Peden McLeod Obituary

Peden Brown McLeod WALTERBORO - Former Senator Peden Brown McLeod, 81, of Walterboro, widower of Mary Waite Hamrick McLeod, died Thursday, December 30, 2021, at Colleton Medical Center. Born September 3, 1940 in Walterboro, he was the son of Walton James McLeod, Jr. and Rhoda Lane Brown McLeod. After college, military service, law school, and judicial clerkship, he returned to Walterboro in 1969 to practice law. He became secretary of the Colleton County Bar Association, became a member of the South Carolina Bar's House of Delegates, and a permanent member of the U.S. Fourth Circuit Judicial Conference. For more than fifty years, he was a leading member of the South Carolina Bar. He was a founder, Board Chairman, and CEO of the Bank of Walterboro, now the Bank of the Lowcountry. He graduated from The Asheville School in Asheville, NC in 1958. He subsequently graduated in 1962 from Wofford College, where he was president of his junior class, president of his senior class, a member of the Senior Order of Gnomes, and a member of Kappa Alpha Order, of which he served as president his senior year. On July 7, 1962, he married Mary Waite Hamrick, of Gaffney, the daughter of Waite Carlisle Hamrick and Mary Strahley Hamrick and a 1962 graduate of Converse College. He served on active duty in the U.S. Army from 1962 to 1964, stationed at Fort Holabird, MD, and Fort Bragg, NC. He was a captain in the U.S. Army Reserve (1962 - 1972). Entering the University of South Carolina Law School in 1964, he was a board member of the South Carolina Law Review, member of the Society of Wig and Robe (the honor society for scholastic achievement), served as president of the Phi Delta Phi legal society, and was a page in the S.C. Senate. Following law school graduation in 1967, he served two years as law clerk for U.S. District Judge Charles E. Simons, Jr. in Charleston. As a civic leader in Walterboro, he served as Commander of the American Legion Post 93, District Chairman of the Boy Scouts of America, and as a member of the Jaycees, Lions Club, Elks Lodge, Moose Lodge, Masons and Shriners. In 1972, he received the Walterboro Jaycees Distinguished Service Award. He served as a Walterboro City Council member from 1970 to 1972. He was elected as a state representative in the South Carolina House of Representatives starting in 1972, where he became a member of the Ways and Means Committee, Assistant Majority Leader, and Chair of the Joint Appropriations Review Committee. On December 4, 1979, he was sworn in as a member of the South Carolina Senate representing Colleton, Beaufort, Jasper, Hampton and Allendale Counties. In the Senate, he became a member of the Finance Committee, Chairman of the Senate Medical Affairs Committee while also serving as a member of the Board of Trustees of the Medical University of South Carolina. He was elected Code Commissioner for the State of South Carolina and Director of the South Carolina Legislature Council and resigned from the Senate effective October 1, 1990. As Code Commissioner, he represented South Carolina as a Commissioner of the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws, and served as Secretary of the South Carolina Judicial Council. He retired as Code Commissioner on February 16, 1998, and received the Order of the Palmetto from Governor David Beasley. After retiring, he returned to practice law full-time in Walterboro. Surviving are four children: Mary Carlisle McLeod Benson (Donald) of Columbia; Peden Brown McLeod, Jr. (Jolee) of Mount Pleasant; Rhoda Lane McLeod Perry (Jim) of Hendersonville, NC; and John Reaves McLeod (fiance;e, Colleen Guffee) of Columbia. There are ten grandchildren: Young Perry; Strahley Benson; Hamrick Perry; Carlisle Benson; McCollough Perry; Eliza Perry; Peden McLeod, III; Bartlett McLeod; Alden Perry; and Mollie McLeod. He is also survived by his brothers, Walton James McLeod, III and Thomas Gordon McLeod III, and predeceased by his brother, William Mullins McLeod. Funeral service will be held on Tuesday, January 4, 2022 at 2:00 p.m. at Bethel United Methodist Church, 355 Hampton Street, Walterboro, with burial service at Live Oak Cemetery, located on South Jefferies Blvd. at Detreville St. in Walterboro. The family will receive friends following the committal at the family residence located at 512 Hampton St. in Walterboro. In lieu of flowers, the family requests that memorials be made to either the Peden McLeod Library at the University of South Carolina Salkehatchie East Campus, 807 Hampton St., Walterboro, S.C. 29488; or the Bethel United Methodist Church, 355 Hampton St., Walterboro, SC 29488. Parker Rhoden Funeral Home, 117 Paul St., Walterboro is assisting the family. Visit our guestbook at legacy.com/obituaries/charleston