USA > South Carolina > The history of South Carolina in the Revolution, 1775-1780 > Part 64
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2 Life of Lacey (Moore), 19; McCall's Hist. of Ga., vol. II, 338.
3 Clinton-Cornwallis Controversy, vol. I, 188.
4 Steadman's Am. War, vol. II, 227; Tarleton's Campaigns, 171, 200.
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to beat up Marion's quarters and to clear his communica- tions of this menace. Tarleton immediately crossed the Wateree and proceeded across the present counties of Kershaw and Sumter into what is now Clarendon County. He proceeded very cautiously, moving in a very compact body, lest the Americans should gain advantage over his patrols or detachments. Marion, whose numbers were, however, greatly exaggerated, as soon as he heard of Tarleton's expedition, moved at once to meet him. Stop- ping at night on the 10th of November in a wood near where Mr. Charles Richardson lived in Clarendon County, he was about to encamp; but seeing a great light toward General Richardson's plantation, he concluded that the houses of the plantation were on fire, and that Tarleton was there.1
Marion's supposition was correct. The light he saw was that of the burning of General Richardson's late residence by Tarleton. Upon the fall of Charlestown, General Richardson had given his parole, and upon its revocation by Sir Henry Clinton he had been amongst the foremost in expressing his indignation against the injustice and impolicy of the measure. Lord Cornwallis, learning of this, and fearing his influence against the Royal cause, offered him, it is said, in the presence of his family, the choice either to unite himself to the Royal standard, with any office or title he might wish, or that he must submit to close confinement. These tempting offers and intimidat- ing threats were equally disregarded. General Richardson promptly answered, with great decision, in such dignified terms as to elicit an involuntary expression of respect : "I have from the best convictions of my mind embarked in a cause which I think righteous and just ; I have know- ingly and willingly staked my life, family, and property 1 James's Life of Marion, 61.
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all upon the issue. I am well prepared to suffer or tri- umph with it, and would rather die a thousand deaths than betray my country or deceive my friends." The alternative was promptly and rigorously enforced; his health declined under the joint influence of a sickly cli- mate and a loathsome prison-house ; the infirmities of old age (then in his seventy-sixth year) increased rapidly, and death was so evidently approaching that he was sent home in September, to linger out the last remaining hours of his life at his family residence. His remains had been interred but a short time before Tarleton occupied the establishment. He ordered the body of General Richard- son, it is said, to be taken up, and left it exposed until, by the entreaties of his family, they were permitted to reinter it. His pretext for this act of barbarity was that he might examine the features of a man of his decided character; but the true object was, it was believed, to ascertain if the family plate had not been buried in his grave. All the property of the estate which could not conveniently be taken for his Majesty's service or the gratification of his officers, was wantonly and sedulously destroyed. Provisions and houses were all burnt; stock of all descriptions slaughtered or driven away ; negroes captured, until little or nothing was left but the dwelling house. Tarleton, having first been in the house and helped himself to the abundant good cheer it afforded, in person directed the torch to be applied to it, and the widow and three children of General Richardson were only rescued from the flames by the humanity of one of his officers.1
While Marion was deliberating what was to be done, Colonel Richard Richardson, the eldest son of General Richardson, who had himself just escaped from confine- ment by the British on John's Island, and was just 1 Johnson's Traditions, 161, 162 ; James's Life of Marion, 63. VOL. III. - 3 G
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recovering from the smallpox, came in and informed him that by the light of the fire he had been able to form a correct estimate of the strength of Tarleton's command. From this information Marion ascertained that Tarleton's forces were at least double his own numbers, with two field-pieces. To add to Marion's consternation he at the same time discovered that one of his best guides had deserted to the enemy. Knowing that Tarleton now had a guide, and that he was in danger, he immediately re- treated, and crossing in the darkness the Woodyard, then a most difficult swamp, he did not stop until he had passed Richbourgh Mill-dam on Jack's Creek, distant about six miles. Having now a mill pond and miry swamp between him and the enemy, he halted, saying, "Now we are safe." 1
Tarleton, learning from the deserter of Marion's ap- proach, prepared to receive his attack, but at length, unable to account for the slow advance of the Americans, dis- patched an officer with a few men to reconnoitre, who soon ascertained Marion's retreat. Upon receiving this report, Tarleton immediately started in pursuit and continued, he says, for seven hours through swamps and defiles.2 The next morning Marion continued his retreat down Black River for thirty-five miles, halting about ten miles above Kingstree in a position of strength. Tarleton had found Marion's trail across the Woodyard, but had not attempted to follow it ; instead he had gone round in a circuit of about twenty-five miles, when arriving at a wide and miry swamp without a road to pass it he had desisted. It was at this time he is reported to have used the expression which has ever since characterized the two generals, Sum- ter and Marion, "Come, my boys ! let us go back, and we will soon find the game-cock (Sumter); but as for this
