USA > South Carolina > The history of South Carolina in the Revolution, 1775-1780 > Part 45
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72
557
IN THE REVOLUTION
upon a contract and pledge that the militia and citizens should be treated as prisoners of war on parole, and the same terms had been held out and granted to others who would come in and surrender. By this promise and pledge the British had obtained material advantages. Sir Henry Clinton may not yet have had positive information of the sailing of the French fleet when he made this stipulation ; but he knew that France was at war with his nation, and that he might expect at any time an attack from that quar- ter, either for the relief of the besieged town or upon New York or elsewhere. It was of the greatest consequence to him, therefore, to procure the surrender of Charlestown as speedily as possible, and that without the loss neces- sarily attendant upon a storm of the works. These advan- tages he obtained by the promise that the militia and citizens should be treated as prisoners on parole.
But it was further argued in this paper, as it was assumed in the proclamation, that because the rebel forces in South Carolina had been dispersed, the province should be regarded as having been reconquered and regained to his Majesty, and that hence the duration and protection of the parole had come to an end. This specious argu- ment was much relied upon. But it will not bear a moment's examination .. The parole was surely to con- tinue during the war unless the person giving it was recaptured or exchanged. But what was the war during which it was so to hold? The terms of the surrender of Charlestown and the army had been negotiated with Gen- eral Lincoln, a Continental officer. General Prévost, the year before, had refused to treat with Governor Rutledge as representing the State of South Carolina, and would only treat with General Moultrie, a Continental officer. The army surrendered was a Continental army -that is, it was an army of the thirteen United States. The war
558
HISTORY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
was between Great Britain on the one side and the thir- teen United States and France on the other; and it was well known to the British that there was a treaty between France and the United States by which neither country could make peace without the consent of the other. The war, therefore, during which the parole was to be of force was the general war between these powers, and not a war between Great Britain and South Carolina. It might be, as it did afterward happen, that South Carolina should be regained to the States. Unless the person giving the parole was therefore released by exchange or recapture, he was a prisoner until the government of the United States was overthrown or peace was declared be- tween those States collectively, France, and England. The attempt by the proclamation arbitrarily to change the condition of the South Carolinian who had surrendered from that of a prisoner to that of a subject was a violation of the contract of surrender, and released every one to whom it was applied from the obligation of his parole. This was the view taken by many who would otherwise have remained neutral during the rest of the war.
The British commanders made another mistake as dis- astrous to the cause of the King as the breach of faith in the matter of the paroles. The great body of the Scotch- Irish who had come into the province during the twenty years preceding the Revolution, as has been before observed, had taken no active part in the movement. They had had their own more pressing troubles with the robbers, horse-thieves, and vagrants on the frontier; and while the dispute had been going on in the Low Country about taxation without representation in the Parliament in England, they had been trying in vain to obtain repre- sentation in the local government at home, and courts to preserve order and administer justice in the land they
559
IN THE REVOLUTION
were settling. True, as has elsewhere been explained, it had not been the fault or neglect of the people on the coast that these evils had not been remedied, and that their unfortunate condition was allowed to continue. It had been the fault of the government in England.1 But this was not understood by these people at the time. They were not concerned about the taxation on the tea nor the collection of revenue, which they did not feel; nor, on the other hand, were they disposed to unite in a revolu- tion under the lead of those by whom they considered themselves aggrieved. The Rev. Mr. Tennent had, there- fore, met with little success in his mission in 1775, nor had he succeeded in arousing their sympathies to any great extent by his broadsheets upon the disestablishment of the Church in 1778. These pious, God-fearing, indus- trious people had scarcely been heard from during the four years the war had lasted. Some few of them had been with Richard Winn in Richardson's Snow Campaign and in his company under Thomson on Sullivan's Island on the 28th of June, 1776; some had been with John McLure at Monck's Corner; and a few more had gone with Davie to Charlestown and fought at Stono; but the people gen- erally to the north of Camden were merely passive. They had not as yet been enlisted in the cause and had taken no part in the contest when Tarleton burst upon them in pur- suit of Buford, and horrified, and for the moment stunned them, by his terrible massacre. But butchery, however horrible, was not to appall men who were descended from the defenders of Londonderry and Enniskillen. It only aroused the dormant fierceness and indomitable courage of their nature.
