Tag: Cornwallis

American Wants You Addicted to Government Worship Days – Be Aware of the Lies

I hate lies. I love truth. Friends don’t let friends believe in lies .. but they also allow someone that process .. towards truth .. it is a different timeline for everyone .. everyone is unique and ultimately have to own their own beliefs, values, mission, etc.

By the way, I detest the way the Lincoln administration chose to bury their dead on an honorable man’s private property .. a man who had 100x the character of Lincoln himself when it came to principles. Lincoln’s words in 1848 about a very Jefferson idea about the consent of the governed would have been something that Robert E. Lee would have agreed with .. and when Lee acted on this belief, Lincoln made sure Lee could never return to his home.

The quote Lee and Lincoln would agree to:

“Any people, anywhere, being inclined and having the power, have the right to rise up and shake off the existing government, and form a new one that suits them better. This is a most valuable, a most sacred right, a right which we hope and believe is to liberate the world. Nor is this right confined to cases in which the whole people of an existing government may choose to exercise it. Any portion of such people, that can, may revolutionize, and make their own of so much of the territory as they inhabit. More than this, a majority of any portion of such people may revolutionize, putting down a minority, intermingled with, or near about them, who may oppose their movements.” ~ Lincoln January 12 1848, expressing the near-universally held Jeffersonian principle

Anyway. “back in the day” it seems like, only 3 years ago, Jacob Hornberger at FFF shared this 2018 Memorial Day article:

Today, Memorial Day, Americans across the land will hear the same message: that U.S. soldiers who have died in America’s foreign wars and foreign interventions have done so in the defense of our rights and freedoms. It is a message that will be heard in sporting events, memorial services, airports, churches, and everywhere else that Memorial Day is being commemorated.

There is one big thing wrong, however. It’s a lie. None of those soldiers died protecting our rights and freedoms. That’s because our rights and freedoms were never being threatened by the enemy forces that killed those soldiers.

Let’s work our way backwards…

Pure propoganda on the part of the government that “we” finance. Not cool!

Yes, lets look at how the US military defended our rights and freedoms … it should not take long and you will see that it has been a LONG time since they actually did that:

Syria. The Syrian government has never invaded the United States and tried to take away our rights and freedoms. Therefore, any U.S. soldier who has died in Syria was not killed protecting our rights and freedoms.

Niger. The Niger government has never invaded the United States and tried to take away our freedoms. Therefore, any U.S. soldier who has died in Niger was not killed protecting our rights and freedoms.

Iraq. The Iraq government never invaded the United States and tried to take away our rights and freedoms. Therefore, any U.S. soldier who has died in Iraq was not killed protecting our rights and freedoms.

Afghanistan. The Afghan government never invaded the United States and tried to take away our rights and freedoms. Therefore, any U.S. soldier who has died in Afghanistan was not killed protecting our rights and freedoms. Even al-Qaeda never invaded the United States and tried to take away our rights and freedoms. Its terrorist attacks, including the one on 9/11, were retaliation for U.S. interventionism in the Middle East.

Panama. The Panama government never invaded the United States and tried to take away our rights freedoms. Therefore, any U.S. soldier who died in Panama was not killed protecting our rights and freedoms.

Grenada. The Grenada government never invaded the United States and tried to take away our rights freedoms. Therefore, any U.S. soldier who died in Grenada was not killed protecting our rights and freedoms.

Vietnam. The North Vietnam government never invaded the United States and tried to take away our rights and freedoms. Therefore, any U.S. soldier who died in Vietnam was not killed protecting our rights and freedoms.

Korea. The North Korean government never invaded the United States and tried to take away our rights freedoms. Therefore, any U.S. soldier who died in Korea was not killed protecting our rights and freedoms.

World War II.

The Japanese government never invaded the United States and tried to take away our rights and freedoms. Therefore, any U.S. soldier who died in the Pacific theater in World War II was not killed protecting our rights and freedoms. The Japanese attack on U.S. Naval forces on Hawaii was intended solely to prevent the U.S. Navy from interfering with Japanese attempts to acquire oil in the Dutch East Indies in response to President Roosevelt’s oil embargo, whose aim was to provoke the Japanese into attacking the United States so that the U.S. could get into the European part of war.