1 James's Life of Marion, 62. 2 Tarleton's Campaigns, 172.
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d-d old fox, the devil himself could not catch him." 1 He claimed, however, that he would soon have brought Marion to action, had not an express from Earl Cornwallis overtaken and recalled him. Some prisoners fell into his hands.2
When Lord Cornwallis abandoned Charlotte and fell back to Winnsboro, General Smallwood, who had com- manded a brigade in Gates's disastrous expedition, and who had now been commissioned by the State of North Caro- lina, collected a force of several thousand militia under Generals Jethro Sumner, William L. Davidson, and Allen Jones, and took post at Providence, about six miles south of Charlotte.3 Colonel Davie with 300 mounted infantry advanced to Landsford on the Catawba toward the Brit- ish right,4 and Sumter having assumed command as Briga- dier General moved his camp with 425 men to Fishdam Ford on Broad River, twenty-eight miles from Winnsboro toward the British left. These positions had been taken in consequence of a plan concocted between Smallwood and Sumter while he was in North Carolina, by which Sumter was to manœuvre near the British army at Winns- boro and endeavor to draw off a considerable detachment from Cornwallis in pursuit of him, while Smallwood was to strike at the main army with the remnants of Gates's Con- tinentals and the North Carolina militia. Smallwood, however, having received information that General Greene was soon to be expected to take command of the Southern army, did not cooperate according to his engagement. Sumter commenced the move.5
On the 7th of November Sumter crossed the Broad at Fishdam Ford from what is now Union, into Chester
1 James's Life of Marion.
2 Tarleton's Campaigns, 172.
3 No. Ca. in 1780-81 (Schenck), 185.
4 Wheeler's Hist. No. Ca., 196. 5 McCall's Hist. of Ga., vol. II, 238
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County. From Fishdam Ford the road to Charlotte runs eastward, and on the right there was a plantation fence along the road for half a mile, from the end of which the Winnsboro road leads out to the right. On the left of the road the ground was open for 200 yards from the river, and partially enclosed by a fence ; then a hill of woodland with thick undergrowth began and continued 200 yards farther along the margin of the road, and thence the high ground diverged to the left. On the left, about 250 yards from the road, a deep gully made out from the river, running nearly parallel to the road along the left of the high ground. General Sumter's tent was pitched on the left of the road at the ford. Colonel Richard Winn's troops, 125 in number, were encamped on the General's left, and upward along the river. Colonel Thomas Taylor's were encamped along the gully on the left of Winn, and Colonels Lacey, Bratton, and Hill's troops, upwards of 300 men, were encamped on the high ground in the thick wood, about 350 yards in front. During the day of the 8th Colonels Twiggs and Clarke and Majors Candler and Jackson of Georgia with about 100 men from that State came in ; and in the evening Colonel McCall with a party from Long Cane in Ninety-Six District joined the camp. These reinforcements occupied the ground between Winn's and Taylor's commands. On the morning of the 8th Colonel Taylor with 50 men was ordered to pro- ceed toward Winnsboro to reconnoitre the country and gain intelligence of the enemy's movements. During the day Sumter called his field officers into council. They advised him to retire over Broad River, but this he declined to do. Taylor returned about midnight, without having gained any information.1
1 McCall's Hist. of Ga., 338, 340.
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Lord Cornwallis had received information as to Sumter's position from the people in the neighborhood, for this was in the Mobley settlement, where most of the inhabitants were Tories. His information was in consequence very exact, even to the position of every corps in the encampment, and he had the best guides to conduct him to the different points. Under these circumstances his lordship laid a plan to surprise Sumter, the execution of which he com- mitted to Major Wemyss, who with his regiment, the Sixty-third, had come across the country from their marauding expedition on the Pee Dee, and had now joined the army at Winnsboro. Wemyss had brought with him a sufficient number of horses, which he had plundered from the Whigs, to mount a considerable part of his regiment. This body of mounted infantry, with an officer and forty men of the Legion who had been left at headquarters when Tarleton had been sent after Marion, composed the force with which Wemyss was intrusted to execute his lordship's plan. So minute was the informa- tion they possessed, that an officer with five men were espe- cially detailed to penetrate the camp and attack Sumter himself in his tent.
