sentences:  Born in Charleston, South Carolina, on August 22, 1807, Gist was the illegitimate child of merchant Francis Fincher Gist and Mary Boyden.He moved with his father to Union County, South Carolina, in 1811 and came under the guardianship of his uncle, Nathaniel Gist, upon the death of his father in 1819.His uncle legally obtained the Gist last name for William Henry and sent him to Columbia to study law at South Carolina College (which became the University of South Carolina after the Civil War ended).