The German government never invaded the United States and try to take away our rights and freedoms. Therefore, any U.S. soldier who died in the European theater in World War II was not killed protecting our rights and freedoms. Germany wasn’t even able to cross the English Channel to invade England, much less the Atlantic Ocean to invade the United States. In fact, the last thing that Germany wanted was war with the United States, as reflected by Germany’s refusal to react to President Roosevelt’s repeated provocations to get Germany to attack the United States. Germany only declared war on the United States after FDR successfully provoked the Japanese into attacking the U.S. Navy fleet at Pearl Harbor, in the hope that this would provide a back door to entry into the war in Europe.

World War I. The German government never invaded the United States and tried to take away our rights freedoms. Therefore, any U.S. soldier who died in World War I was not killed protecting our rights and freedoms, especially given the ridiculous aims of U.S. intervention into the war: to “end all wars” and to “make the world safe for democracy,” a word that isn’t even in the U.S. Constitution. In fact, it is perversely ironic that it was U.S. interventionism into the conflict that contributed to the rise of Nazi Germany and World War II.

The Spanish-American War. The Spanish government never invaded the United States and tried to take away our rights freedoms. Therefore, any soldier who died in the Spanish-American War was not killed protecting our rights and freedoms.

I will add the following:

The War Against Southern Independence (of seven states originally, wrongly called a civil war, wrong because the southern states did not want any other territory, PERIOD).

The South Carolina militia in Dec 1860 to April 1861 never invaded the United States and try to take away the rights of those in other states. As a sovereign entity (reclaiming what it had before the Constitution and the Articles of Confederation) it said LEAVE US ALONE.

The Confederate States of America from Feb to April 1861 never invaded the United States and try to take away the rights of those in other states. While after the US Army detachment in Fort Moultrie violated the agreement in place since Dec 1860 when it agreed NOT to take any action in Charleston Harbor and remained at peace in what was now South Carolina territory (seceded from USA), Gen. Anderson, in the cover of night moved his troops to Fort Sumter. When Lincoln attempted to resupply the fort with provisions AND troops was when the forces around Charleston Harbor chose to fire on Fort Sumter .. KILLING NO ONE.

The Confederate States of America, after the bombardment of Fort Sumter (now 11 states) from April – July 1861 never invaded the United States and try to take away the rights of those in other states.

President Abraham Lincoln waited until 04JUL1861 to call Congress to session to officially declare “an insurrection” in parts of the United States. This was followed by a major campaign by Union forces to invade Virginia resulting in the first major battle of the war at the Battle of First Manassas (Battle of First Bull Run is the Union forces name) on 21JUL1861. The northern states was the aggressor but through propaganda during and after the war, most people see the southern states as traitors and the aggressors for a domestic war.

CASE CLOSED!

Why celebrate Memorial Day when the reason for its existence is based on lies .. it is yet another government piece of propaganda that when repeated enough get into the heads of the sheep!

Bottom line is that while the defense of the United States in the War of 1812 was honorable, even that war was entered into under questionable circumstances and outright lies. Know that by 1814 the NORTH was ready to secede from the United States (peacefully) .. you might want to Google the “Hartford Convention of 1814”

“… the Hartford Convention began a three-week debate about the relationship between the then 18 states and the federal government. The meeting was held in secret by New England members of the Federalist Party and there were nationwide fears that the Hartford Convention would call for New England’s secession from the Union.

New Englanders were unhappy over political concerns that they were being badly treated by the Union. Since Thomas Jefferson’s election in 1800, the president had been a Southerner chosen by an electoral system that allowed the slave-holding Southern states to count each slave as 60 percent of a free person for their allocation of congressional seats and the number of presidential electors…”

Did the southern states invade the north to keep this from happening? No! As early as 1804, sensing that New England was not happy with things (this time it was the Louisiana Purchase, another time when secession was discussed in the north.):

“Whether we remain in one confederacy, or form into Atlantic and Mississippi confederacies, I believe not very important to the happiness of either part.  Those of the western confederacy will be as much our children & descendants as those of the eastern, and I feel myself as much identified with that country, in future time, as with this; and did I now foresee a separation at some future day, yet I should feel the duty & the desire to promote the western interests as zealously as the eastern, doing all the good for both portions of our future family which should fall within my power.”