On the evening of the 8th Wemyss, furnished with guides, moved toward Fishdam. The rapidity of the march brought him to the American post sooner than he expected. A delay till daybreak, which was the time intended for the attack, he thought would discover him to Sumter, who might take the opportunity to escape. He determined, therefore, to make the attempt without loss of time.1 Fortunately Sumter's officers, who, it appears, were uneasy at the situation, were on the alert. Colonel Winn suggested to some of them the probability of the enemy's attempting a surprise, and he took the pre-
1 Tarleton's Campaigns, 173.
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caution to require his men to keep up good fires during the night, and sleep on their arms in rear of their fires. He also wisely pointed out the ground on which they were to form in case of attack. Colonels Twiggs and McCall had taken similar precautions, but their ground was not so well calculated for defence.1 At one o'clock in the morning Major Wemyss, at the head of his corps, charged the picket. Out of five shots fired by the Ameri- can picket two of them took effect in the arm and knee of the British commanding officer. Sumter was in a profound sleep, and his orderly neglecting to awaken him on the first alarm, the British party assigned to that service were at his tent before he could put on his coat. He ran out, leaped the fence, and escaped by the river bank. As soon as the American picket fired, the British advanced in full charge into the camp; but when the dragoons reached the fires before Winn's command, per- ceiving no enemy, and blinded by the light, they paused. This gave Winn's troops a clear view of them, upon which they took deliberate aim and fired. The dragoons themselves, thus surprised, wheeled about, and on their retreat they killed a young man by the name of Sealy, a Loyalist, who had been a prisoner and liberated the day before. The British infantry had dismounted, and now formed and advanced near the fires. As they did so Winn, having formed his men behind the fence, and Twiggs and McCall partially so, opened their fire, which was briskly returned for a short time, when the enemy charged with bayonets ; but the fence obstructing their movements, and receiving a heavy fire from the Ameri- cans, they fell back, when they were met by Taylor, advancing on their flank, who gave them a heavy fire. After an action of twenty minutes the British infantry
1 McCall's Hist. of Ga., 340.
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remounted and retreated. Lacey's, Bratton's, and Hill's corps did not fire a gun, fearing that they would kill their friends, as the action was close and the night very dark. McCall, who gives the most circumstantial account of the battle, says the British loss was con- siderable ; Major Wemyss was badly wounded ; about twenty more were killed and the ground strewed with their wounded. A surgeon, who was sent with a flag to take care of these, declared when he returned to Winnsboro that he had never seen so much injury done by so few troops in so short a time since he had been in America.1 Tarleton states that the British had nearly twenty officers and men killed and wounded.2
Upon the result of this affair, Cornwallis immediately sent an express to Tarleton, and wrote, saying : "Major Wemyss attacked Sumter at Fishdam at one o'clock this morning, contrary to his plan, which was to wait until daylight; the consequence is that Wemyss is wounded and left, and about twenty men. Lieutenant Hoveden is wounded, but I believe the Legion has not lost much. Must beg you to return immediately, leaving some horses · for mounting men at Camden. I am under the greatest anxiety for Ninety-Six, and trust that you will lose no time in returning to me."3 It was this urgent message which recalled Tarleton from his pursuit of Marion.
Wemyss, who was severely wounded, was taken pris- oner, and in his pocket, as we have before mentioned, was a list of the houses he had burned in Williamsburg and on the Pee Dee ; with great trepidation he showed it to Sumter, and begged he would protect him from the mili- tia. Sumter threw the paper in the fire, and notwith- standing the brutality with which Wemyss had personally