Fortunately, says Johnson, the British felt too confi- dent in themselves, or too much contempt for their enemy,
1 Hist. of So. Ca. under Roy. Gov. (McCrady), 623-643.
560
HISTORY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
to act with moderation or policy. Amidst the infatuation of power and victory their commanders appear to have for- gotten that a nation may submit to conquest, but never to insult. They seem to have forgotten also that religion, which looks to another world for its recompense or enjoy- ments, becomes the most formidable enemy that can be raised up in this. As the Dissenters of New England had the reputation of having excited the war, Dissenters generally became objects of odium to the enemy. Hence their meeting-houses were often burnt or destroyed. One of them in Charlestown was converted into a horse-stable; in the populous settlement of the Waxhaws their minister was insulted, his house and books burnt, and bellum inter- necionis declared against all the Bibles which contained the Scotch version of the Psalms.1 At the command of Major Wemyss, who used the torch as Tarleton did the sword, the church of Indiantown, in what was then St. Mark's Parish, was burnt because he regarded all Presby- terian churches as "sedition shops." The Holy Bible, too, with "Rouse's Psalms " indicated the hated rebel- lious sect, and was universally consigned to the flames.2
Thus, in the course of a few weeks, the British had released their prisoners from their paroles and had con- verted the neutrals in the State into their most implacable enemies. The war spirit was no longer confined to a class in South Carolina; it had taken fire and pervaded the whole people. The heroic period was now to begin.
1 Life of Greene (Johnson), vol. II, 287-288.
2 Hist. of Williamsburg Church, 56.
CHAPTER XXVI
1780
SIR HENRY CLINTON, having issued his famous procla- mations, the effects of which have been told, embarked for New York on the 5th of June, carrying with him all the troops that could be spared, leaving the Earl of Cornwallis in the command of those that remained, with the charge, as we have seen, of carrying the war into North Carolina as soon as the season of the year and other circumstances would permit. The force left under Lord Cornwallis amounted to about four thousand men, and these men in the meantime were dispersed in cantonments so as to cover the frontiers of both South Carolina and Georgia. The principal force was at Camden, under the command of Lord Rawdon.1 It consisted of the Twenty-third and Thirty-
1 Francis, Lord Rawdon, Earl of Moira, was born December 7, 1754, and was at this time but twenty-six years of age. Having completed his education, about the commencement of the American war his lordship entered the army, and embarked with his regiment for Boston. He dis- tinguished himself at the battle of Bunker Hill. His rise in the army by purchase and family interests was very rapid. In 1778 he was appointed Adjutant General to Sir Henry Clinton, with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel in the army. In this position he rendered conspicuous service in the Jerseys and at Monmouth. He was now about to enter upon a career scarcely less distinguished than that of Lord Cornwallis, and like him was after the Revolution to be sent to India as Governor Gen- eral. Lord Rawdon on his return to England was created a peer of Great Britain, and nominated one of his Majesty's aides-de-camp, but he afterward joined the Prince of Wales's fast set. It is said that the paper of his Royal Highness, Lord Moira, and the Archbishop of Canterbury (Cornwallis) was sold by a butcher in St. James at twenty-five per cent
VOL. III .- 20 561
562
HISTORY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
third Regiments, the Volunteers of Ireland, a corps raised by Lord Rawdon while the British army was in possession of Philadelphia, and which became famous for its fighting qualities, Tarleton's legion, Browne's and Hamilton's corps of provincials, and a detachment of artillery. Major Mc- Arthur with the two battalions of the Seventy-first was advanced to Cheraw to cover the country between Cam- den and Georgetown, and to open communication with the loyal Highland settlement at Cross Creek. Georgetown was garrisoned by a detachment of provincials. Camden was connected with the District of Ninety-Six by a strong post at Rocky Mount upon the Catawba, at the point of division between the present counties of Chester and Fair- field. This post was garrisoned by the New York volun- teers and some militia under Lieutenant Colonel Turnbull. At Ninety-Six were stationed three battalions of Royal provincials and some companies of light infantry at first commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Balfour, and afterward by Lieutenant Colonel Cruger. Major Ferguson's corps of Royal provincials and a body of loyal militia were not stationary, but traversed the country between the Catawba and the Saluda. At Augusta Lieutenant Colonel Browne commanded, with his own, a detachment of some other regiments. The rest of the British troops were stationed at Charlestown, Beaufort, and Savannah. Brigadier Gen- eral Patterson commanded at Charlestown and Lieutenant Colonel Alured Clark at Savannah.1 The British line thus ran through the present counties of Chesterfield, Kershaw,
on the pound. It is a curious and interesting fact that Lord Rawdon, Tarleton, Hanger, and McMahon, who served together in South Carolina, were afterward all intimates of the coterie of the Prince as against the father, his Majesty George III. British Military Library (London, 1801), vol. I, 85 ; Memoirs of George IV (Robert Huish, London, 1830), 303. 1 Steadman's Am. War, vol. II, 195.