–Letter from President Thomas Jefferson to Dr. Joseph Priestly, Jan. 29, 1804

So maybe the American Revolutionary War was really the last time the government’s troops fought for our freedom and for our rights. Think about that!

-SF1

PS Also, if you think George Washington was really the tactical hero of Yorktown, just know that when the French general Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau told Washington to move his troops to Yorktown as the French fleet was coming to contain the British troops under Cornwallis there, Washington had a melt-down and at first refused the thought thinking as he had the last few years that the decisive battle HAD to take place against the British in New York harbor. [Do your own research!]

Collectivism Addiction – The US Society Circles the Drain

The masses have been sold that collectivism, the whole “Diversity and Inclusion” agenda (typical these days to name things opposite of what they actually accomplish, like war on terror, war on poverty, Anfifa and BLM), has been projected to make a better tomorrow, for the “greater good”.

Puke. Anyone with critical thinking skills knows that people are unique individuals, endowed by their Creator with unique talent and gift set, that in community with others “can” achieve amazing things to the benefit of society. Most of the time, this is serendipitous, luck or I contend, a God-arranged group for such a time. Think militias in South Carolina colony that kept Cornwallis behind in his agenda to roll up the southern colonies and join Clinton in the north to finish off George Washington.

From an eight year old article in Lew Rockwell’s web site ( ‘The Scourge of Collectivism’ ) comes some pretty accurate critique of this whole collective approach to life, that no doubt only benefits the ruling elites in the long term.

Unless a man has talents to make something of himself, freedom is an irksome burden. Of what avail is freedom to choose if the self be ineffectual? We join a mass movement to escape individual responsibility, or, in the words of the ardent young Nazi, “to be free from freedom.”

~ Eric Hoffer

Yes, Nazism is pure collective and totalitarian thought. You can group this with Fascism, Socialism, Communism and even Democracy.

As Butler Shaffer pointed out in the past in his great article titled Collectivist Utopias:

“All political systems are socialistic, in that they are premised upon the subservience of individual interests to collective authority.”

Politics is the place where good ideas go to die. I have seen this inside big business, small churches and the US government.

“Collectivism holds that, in human affairs, the collective — society, the community, the nation, the proletariat, the race, etc. — is the unit of reality and the standard of value. On this view, the individual has reality only as a part of the group, and value only insofar as he serves it.”

~ Leonard Peikoff

This is America’s greatest loss in the last century, the lure of collectivism is an easy out for the masses to pretend they are helping.

The mind of the collectivist is empty and pitiful, and has not the ability to think on its own. It has no uniqueness; it has no individual personality. It does not create, nor does it possess any sense of self. The collectivist mind can’t possess these virtues because it is only a very small cog in a wheel of the group. It is but a speck in the midst of a mob. This is the story of America today, as collectivism runs rampant and individualism is shunned.

It is a very sad story that runs counter to what the founding generation had to offer each colony, the American colonies and the world. Acting as individuals that each could think for themselves, militias came and went, bad battles/strategies had no one to fight them, good battles/strategies had plenty of volunteers. The collective Continental Army was not as lucky.

When collectivism takes hold, individual rights naturally disappear, and mob rule policies take root. This policy transformation of course, is affected by the state. The progression from a system that is based on individual self rule and individual sovereignty to one of community or nation is not in the interest of freedom and liberty. When any political system is in place, this negative progression is easily achieved nonetheless. Only peaceful anarchy allows for the individual to be truly sovereign. Only when the state is absent can freedom flourish.

Ruling “elites” crave this merging of individuals into a societal tumor, because this cancer destroys the power of individual thought. The result of this diseased system can lead only to consensus and compromise. It can lead only to corruption. Consensus leads to no real decision at all, and the following compromise is nothing more than a mass combining of ignorance. When political policy is decided in this manner, it serves only to limit the individual’s ability to achieve.

The state is the poison for society. The state must be minimized for liberty and freedom to thrive. Perceived safety as a goal always leads to little liberty and little safety in the long term.

