w, on the banks of the San Pedro River, about 15 km southwest of Tombstone.
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Actually, Charleston is in Cochise country, it it approximately 10 miles southwest of Tombstone and 6 miles North East of Sierra Vista. Charleston is now within the San Pedro Riparian National Conservative area and is one of several ghost towns, Including Milleville, Fairbanks and Contention which served as mill towns for the silver mines during the silver boom in approxiamately 1880. All of these mill towns were located along the San Pedro to take advantage of that water source for their operations. The mines in Tombstone were flooded in 1888 and forced to discontinue operations. Charleston hung on until 1899 but, unlike Tombstone, the town too tough to die, Charleston was abandoned and is remembered as the town "too mean to live" Ike Clanton (villain of the Wyatt Erp, OK coral shootout)was a major land owner in Charleston, operating it's first hotel (Canvas at the time) and purchasing several lots, houses and most importantly saloons and liquor stores. The Clanton ranch site is actually located less than 2 miles to the South of Charleston (Still in the Riparian area) but, little of it remains.