563
IN THE REVOLUTION
Fairfield, Newberry, and Abbeville. They held quiet pos- session of all the State to the south and east of that line.
In the beginning of June Colonel Lord Rawdon, with the Volunteers of Ireland and a detachment of cavalry of the legion, advanced from Camden into the Waxhaws, which he expected to find a friendly as well as prosperous settlement. But, disappointed in the disposition of the people, after a short stay there he fell back to Camden.
The scene of the Revolution in South Carolina and the actors in it were now alike changed. New men now appeared upon the field, - men who had not met under the Liberty Tree, nor marched in procession with forty- five lights in honor of Wilkes; nor pledged themselves in ninety-two glasses for the Massachusetts non-rescinders, around a table with twenty-six bowls of punch for the members of the Carolina Assembly who had supported their Massachusetts brethren; men who had not attended the Convention under the Exchange in 1774; who had not been of the Council of Safety; who had not counte- nanced the tarring and feathering of those not yet pre- pared to abandon the King; men in short who had had nothing to do with bringing on the Revolution were now to take upits fallen standard and to restore its sinking fortunes. These new leaders, under Rutledge, who him- self had so long been unwilling to close the door to recon- ciliation with the mother country, now seizing the moment of resentment and indignation at the breach of faith and atrocities committed by the British, turned the popular sentiment of the State against the invaders, organized partisan bands, and inaugurated a system of warfare which broke up the plans of the enemy, retarded their movements, harassed their outposts, surprised and captured their con- voys, and often with the most brilliant movements ob- tained signal advantages, sometimes achieving no mean
564
HISTORY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
victories, and always bearing defeat and disaster without loss of faith or spirit. These men, without Continental or State commissions, were the redeemers of the State when the regular forces were captured and dispersed. It is not too much to say that without the partisan leaders of South Carolina and their followers the independence of America would never have been achieved. This will we think clearly appear as we proceed. Chief among these were Sumter, Marion, and Davie. Pickens was later to throw off the bond which now restrained him, and to associate his name indelibly with theirs; but in this most critical period of their country's struggle these three were the men who stepped into the breach and stayed the tide of oppression which was rising to overwhelm their people. None of these, as we have said, had anything to do with bringing on the Revolution, but each had already taken a subordinate part in the war.
Thomas Sumter was born the 14th of July, 1736, in Han- over County, Virginia. His father's family were from Wales, but had removed to England and thence migrated to Virginia. His mother was a Virginian of English stock. Sumter had served in the Virginia Provincial Corps in the French and Indian Wars, and was present at Braddock's defeat in 1755. He had afterward been sent by Governor Dinwiddie on a mission to the Cherokees, and had then accompanied Occonostota and his chiefs to England on their mission in 1762. After this he had settled in South Carolina and married Mary Cantey, a member of one of the oldest and most prominent families in the province.