“.. In the United States today, virtually everything is decided by the few, but with the implied consent of the mob. The U.S. political system has major aspects of socialism and fascism, and is certainly an oligarchy, but most have the misguided notion that the mob is in charge. This is due to a belief by the masses in the farce of voting. Voting gives the false impression that the voters themselves are in control, but nothing could be further from the truth. In essence, those voted into office as “representatives” of the people, are fully controlled by very powerful interest groups, and these groups are the real rulers. This is a very flawed system, but it is one that gives the false impression that the majority rules. That is simply not the case, and even if it were, it would still be immoral! This system is accepted and embraced by the crowd, but in reality, why should anyone rule over anyone else, majority or not? How can freedom survive in a place where one has the power to rule over another? I can tell you, it can’t!..”

In 2020, only those in denial still believe that voting matters.

Finally, be aware of all the ways this collective thought, sounding so true when first heard, can be destructive of families and communities, which is the ultimate goal of the ruling elites.

“.. The collective “we” has been brainwashed into believing that self-interest, self-responsibility, and self-sufficiency are not in the best interest of the group, but just the opposite of course is the case. This brainwashing has been accomplished through a long indoctrination process that is still firmly in place…”

  • Consider the government’s “public” school system, where most every child in the country is taught the same nonsense for most of his learning years, and is indoctrinated throughout childhood to love first his community, state, and nation.
  • Consider the worship for a constitution that gave massive and in some cases, unlimited (not limited) power to a federal government, and lessened greatly the importance of the individual in favor of the “general welfare.”
  • Consider the reliance on government welfare by the people via the multitude of social programs that are meant to make dependency on government almost mandatory.
  • Consider the mindset of the “99 per centers” that aim to force the so-called 1 per cent to be more inclusive, fair, and responsive to the group.
  • Consider the mob’s acceptance of a heavy and progressive income taxation used as a way to equalize outcomes by redistributing private property for the so-called benefit of all.
  • Consider “public” lands or “public” anything.
  • Consider the idiotic term, “giving back.”
  • Consider today’s strict concentration on race, class, society as a whole, community, state, and nation, all more important than the individual.
  • Consider the mass acceptance of the National Anthem and the communistic Pledge of Allegiance.
  • Consider the constant call “for the greater good of society!”

We need to challenge the promotion of this poisonous thought in unique ways that only the individual can carry out being wise as a serpent and harmless as a dove 🙂

Peace out

-SF1

When Innovative Projects Get Hijacked (Part 2 of 2)

As a follow-up to my previous post about innovation hijacking, the above photo shows President George Washington leading 13,000 troops to put down a tax rebellion that was totally just according to the principles of the Declaration of Independence.:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent

Alexander Hamilton’s plan to pay for the combined war debts of all the colonies with a heavy Whiskey Tax (in today’s terms, $2.50/gallon), in the Distilled Spirits Tax of 1791 act.

How very British of Alexander right? Apparently, the Amerexit (secession of the thirteen colonies from the British empire) was all in vain as the names and flags have changed but power instead of liberty reigns yet again. Hijacked!

So in my last post I had shown how George Washington, as a young British officer, sparked a war between two superpowers in the Ohio country, called the French Indian War (1754-1763), this conflict had a distinct fallout in the American colonies after its conclusion.  My effort today is where:

… I hope to bring both the ramp-up to revolution over the next 25 years (1750-1775) as well as the end result of the quest for independence into focus, and how the dreams of the 20% of the people that were for independence, liberty and freedom were hijacked resulting in a culture in 1790 that involved the very things they were fighting against:

… tyranny, new or higher taxes, monopolies, and restrictions …

By the end of the war the British Empire was the undisputed superpower in both North America and Europe and was all too eager to foist upon their hapless colonial subjects the previously unenforced Navigation Acts along with new taxes. Thanks George!

The liberty experienced for the past 140+ years started losing ground to increased power that the state brings with coercion and violence. To be sure, this shift was gradual, but within a generation it was clear that the British empire failed to understand each of the American colonies to the extent that they should never had intervened from thousands of miles away. As any parent knows, once you have a child on the way to their own independent life, attempting to control that child for the parent’s own well-being is an effort in futility UNLESS you make slaves of everyone.

