The number of newspapers that have been digitized, though large and growing larger every year, represents a small fraction of the total number of newspapers published during this period. To identify antebellum American newspapers, a good starting place is the U.S. Newspaper Directory. You can search the directory by state, county, city, time period, as well as by language and ethnicity. The directory also supports keyword searches, but just remember that the database is a collection of records that describe newspapers, so a keyword search is searching these records, not the newspapers themselves. The U.S. Newspaper Directory identifies extant copies of newspapers, which means that the directory doesn't include newspapers for which no issues have survived to the present.
Two other important sources for identifying antebellum American newspapers are History and Bibliography of American Newspapers, 1690-1820 by Clarence Brigham, and American Newspapers, 1821-1936 by Winifred Gregory. Both bibliographies are organized by state and then city; both bibliographies are available for library use only at the Spartanburg County Public Library, as well as several other local institutions in the South Carolina Upstate region.
Locating newspapers (print, microfilm, and electronic versions) in the library catalog can be quite challenging, and the catalog records for newspapers differ from books. Some tips to try:
One of the richest sources of historic newspapers in South Carolina is the South Caroliniana Library on USC's Columbia Campus. Please use the link below to access the holdings of the South Caroliniana, and to find contact information and use guidelines for the library.