In the commencement of the Revolution, Sumter, it will be recollected, had been a friend of Moses Kirkland, who had deserted the cause in 1775, and gone to the Brit- ish, and in consequence Sumter himself had been looked
565
IN THE REVOLUTION
upon with suspicion and distrust when he sought a com- mission from the Council of Safety. Indeed, Drayton and Tennent had thought it necessary to warn the Council to be cautious in giving it to him; he was only taken by the Revo- lutionists on probation; Colonel Richardson, with whom he went on the Snow expedition as Adjutant General, promis- ing "to keep a sharp eye on his conduct." It is curious that neither Drayton, Tennent, nor Richardson lived to know that they had nearly excluded from the service of the State one who was in great part to redeem it when all the living leaders of the Revolution were in captivity or exile. Sumter had, however, received his commission, and had afterwards been appointed to the command of the Sixth South Carolina Provincial Regiment, in February, 1776, and as such had been put upon the Continental establish- ment in September of that year. He had been present at the eastern end of Sullivan's Island under Colonel Thom- son at the battle of Fort Moultrie, but had had no oppor- tunity of distinguishing himself in that action. Domestic affliction coming upon him, having lost all of his children but one, the inactivity of the service at that time in- duced him to resign in September, 1777. He had then remained in retirement upon his plantation until the fall of Charlestown, but soon after that event, on the 28th of May, 1780, again took the field. He left home a few hours before Tarleton, in his pursuit of Buford, reached his plan- tation, and escaped into North Carolina, where he joined Governor Rutledge. Tarleton, upon reaching Sumter's plantation and finding that he was gone, burnt his house. From that time until the war was practically over Sumter devoted himself to the service of his country in its struggle for independence. This having been achieved in a great measure by him, he was at last forced from the field by the intrigues of those whose successful careers were
566
HISTORY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
rendered possible by his exploits, and who came into the State to reap the fruits of his service.
Sumter was a man of large frame, well fitted in strength of body to the toils of war. "His aspect was manly and stern," says Lee, - who, however, it may be observed here in passing, united with Greene, as we shall see, to suppress him, - "denoting insuperable firmness and lofty courage. He was not overscrupulous as a soldier in his use of means, and was apt to make considerable allowances for a state of war. Believing it warranted by the necessity of the case, he did not occupy his mind with critical examination of the equity of his measures, or of their bearings on individ- uals, but indiscriminately pressed forward to his end - the destruction of the enemy and liberation of his country. In his military career he resembled Ajax, relying more upon the fierceness of his courage than upon the results of unrelaxing vigilance and nicely adjusted combination. Determined to deserve success, he risked his own life and the lives of his associates without reserve - enchanted with the splendor of victory, he would wade through tor- rents of blood to attain it. He drew about him the hardy sons of the upper and middle grounds, brave and deter- mined like himself, familiar with difficulty and fearless of danger, and traversed the region between Camden and Ninety-Six.1
The same general character is given him by Garden. "No man," says this author, " was more indefatigable in his efforts to obtain victory, none more ready for the generous exposure of his person and the animating ex- ample of intrepidity to deserve it. His attacks were im- petuous and generally irresistible. He was far less inclined to plan than to execute; and on many occasions, by an
1 Memoirs of the War of 1776 (Lee), 74.
567
IN THE REVOLUTION
approach to rashness, accomplished what prudence would have forbidden him to attempt."
Dr. Caldwell describes him as greatly superior to Marion in personal strength. Trusting less, he says, to stratagem and skill, he placed his fortune much more exclusively on his daring resolution and the execution of his sword. Warm in temperament and devoted to his country, whatever could contribute to rescue her from the invader and establish her independence became an object of his ardent affection. He was also enamoured of brilliant achievement for its own sake. To victory and the glory of achieving it he would cut his way through every danger, regardless alike of his own blood and that of his enemy. If, from want of due precaution or from an exuberance of courage, misfortune and defeat sometimes assailed him, they neither broke his spirit nor enfeebled his hopes. Unmoved as the firmest Roman in the best times of the commonwealth, he never despaired of the arms of his country. With an inflexible resolution to witness her triumph or not to survive her overthrow, he pressed toward his object with direct aim and unrelaxing vigor.1 Lord Cornwallis, writing to Tarle- ton to give energy to his pursuit, says, "I shall be glad to hear that Sumter is in no condition to give us further trouble ; he certainly has been our greatest plague in this country." 2
These sketches of Sumter by Garden and Caldwell were written after, and bear the impress of, that of Lee ; before fully accepting their criticisms upon Sumter's rashness, it should, therefore, be observed that Lee was Sumter's rival, and, as it will appear hereafter, was jealous of his fame, and intrigued with Greene to keep him down. As we