In England itself, with the liberal Whigs out of power and the warmongering Tories in control, there was fresh support for the new King George III who would station its troops in the colonies during peacetime, enforce the Navigation Acts, restrict western settlement to stunt growth, and institute new Parliamentary taxation. Statist power came like a pendulum to each of the colonies. So with the Proclamation Line of 1763 that restricted western settlement, the 1764 American Revenue Act that enacted taxes on sugar and increased customs enforcement, and the 1765 Stamp Act that raised new taxes on paper products, it was finally The Stamp Act that was especially hated and produced a storm of protest.

Why was there no general revolt in 1763, or 1764? Murray Rothbard has a thought from his fifth volume of Conceived in Liberty:

Ultimately, revolutions are mass phenomena, and cannot succeed without the support—indeed the active and enthusiastic support—of the great majority of the population. . . . Otherwise it will not even make a respectable showing, much less take and keep the reins of government. But the masses will not move, will not erupt, if they lack aggressive leaders to articulate their grievances and to point the path for them to follow. The leaders supply the necessary theoretical justification and analysis of the revolution’s short- and long-term goals. Unaided by leaders, the masses tend to accept each act of tyranny, not out of willing agreement, but from failure to realize that successful opposition can be mounted against the status quo. The articulation by the leaders is the final necessary spark that ignites the tinderbox of revolution.

Leaders are not appointed, they rise to the occasion when this kind of statist tyranny happens. These leaders risk all, as during the American Revolution demonstrated in just the lives of those that signed the Declaration of Independence.

In 1765, Patrick Henry and Samuel Adams, who respectively wrote the Virginia Resolves and Massachusetts Resolves stepped up their game. Sam Adams also established a resistance group known as the Loyal Nine, which soon expanded into the colony-wide Sons of Liberty. The result was that by 1766 The Stamp Act was repealed.

However, in Massachusetts after the passage of the tax-increasing Townshend Acts in 1767, British troops occupied Boston and colonial assemblies were forced to be dissolved. The colonies responded to this increasing coercion with mass non-importation protests that severely hurt British commerce. This BOYCOTT sent a message to the British that eventually, three YEARS later resulted in that the Townshend Acts were partially repealed in 1770.

Yet again, the British Empire pushed buttons yet again as they are now dealing with a teenager, and enacted the Tea Act of 1773 that extended the British East India Company’s tea monopoly to American shores.

This was epic BS as ANY nation that picks and chooses where their people can purchase products THEY want (i.e. free trade) is not a friend of the consumer and is a fried of both economic warfare and eventual physical warfare. Here is looking at you President Trump with all your sanctions and trade deals. But I digress …

Those in Boston promptly responded accordingly with the famous Boston Tea Party of December 1773. Great Britain responded with the Coercive, or “Intolerable” Acts of 1774, which provoked the assembly of the First Continental Congress in late 1774.

It was at this point that the radicals (I am pretty sure in 2019 USA that these people would have been targeted, marginalized and most likely suicided), led by Massachusetts’ Sam and John Adams and Virginia’s Patrick Henry and Richard Henry Lee, battled the conservatives and decided upon a colony-wide boycott of all British products.

In the spring of 1775, the British redcoats responded by trying to arrest Massachusetts radicals John Hancock and Sam Adams, who were currently near military supplies in Concord. Paul Revere traveled to nearby Lexington to warn of the impending British, and colonial minutemen confronted the approaching British troops. The showdown led to the famous “Shot Heard Round the World,” and the American Revolution began.

At this point, with open warfare on the people, which is what the confiscation of firearms is, how does liberty respond to power? Philosophically, it was with managing the war that the forces of liberty faced their most difficult challenge, since war is naturally a coercive event that leads to death and destruction.

The war itself split the liberty lovers that probably included less than 20% of the general population. Many would align with power within this renegade government and use British tactics and statism against the British. How absurd. Bringing war to a larger power in the same way that larger power does war is a study in insanity. This was accomplished both during the American Revolution as well in the Second American Revolution, the War Against Southern Independence that most people refer to as the American Civil War.