1 McCall's Hist, of Ga., 342,
8 Ibid., 200, note.
2 Tarleton's Campaigns, 174.
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superintended the execution of Mr. Adam Cusack and his many other atrocities, he was protected and treated with indulgence, indeed with kindness ; but he became a cripple for life.1
General Sumter, the day after the fight at Fishdam, recrossed the Broad River, and moved down through what is now Union County to one Niam's plantation on the Enoree.2 Here he appears to have concerted with Colonel Clarke of Georgia an attack upon Ninety-Six,3 of which Lord Cornwallis had written he was so appre- hensive. From the Enoree he again moved southerly, through the present Laurens County, and menaced the camp established by Ferguson at Williams's plantation on Little River ; but the British declined to quit their works and come out to battle.4 Indeed, Cornwallis reports that had Sumter at once attacked the camp, he would have met with little resistance.5
Upon the recall of his commander-in-chief, Tarleton had hurried back, and with such celerity had he marched that he had arrived in his neighborhood before Sumter had even heard of his advance. On passing the Wateree, he received instructions from Cornwallis to lead the light troops to Brierley's Ferry 6 on the Broad, where he would find the first battalion of the Seventy-first and a detach- ment of the Sixty-third Regiment. This latter regiment, after its defeat at Fishdam, had not yet returned to Winnsboro when it was directed to proceed to meet Tarle- ton. Before reaching the ferry, Tarleton received further
1 Ramsay's Revolution of So. Ca., vol. II, 189 ; James's Life of Marion, 73; Gregg's Old Cheraws, 306; Johnson's Life of Greene, vol. I, 317, note.
2 McCall's Hist. of Ga., 343.
3 Memoirs of the War of 1776 (Lee), 205.
4 McCall, supra. 5 Tarleton's Campaigns, 204.
6 Afterwards Shirer's and then Strother's Ferry.
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orders from Cornwallis to pass the river with the Legion, the light infantry, and the Sixty-third, and to cut off Sumter, who, he was told, was moving against Ninety-Six. Care was taken to conceal the green uniform of Tarleton's Legion from the American picket, which occupied the opposite bank, in order to throw them off their guard and continue their belief in the absence of the British Legion on the expedition against Marion. On the evening of the 18th Tarleton received information of Sumter's position before the camp at Williams's plantation, with a force represented as one thousand strong. At daybreak the next morning Tarleton started with light troops, taking the direction of Indian Creek, a branch of Enoree, through what is now Newberry County, and marching all day with great diligence, encamped at night with secrecy and pre- caution near that river. Another day's movement was intended up the banks of the Enoree, which would have placed him directly in the rear of Sumter at Williams's plantation. Sumter's surprise was frustrated by a deserter from the Sixty-third Regiment, who, at twelve o'clock that night, carried him the information of Tarleton's approach.1 Upon this Sumter fell back, moving up the country, and took post at Blackstock on the south side of Tyger River in Union County, sixty miles from Winnsboro and thirty- five miles from Fishdam Ford on the Broad River. 2
Blackstock was a large tobacco house, built of logs, long and narrow and of two apartments of eighteen feet square, with eighteen feet space between and a roof or wall. In the rear of the house, a few hundred yards, was the crossing place of the Tyger River ; midway from the house to the river was a hill, sloping down from the right, nearly parallel with the house, and terminating at the
1 Tarleton's Campaigns, 175-176.
2 McCall's Hist. of Ga., 343.
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road. The house was on a second elevation below the hill, with open woodland forming a half moon with its concave to the front. The road led from the river by the right of the house, and, passing its front, descended through the field about one hundred yards to a small rivulet. Near the road to the right was low brushwood, and on the left a field with a fence extending a quarter of a mile in a straight direction where the road divided. The field on the left made a right angle at the house, and the fence ran directly to the left to the low grounds of the river. On the right of the road, opposite to the end of the house,
was a small pole building. On the second elevation, in the rear of the house and parallel thereto, General Sumter encamped his troops, and expecting that he would be attacked, he assigned to each corps its position. Colonel Henry Hampton was directed to occupy the house with his troops. Colonel Twiggs of Georgia, the senior officer under General Sumter, assisted by Colonel Clarke and Majors Candler and Jackson with the Georgia troops, was to occupy the fence and woodland to the left of the house. Colonels Bratton, Taylor, Hill, and McCall were to occupy the right of the house with their right formed on the curve of the rising ground. Their corps was to be commanded by the General in person. Colonel Lacey was directed to cover the right, and Colonel Winn to occupy the hill as a corps of reserve. Colonel Chandler had been detached on the march to collect provisions. General Sumter's force consisted of 420 men.1
Tarleton had continued his pursuit at dawn of the 20th, and before ten o'clock had information of Sumter's retreat. On reaching a ford on the Enoree, where he expected to gain further intelligence or to come up with the Americans, he found that Sumter had passed the
