Tag: Winnsboro

12DEC1780: Halfway Swamp – a Long Time since the Snow Campaign

Marion’s Militia catches the British taking new recruits towards North Carolina

What prompted Marion and his men to leave Snows Island was two fold. First, word came that a patriot force found two brothers of the Loyalist militia leader Major John Harrison at home ill with smallpox and the patriots murder them in their beds. This action upsets Marion greatly as he desires a revolution that does not stoop to the tactics used by the British Empire. Second, Marion gets Intel that Lt. Col. Samuel Tynes has escaped and so Lt. Col. Peter Horry is sent towards the High Hills of the Santee in a chase. In the mean time Marion and his men ride to Indiantown which he knows will spark Intel back to the British that the “Fox” is out and about.

The British escapee Tynes makes his way to British HQ at Camden fairly shaken along with a small group of his men and decides he has had enough of the war and resigns. This is the psychological effect that Marion’s guerilla force had on the larger British/Loyalist forces that worked in the rebel’s favor.

This month of December 1780 marked a five year anniversary of one of the first actions in South Carolina in the drive to separate from the British Empire. In December 1775, Col. Richardson and his men had been busy in upcountry regions removing Loyalist leadership so that state forces could focus on the areas of the colony that were more aligned to Tory/British leadership, the area below the fall line and the tidewater regions of South Carolina. Toward the end of this late 1775 campaign, the troops faced an intense winter storm that lasted 30 hours or more and dumped over 20 inches of snow in areas of northern South Carolina and neighboring North Carolina. Does this sound familiar? Is this part of a re-enactment?

09DEC2018 Winter Storm Snow Estimates for South Carolina, North Caroline and Virginia

For Marion and his men, it had been quite a seesaw of emotions over the course of these five years. By summer 1776 it appeared after the British were repulsed at Charlestown that they would leave the southern colonies alone. This lasted until early 1780 when the British sought to roll-up through the southern colonies gaining loyalist men as they went to join British General Clinton in the north and squash this rebellion. Based on the success of their militia in the fall of 1780 I can only imagine that these men has a spark of excitement in their minds as they seemed to actually be able to slow the British advance into North Carolina. The next month would be critical to build on past success and continue to hamper British ops.

On 11DEC1780, more Intel arrives for Marion that alerts him to the British Commandant of Charlestown’s effort to send 200 new recruits to Cornwallis who is inside South Carolina at his winter headquarters at Winnsboro west of Camden. As Marion leaves Indiantown and approaches Nelson’s Ferry his band of freedom fighters swells to 700. A combination of his success and the fact that the harvest is about done allows Marion the opportunity to change things up a bit as how he has the numerical edge.

About 20 miles above the ferry at the Santee River, at the Halfway Swamp, (which is just a mile from Richardson’s plantation where Marion had almost walked into a trap just a month before) he overtakes the Maj. Robert McLeroth, his 64th Regiment of Foot who are escorting the recruits of the 7 th Regiment to Winnsboro. The very reason for the escort was that Cornwallis did not trust these 200 fresh recruits alone out there with the fox on the loose! Marion’s mounted troops made quick work of the British pickets as McLeroth had no cavalry.

[Author’s note: I had the privilege of visiting this site with Captain1776 and Malibu last month. While the road near the swamp had been closed for a while, and we could not get exactly to the site of this battle, it seems that the current swamp has not changed much from 238 years ago as it still is a cypress filled quagmire.]

Marker for Halfway Swamp near the Santee / Lake Marion

At this point, Marion was in control of the battlefield. McLeroth sent a message under a flag of truce protesting the shooting of the pickets. Marion’s reply was that the British practice of burning houses was more egregious adding that if the British persisted in the latter that he would continue the former. McLeroth also challenged Marion to come out in the open field and fight like a man.

Marion offered a counter proposal in that each side would pick their 20 best marksmen do this combo duel to decide this battle. This tradition dates back to biblical times! It was agreed that this would happen to the south of a prominent oak tree as the men lined up 100 yards from each other. Marion appointed Maj. John Vanderhorst to lead the patriot team but it seems that Vanderhorst asked Capt. Witherspoon at what range should they choose for firing the opening round of buckshot and Witherspoon said 50 yards. Vanderhorst admitted that he was not good judging distances and asked that Witherspoon tap him on the shoulder when they should commence firing.

As the men got closer, it was the British who fled the field back to the main body of their force. Marion’s men let out a cheer. Once again, psychological edge is a major factor.

It seems by this time it was about nightfall and each force went to their evening campfires. McLeroth actually was able to out fox the fox as he setup camp and kept the campfires lit while he and his men slipped away to Singleton’s Mill 15 miles north. However, the price paid by McLeroth was having to leave supply wagons and heavy baggage that the patriots used for re-supplying themselves.

Marion, once aware of the British slipping away sent Maj. John James in pursuit but he encounters British reinforcements of 50 mounted cavalry and 80 more infantry and even something more threatening than that, the Singleton family had smallpox. Jame’s men got off one round before leaving the property and returned to Marion who decided not to engage the enemy at this time. At least he delayed this force of recruits on their way to Winnsboro. These recuits would remember this encounter (psyche) and it would play a role in the battle of Cowpens about a month later.

December 1780 still has some more action packed in it so stay tuned!

-SF1


02NOV1780 – British Lt. Gen Charles, Lord Cornwallis Green Lights Lt. Col. Tarleton

The context for this decision by Corwallis to “green light” Tarleton is essential toward understanding the gravity of this moment in the confederation’s (thirteen colonies joined together for this cause) war for independence from the British Empire.