Murray Rothbard, in Conceived in Liberty Volume I-IV, yet again points to what method actually saved the American Revolution, which was the use of guerilla warfare where he is paraphrased as saying:

… the Patriots’ greatest military strength lay in their guerrilla warfare tactics (ambushing armies, sneaking behind enemy lines, disrupting supply chains, etc.) and he argued that the only libertarian method of fighting a war is through such guerrilla warfare. This is because it is relatively inexpensive since there is no standing army, soldiers are better motivated because they are close to home, and there is far less need for a stifling and oppressive military bureaucracy.

.. and beyond this, the strategy that was chosen:

.. the decision to fight the war conventionally led to enormous government intervention in the economy through paper-money inflation, debt financing, price controls, and confiscation of goods

War debt leads once again to a desire for a strong central government that will eventually bring tyranny to the forefront yet again, like in 1794 with Washington leading 13,000 troops into Western Pennsylvania and the very real situation we have today with a militarized Redcoat fully entrenched here in the USA in 2019:

So we have come full circle in showing how this struggle between liberty and innovation has with power and political status-quo bureaucracy.

So quickly, in general, I will offer two of my own experiences with this as I referred to in my previous post:

Also in “Part 2”, I hope to offer my own general experiences of where an innovative project’s dreams were hijacked by political and organizational forces bent on expediency and short term gains.

I have a two in mind, one in business and one in ministry, that I have personally participated in. The parallels are very interesting!

It does seem that innovative projects and initiatives do threaten the political status-quo in any organization. I have no doubt that this is the main reason that Jesus himself resisted the human-natural act of forming an organization to accomplish some vision or mission.

In corporate America, as opposed to smaller businesses, there seems to be a bent toward managing verses leading, that risks are to be totally managed so as to really make no progress at all for years or decades. In the end, the business can no longer sustain itself as management surrounds itself with “yes men” (I know that sounds wrong in this PC-world, just assume someone else e-mailed me about this aggression) and stifles innovation that would actually IMPROVE the ability of the business to provide value to its customers going forward.

In my specific case, a very innovative project was hijacked in the development stage by management that failed to understand the project’s attributes and decided to bring in a partner that was ill-equipped to compete development and bring the project into production. Along the way, typical traits were demonstrated like the marginalization of those who really knew the core philosophy of the project as well as how the design was intended to positively impact this business. In the end, money was squandered and the project, like so many in government circles (F-35, Ford Carrier Class, etc), ends up imploding and being a general dumpster fire where good money is thrown after bad.

In organized ministry circles, similar innovative approaches can also bring the status-quo political fake news people out of the woodwork to halt anything that they can understand as being beneficial for people who could use a relationship with Jesus to bring peace and love to their lives and give them an insight into the way that Papa (God, Father) is especially fond of them. Close-minded church-goers and rule-followers have little patience for alternative ways that people can be reached whether is be from one’s home, from a coffee-house or even in the marketplace.

In my specific case, a ministry that had already transitioned from an inward facing clique/country club to a spiritual family that actually had a heart for those without Jesus, just could not give up their view that the church building was the center of what Jesus-following is all about. Threatened that their years of tithing (investing) might find them not able to realize their ROI, they effectively marginalized any staff (professional/volunteer) personnel that would not maintain the new status-quo.

In both instances, the lost dreams of the innovators has to be grieved, which is a process that every visionary has to deal with in their own terms. While they will many times see the positives and learnings that came out of the process as being very beneficial for the next “project/dream”, there is usually always a scar on ones heart to those that gave their all to attempt something that others barely or rarely understand, something much bigger than themselves.

I can only reflect on how Francis Marion, guerilla leader of the militia in South Carolina (1780-1783) that successfully dogged Cornwallis so that he could eventually be trapped by the French fleet at Yorktown. After much of the conflict was over, he was already being marginalized for the next chapter of life in the American Colonies as I indicated in a previous post:

So by the fall of 1781 as the British catastrophe at Yorktown reverberated throughout the British Empire, there were nationalist forces that were already parting ways with the radicals, and even the militias that brought them to this day. By 1783, Francis Marion saw the writing on the wall. The NOV1782 election meant that Marion had to leave Pond Bluff yet again for the 06JAN1783 legislative session. Writing from there on January 18th he shared the inequalities that tainted his excitement about the future of the colony as well of the federation of states. It seems that the Rhode Islander Continental Nathaniel Greene was awarded 10,000 guineas from SC toward the purchase of a SC plantation and quoted an old saying “that kissed goes by favor”. Georgia had also given Greene 24,000 acres as well. Marion eventually was awarded 300 acres in 1785.