1 McCall's Hist. of Ga., 343, 344 ; Life of Lacey (Moore), 22.
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river nearly two hours before. He states that a detach- ment to cover the rear was waiting there the return of a patrol, and that the advanced guard of the British dragoons charged this body and defeated them with con- siderable slaughter.1 The facts, as given by McCall, were that Captain Patrick Carr with a few men had been ordered to reconnoitre, and had taken prisoners three unarmed Loyal militia and two boys, who had been to the mill. Carr was conducting these men to camp when Tarleton's advance guard came upon them. Carr gave them a shot and fell back to the main body, leaving the prisoners and mill boys behind. These poor fellows were killed by Tarleton's men, and constituted the party he reported defeated " with considerable slaughter."2 Tarle- ton pressed on with his whole force until four o'clock in the afternoon, when, apprehending that Sumter would pass the Tyger River unmolested before dark, he left his Legion light infantry to march at their own pace, whilst he made a rapid pursuit with 170 cavalrymen of the Legion and eighty mounted infantrymen of the Sixty-third Regi- ment.3 Colonel Chandler, with his forage wagon, had just passed Sumter's picket when the picket fired on Tarleton's van. Taylor, with his party and wagons, ran in with the pickets and were closely pursued by the British dragoons when they entered the camp.4
Tarleton immediately advanced to the attack, as he came up with Sumter at Blackstock before five o'clock in the evening. Upon receiving the fire of the American picket, he ordered his infantry to dismount, and with the cavalry made a rapid charge through the field on the Georgians under Colonel Twiggs. The British infantry advanced,
1 Tarleton's Campaigns, 176. 2 McCall's Hist. of Ga., vol. II, 345.
3 Tarleton's Campaigns, 176, 177.
4 McCall's Hist. of Ga., vol. II, 345.
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and Sumter, leading on Bratton, Taylor, Hill, and McCall to the attack, gained their flank.1 Colonel Lacey's mounted infantry advanced to the west side through a thick wood, within seventy-five paces of the enemy, undiscovered, when with a well-directed fire twenty men and nearly as many horses fell. Tarleton's cavalry were afraid to enter the thick wood to get at Lacey's troops, but pressed forward through the lane, where they fell so thickly that their numbers, dying and dead, blocked up the road.2 Meanwhile the Sixty-third was roughly handled. The part of the hill to which their attack was directed was nearly perpen- dicular, and their left was exposed to the log house into which Hampton's men had been thrown and from which, as the apertures between the logs served them for loop- holes, they fired with security. Tarleton, repulsed, fell back with his cavalry, but re-formed, returned to the charge, and thus continued, directing his chief efforts to turn the American left ; he had nearly succeeded in doing this when Colonel Winn advanced to the support of the Georgians. Tarleton was again compelled to retire with precipitation, and was pursued by a party under Major James Jackson, which took upwards of thirty horses. Sumter unfortunately had been disabled. While engaged in leading on the attack from the right, he was shot in the right shoulder. He requested his aide-de-camp to put his sword into the scabbard and to direct a man to lead off his horse. "Say nothing about it," he directed, " and request Colonel Twiggs to take command." The action closed, leaving the Americans in possession of the field.
Colonel Twiggs directed the enemy's wounded to be collected, and as many of them as could be sheltered were laid in the houses. Supposing that Tarleton would renew
1 McCall's Hist. of Ga., vol. II, 344.
2 Life of Lacey (Moore), 23.
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the action with his increased force when the Seventy-first Regiment and the Legion and light infantry came up, Twiggs ordered the troops to retreat and cross the Tyger River, where they would be unassailable. He left Colonel Winn with the command on the battle ground until night ; where Winn caused a number of fires to be lighted up as of an encampment, and then safely crossed the river. There was an extraordinary difference in the casualties occurring between the two parties. Of the British, the American authorities claim that ninety-two were killed and one hundred wounded, among the former Major Moneys and Lieutenants Gibson and Cope. Tarleton admits a loss of but fifty-one. Of the Americans one was killed and three wounded, including Sumter.1
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