My previous post showed how Francis Marion’s winning streak was turning society away from leaning toward an inevitable “Loyalist” South Carolina and swelled the ranks of the patriots. From the book “Swamp Fox: How Francis Marion Saved the American Revolution“:

Marion’s victory at Tearcoat Swamp left the British high command in a state of panic. With no effective enemy force in the field, Marion now had the ability to strike at will throughout the entire area of South Carolina east of the Wateree River and north of the Santee.

As a result it had become almost impossible for the British to safely send supplies or communications from the coast to Cornwallis’s army. The Santee, the major navigable river flowing through the heart of the state, did not connect directly to either Georgetown or Charleston. Therefore, to move supplies from the coast to Camden and Winnsboro, it was necessary to use both roads and waterways. Typically the British traveled either overland or by boat to Nelson’s Ferry, where they crossed the Santee, then by wagon to Camden. But because of the threat Marion posed, the British were afraid to cross at Nelson’s and began taking a longer, more circuitous route to the northwest over more difficult roads to Friday’s Ferry on the Congaree River. From there they crossed the Congaree and traveled overland to Camden and Winnsboro.

Desperate times calls for desperate measures apparently. Lord Cornwallis, who prided himself publicly as a man who fought with honor decided to give in to Banastre Tarleton’s pleas to go after the guerrilla militia leader Marion. This was not just Cornwallis granting just any staff officer their desire, it was a calculated move based on Tarleton’s history, character and reputation. Cornwallis was brilliant in strategy, however, it seems that his assumption that American colonial society would quickly forget atrocities (underestimating “blowback”) may well have been one of his weaknesses, along with pride.

From the movie “The Patriot” (2000):

  • Benjamin Martin: I’ve just read into the mind of a genius. Cornwallis knows more about war then any of us could ever hope to learn in a dozen lifetimes. His victories at Camden and Charleston were perfect, perfect. The thing is, he knows that… and perhaps that’s his weakness.
  • Gabriel Martin: Sir?
  • Benjamin Martin: Pride. Pride’s a weakness.
  • Major Jean Villeneuve: Personally, I would prefer stupidity.
  • Benjamin Martin: Pride will do.

Basically, the man Cornwallis chose is the antithesis of Francis Marion. Read the following from John Oller’s words and see for yourself:

Young (twenty-six in 1780), boyishly handsome, athletically built, a drinker, gambler, and womanizer, he cut the sort of dashing figure that some have mistakenly ascribed to Marion. His stock in trade was his ruthless pursuit of his quarry followed by a headlong, frontal cavalry attack, with sabers flashing and slashing when he inevitably caught up with them. Son of a wealthy Liverpool slave-trading merchant, Tarleton attended Oxford and studied law at London’s prestigious Middle Temple before quitting to follow his friend and fellow Oxfordian, Francis Rawdon, into the military.

He purchased a “cornet,” or commission, in the British cavalry in 1775 and voluntarily sailed to America to fight with the king’s men. He was part of Clinton’s first, unsuccessful attack on Charleston, saw action at Brandywine, and helped capture Charles Lee, the Continental commander, in a raid on a tavern in late 1776. During the British occupation of Philadelphia he gambled away his salary, nearly dueled an officer whose mistress he dallied with, ..

Next, let us add in the 1780MAY actions of Tarleton as a follow-up to the British capturing Charlestown:

.. In late May, Cornwallis had dispatched Tarleton and his Legion of 230, along with a company of 40 British army dragoons, to pursue Colonel Abraham Buford. Having arrived too late to reinforce Charleston, Buford and his 350 Virginia Continentals were then on the run toward North Carolina. With them were Governor John Rutledge and some members of his council, who had fled Charleston before it fell.

Although the Americans had a ten-day head start on him, Tarleton drove his men relentlessly forward, covering 150 miles in fifty-four hours to catch up with them. Rutledge barely avoided capture by veering off from the main force hours ahead of the pursuers, but Tarleton overtook Buford just shy of the North Carolina border at a place called the Waxhaws. There, in Tarleton’s own words, “slaughter was commenced.”

Some historians think this is shear propaganda, however, there have been many direct sources that relay some rather harsh orders that this 28 year old gave to his men.  Here is some more detail from the claims that emerged after this event:

The patriot side claimed that after the fighting stopped, Tarleton’s men were guilty of outright massacre, hacking Buford’s men to death even as they lay down their arms and begged for quarter. “Tarleton’s Quarter” (meaning take no prisoners) and “Buford’s Massacre” became rallying cries for the patriots in later battles, notably King’s Mountain. What is sometimes overlooked is that although the commander of the king’s troops at both King’s Mountain and the Waxhaws was a Briton, virtually all the slaughtering was done by Americans against Americans.

This man had no long-term appreciation for what America would be like after his assumption of British subjection of the rebel spirit. This man is very much unlike Francis Marion in almost every way.

In the six months Tarleton had been in the colony of South Carolina, he bested the likes of William Washington, Issac Huger, A. Buford and even Thomas Sumter, all of senior rank to Tarleton. With a reputation like this, Corwallis was hoping for a quick win from someone who could get things done, even if it was done ruthlessly. Cornwallis had already spent more time than he would have liked in this southern colony and was anxious to maneuver north to bring a quick end to this conflict and bring the colonies back under the British wing.

With the “green light”, Tarleton moves out of Winnsboro which is 30 miles west of Camden and will take several days ride to arrive in the area Marion and his militia might be. Tarleton will be leading what is called a British Legion, which is actually a loyalist cavalry (American Tories) unit that was recruited from both New York and Pennsylvania. Legions consisted of traditional saber carrying cavalry and dragoons which are infantry who traveled on horses who had pistols and muskets.  Tarleton’s men wore green coats to set them from the redcoat British regulars.

The hunt is on, for this “fox” that has interrupted British operations in the region.

Stay tuned.

-SF1