It should be noted that the correspondence Marion had with Greene stopped abruptly as the hostilities stopped in DEC1782. Marion had hoped that Congress would follow through on the promise of a lifetime of half-pay for officers but it would be 50 years before that practice would finally start. Marion lamented that “idle spectators of war” were in charge now.

It is little wonder then why there is much more effort needed to be put towards the maintenance of liberty in this broken world than it does to maintain power. It seems that power, and kings, is the default mode of man:

Just some things to reflect on.

I do hope this allows y’all to reflect on history as well as current events.

-SF1

14APR-22APR1781: Tough Times Can Produce Innovations that Matter

In my last American Revolutionary War post, I suggested that after some darkness, that change was in the air, and that a new course might be upon the efforts in South Carolina to exit the British Empire. Time to hoist the sails, capture that wind and move forward:

Francis Marion believes it is time to slip away into North Carolina to preserve their numbers in light of the nearby British force bent on Marion’s destruction. On this night, a detachment from Lt. Col. Henry “Light Horse Harry” Lee, part of the Continental Army, arrives and all talk of slipping away is put aside. The rest of Lee’s Legion is on their way. Not only that, news was delivered that Gen Greene had stopped Corwallis at Guilford Courthouse in North Carolina.

Marion and Lee wasted no time in embarking on some new tactics toward controlling most of South Carolina and Georgia for the cause. It is interesting that the great military minds that do adapt to new strategies sometimes, when they have a second chance, they can then secure a region militarily. In this case, General Greene of the Continental Army was about to adopt the “war of posts” strategy that he had dissed before.

What had allowed the freedom to operate was that Cornwallis was so impacted by the Guilford Court House battle in North Carolina that he decided to move his troops to Wilmington NC on the coast to recover. After this his plan was to then invade Virginia never again to enter South Carolina. Greene used this opportunity to secure South Carolina and Georgia land so that if a peace treaty were to be achieved, the colonies would have these territories.

With Cornwallis’ exit from the deep south colonies, the various Tory elements in South Carolina started to melt away into the countryside as news spread of Cornwallis’ departure from the region. The British left only significant forces at Camden, Georgetown and Charleston along with other troops at various posts across the colony numbering 8,000 in total. These posts were along the supply line that kept forces 800 strong supplied in Camden which is over one hundred miles away from the coast and ports.

Greene’s army numbered only 1,400 but was on the move now deep into South Carolina. In this scenario, Watson gave up chasing Marion and dumped his artillery and heavy baggage into a creek and sped toward Camden to join forces with British officer Rawdon and then circled back steering clear of the rebel forces going back to the coast at Georgetown.

“Lighthorse” Harry Lee arrived at Marion’s camp on April 14th, 1781 and filled in Marion on the details of Guilford CH, a bloody battle that the British technically won but having outrun their own supply line, Cornwallis’ troops were a mess. British cavalry officer Tarleton himself had several finger amputated from wounds he suffered in the conflict.

Lee articulated how his troops would now focus on the larger garrisons at Camden and Ninety-Six while the militia (Pickens, Sumter and Marion) work away on the smaller posts in SC. However, it was another target that Lee had in mind that Marion did not see “eye-to-eye” on. Lee wanted to lay siege to Fort Watson WITH Marion, while Marion wanted to continue his chase of British office Watson. Marion had seen first hand both the disastrous Savannah siege in 1779 and also Thomas Sumter’s attempted siege in which he got impatient and lost a lot of his men.

While the 49 year old Marion was technically in charge and 25 year old Lee was second in command, the fact that Lee had 300 troops to Marion’s 80 at this time probably led to Marion acquiescing.

