There is nothing like going to the land where honorable and brave men not only withstood an empire, but were able to slow its armies down and stall them so that the empire’s people and politicians would lose motivation to continue the fight.
Late on a November day, about dusk, SF1 along with Captain1776 and Malibu, were able to walk on to Dunham’s Bluff and experience what Marion’s lair might have felt like back in 1780 when he and his men used the terrain and topography to be protected from those who sought to kill them. The river was high and slow (slow waters run deep, probably still containing waters from Hurricane Florence from weeks before), but the high ground afforded a sense of security that a castle has when surrounded by a moat.
To reach this point, we needed to ditch the rental car a good mile away and hike in through the South Carolina swamp (complete with alligators, never seen, but definitely heard) to reach one of several secure locations that Marion sought out, this one most likely including earthworks in 1780.
A few miles away to the west was the spot, called Witherspoon’s Ferry in 1780, where Marion was first introduced to Kingstree militia that had requested a Continental officer as a leader from General Gates.
The visit to one of Francis Marion’s areas of resistance prompted a common theme mentioned in the days that followed, all three of us from two different generations, earnestly desire to return to this land someday, and hopefully include yet another generation in the common admiration of a few men, who against all odds, defied empire and authority in the hope of a future based in liberty for all.
-SF1