1 Memoirs of the Life and Campaigns of the Hon. Nathaniel Greene, Major General, etc. (Charles Caldwell, M.D.), 111.
2 Garden's Anecdotes, 32.
568
HISTORY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
come to study his career more closely by the light of mate- rial to which neither Garden nor Caldwell had access, it will appear, we think, that if Sumter was at times rash and lacked the caution of Marion, he was nevertheless a man of larger and broader views, and with a much greater military instinct than has been represented; and that, indeed, had his strategy prevailed, and not been overruled by Greene, it might have been better for the cause, -the British army might have been crushed immediately after the evacuation of Camden by Lord Rawdon in May, 1781, before the acci- dental renforcement which enabled Stewart to hold his ground when assailed by Greene at Eutaw the following September.
Francis Marion was of Huguenot descent. He was born in St. John's Berkeley,1 in the year 1732, and so was four years older than Sumter. In 1759 he settled in St. John's Parish at a place called Pond Bluff, about four miles below Eutaw, the famous battlefield. It was in this year that the Cherokee War broke out, and Francis Marion volunteered in his brother's troop of provincial cavalry. In 1761 he served in the expedition under Colonel Grant as a lieutenant in Captain William Moultrie's company, form- ing a part of a provincial regiment commanded by Colonel Middleton.2 General Moultrie said of him in that cam- paign that he was an active, brave, and hardy soldier, and an excellent partisan officer. He was a member of the Provincial Congress of 1775, but does not appear to have taken any active part in its deliberations ; and, as has been seen, he was appointed captain in the Second Regiment under Moultrie, to the command of which he succeeded. He had already seen considerable service. As major of the Second Regiment he was in the action of the 28th of
1 Simms' Magazine, vol. I, 273.
2 So. Ca. under Roy. Gov. (McCrady), 350.
569
IN THE REVOLUTION
June, 1776. He had been with Moultrie during Prevost's invasion in 1779, and was present at the siege of Savannah. When Sir Henry Clinton arrived with his invading force, Marion was in command of a body of light troops at Shel- don, and with these he had joined Moultrie at Bacon's Bridge. There he had been relieved by Lieutenant Colonel Henderson, and had gone into the town. Before, however, the investment had been completed, an accident befell him which, no doubt regarded at the time as a great misfortune, turned out to be indeed a blessing in disguise to him and to his people. Dining one day with a party of Whigs at the house of a friend, according to a very general custom of the time his entertainer had turned the key upon his guests so that none could leave until the festivities were over. Marion's sense of duty, however, would not allow him to remain, and in attempting to escape from this drink- ing party, through a window, he fell to the ground and dis- located his ankle in a very serious manner. Being unfit for duty, he was sent out of the town upon a litter to his seat in St. John's Parish. This accident saved him from captivity with the rest of the garrison of the town. After Huger's defeat at Monck's Corner the whole of this part of the country was opened to the British, and to escape from their foraging and marauding parties Marion was obliged to move about from house to house, and often to hide in the woods. After the fall of the town, as soon as he was able, he set out for North Carolina to join any force that he might find there. On the road he met Major Peter Horry on a similar mission. Upon arriving at Hillsboro they found General Isaac Huger and Colonel White, whose regiments had been so badly cut up at Lenuds's Ferry, and learned from them that Washington had sent on a detach- ment of Continentals who were now on the march to aid South Carolina. There they met, also, Colonel Senf, the
570
HISTORY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
engineer officer who had been in Charlestown, and by him were introduced to the Baron De Kalb, who was in com- mand of the troops. Marion and Horry were received with great courtesy by De Kalb, and were soon appointed by him supernumerary aides. As such they accompanied the Baron on Gates's advance into South Carolina, and were with him until just before the battle of Camden, when Gates, confident of victory, to get rid of them sent them off to the Santee to destroy every scow, boat, or canoe that could assist an Englishman in his flight to Charlestown.1 This was the commencement of Marion's brilliant career.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.