Beaufort County’s coroner has identified a man whose body was pulled from Chowan Creek in northern Beaufort County nearly three weeks ago, closing one part of an investigation that began with a boater’s grim discovery.
The Beaufort County Coroner’s Office confirmed the man was 32-year-old Calvin Armstrong of Beaufort. His body was recovered from the water near the Chowan Creek bridge along Sea Island Parkway on Sunday, Aug. 30, after a man in a boat spotted him. Chowan Creek separates Lady’s Island from St. Helena Island, a waterway many Beaufort County residents cross daily on their way between the mainland and the sea islands.
Identification found in Armstrong’s clothing pointed investigators toward his name almost immediately, but the coroner’s office withheld any public confirmation until DNA testing verified the match. That kind of caution is standard procedure when a body has been in the water for an unknown period, and it meant families and the wider community waited weeks for an official answer even after informal word had begun to spread.
Cause and manner of death remain pending the results of an autopsy. The coroner’s office has said there is no indication of foul play in Armstrong’s death, though the Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office continues to investigate the circumstances that led to his body ending up in the creek.
Armstrong was not the only person recovered from local waters that same August weekend. A second body, that of 33-year-old Yu Wei Huo, a Navy hospital corpsman third class assigned to the Headquarters and Service Battalion at Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island, was found along the shore of the Broad River the same day. Authorities have not disclosed a cause of death in that case either, and the two discoveries — though geographically close and nearly simultaneous — are being treated as separate investigations.
A funeral notice from Marshel’s Wright-Donaldson identified Armstrong as the son of Eddie Mae Armstrong and Jonas Armstrong. Beaufort County Sheriff’s Office detectives are continuing to piece together the timeline of Armstrong’s final days as the investigation moves forward.
