A belt course, like the one pictured, is an exterior detail made from extending the courses of brick at a certain point, then stuccoing over to create a spatial look between floors. It was less efficient to cut through the extra brick course than either above or below it, and if the brickmasons’ work was not level with the framing, the rod would be obstructed as it obviously was here, so either the separate rods go through at slightly different levels, or the belt course was removed and relaid between the plates, or they simply were cut to fit.
It was not uncommon to fix gib plates on damaged buildings were bricks had fallen and then re-brick over them, as can be seen from Stoll’s Alley on the Northwest corner of the house at 47 East Bay Street, whose corner “coin” had obviously come off during the earthquake, a gib plate affixed, then the coin rebuilt on top of the plate. So, if you look closely around Charleston, you will see the partial earthquake plate look in several locations.