Fort Watson was surrounded on April 15th, however, all the trees around the fort were gone so there was no way sharpshooters could be utilized. The British had learned much from previous militia encounters. Cutting off the water supply was also attempted but the the well right outside the fort could be used at night through a covered passage had been built. After the siege had started, the 120 defenders started digging a well inside the fort and struck water on the fourth day of the siege.

The rebels had requested a six-pounder from Greene which would have made quick work of this fort since it had no cannon of its own, but the men bringing the cannon got lost and returned to Greene’s location outside Camden.

The bottom line was that Marion’s men were not prepared for a siege and were not experienced at it. This was not their strong suite. Morale was sinking and Marion was corresponding with various militia’s around the state about some significant issues that distracted Marion from a situation he was not comfortable in:

  1. Militia Capt. Snipes was free-lancing/looting around the state and bad-mouthing Marion suggesting that people should not send supplies to him
  2. “Sumter’s Law”, which paid ten months of service to men with plunder from local Tories (horses, clothing and slaves), was causing many potential militia members to join Sumter instead of Marion’s militia. Marion did not agree with the plunder reward, but was in the minority opinion on this one.
  3. Rumor was out that Marion’s men killed three prisoners in their care according to the Brit commander in Charleston and Marion’s mentor suggested in a letter that he half-believed it.

The siege was taking its toll on the ones facilitating the siege until an innovative spirit emerged in militia leader Lt. Col. Hezekiah Maham. A tower would be built out of range from the Brits in the fort, but tall enough for sharpshooters to do their work. The fort walls were 7 foot on top of a 23 foot mound so the tower would have to be very, very high. Geometry as well as ballistics played a part in this experiment.

By April 22nd it was ready with a perch at the top with openings for the long rifles. The rebels sharpshooters rained down fire into the fort and simultaneously a patriot unit was taking down the stockade section of the fort itself. A surrender request was made and the commander McKay put up the white flag. In his journal it seemed the British inside the fort refused to fight any longer. Generous terms were offered and the British troops made their way to Charleston.

Lee and Marion reaped a bounty of ammunition and public praise was awarded to Maham and his innovation. Lee, whose ego usually precedes himself, actually came to praise Marion publicly and asked to be formally placed under Marion’s leadership “in some degree”. Greene wrote Marion and said praise would travel to General Washington and the world.

With Fort Watson out of the picture, it would be the first of many dominoes to fall for the British in South Carolina as the summer heat started returning to the region.

-SF1

14DEC1780: Nelson’s Ferry Skirmish – When 700 Patriots Engage a Supply Boat

When you can field 700 instead of 20, 40 or 80, you are able to intimidate the enemy without bloodshed to obtain well needed supplies from their supply line. Lord Cornwallis is attempting to supply himself from the South Carolina coast but due to Marion’s streak of wins and his reputation, Lt. Col. Nisbet Balfour modifies the normal port of Charlestown to Camden supply route that includes a stretch from the Nelson’s Ferry and the Santee Road over to a “bypass” from Moncks Corner to Friday’s Ferry on the Congaree River. There is one supply boat does not receive this order in time and the Patriots board the vessel at Nelson’s Ferry on 14DEC1780 and Col. Marion’s men remove all supplies of military value, then they apply the torch.

The British 64th Regiment happened to be near Nelson’s Ferry at the time of this raid, but their numbers are not even adequate to pursue Col. Marion’s large number, 700 of them, mounted men.

The British and Loyalists continue their “no quarter ways” as the story comes out in December 1780 that Patriot leader Lt. Roger Gordon wast out with a small force to patrol on Lynches Creek, stopping at a house for provisions and refreshments., is attacked by Capt. Butler with a much larger force of Loyalists and they set the house on fire. Gordon then capitulates on the promise of quarter, but no sooner has his Patriots grounded their muskets than they are all put to death.

In addition to this, the British have a “Christmas present” for Marion, on 21DEC1780, Maj. Gen. Alexander Leslie arrives in Charlestown with 2000 British regulars. The gloves are coming off in South Carolina as the British desperately desire to move into North Carolina in early spring and take aim at Continental Gen. George Washington in the north.

Stay tuned for details as to how Marion deals with the swarming British forces that are all after neutralizing him and getting on with routing these farmers with pitchforks!

-SF1