Washington's Immortals

by Patrick K. O'Donnell

  A small group of Virginians led by Colonel Abraham Buford were riding toward Charleston to reinforce the city when it was captured. Realizing they couldn’t add any value, Buford’s Virginians quickly retreated, with the British cavalry in hot pursuit. Just before Buford and his men reached the North Carolina border, the British dragoons and cavalry, led by Banastre Tarleton, caught up to the Americans in the seedy South Carolina village of Waxhaws on May 29. The “battle,” if one can call it that, went disastrously for the Americans. The British routed Buford and his men, who attempted to surrender. For a variety of reasons (Tarleton’s excuse was that he had been thrown from his horse), the cavalry failed to honor Buford’s white flag of truce. Tarleton’s men brutally slaughtered 113 of the Virginians and wounded 150 more in an incident that became known as the Waxhaws Massacre. From the bloodbath, Tarleton earned the nickname Bloody Ban. For the next two years the incident had a huge impact on Whig, or pro-American, morale, and the term “Tarleton’s quarter” came to mean that no prisoners would be taken. It also set the stage for bloody reprisals between the local Whigs and Tories. The survivors of the massacre, a little over a hundred men, all that was left of the American army in the South, rode like lightning north.

  Confident that he had crushed the American army in the South, Clinton returned to New York, leaving Cornwallis behind to hold ­Georgia and South Carolina.

  By this time, the Marylanders had landed in Petersburg, Virginia, and trudged 140 miles south to Hillsborough, North Carolina. After learning of Charleston’s fall, de Kalb and company headed south into what was at the time some of the most rugged and wildest country of the thirteen colonies.

  The Carolinas had few roads and were crisscrossed by numerous large rivers. Fording the waterways offered a challenge for offensive operations yet could provide good defensive positions and buy time for a retreating army. Control of the boats used on these rivers had a profound bearing on the campaign. In general, the terrain in the region was far different from that of the north. Near the coast, the Lowcountry consisted of a swampy, flat plain where prosperous, slaveholding plantation owners grew rice. Farther inland, rolling foothills gradually ascended into the Appalachians. The Backcountry, as this section was known, was home to less well-off farmers who raised corn and wheat in the shadow of the neighboring Indian nations. Farther west, some of the toughest men in America illegally occupied the land of western South Carolina and present-day Tennessee. The area fell behind the Royal Proclamation Line, which roughly followed the Allegheny Mountains and set aside the land to the west for the Native Americans; colonists were forbidden to settle there. In this forbidding place, these pioneers constantly battled not only the Indians but also the elements.

  As they crossed the unfamiliar landscape, the Marylanders again faced a lack of food. Both armies picked the area clean, and Whig and Loyalist farmers often drove livestock out of harm’s way before it could be seized by either army. Making matters worse, the frontier-like colonies had few towns and villages where provisions could be purchased. At the time, Charleston, the largest town, had only fourteen thousand inhabitants, including around five thousand slaves. The next-largest towns, Hillsborough and Salisbury, had only sixty to seventy houses each. In dealing with the constant hunger, the Maryland officers led by example. Otho Holland Williams recalled, “The officers, however, by appealing to their own empty canteens and mess cases, satisfied the privates that all suffered alike; and exhorting them to exercise the same fortitude of which the officers gave them example.” As spring gave way to summer, the scorching heat wilted the men. Those that had uniforms withered away. Tens of thousands of ticks and fleas descended upon the men, feasting on their blood. Even the intrepid de Kalb groused, “The tick, a kind of strong black flea . . . makes its way under the skin and by its bite produces the most painful irritation and inflammation . . . my whole body is covered with these stings.”

  The Carolinas boasted a diverse population; former British Roundheads (those who supported Parliament during the English Civil War in the mid-seventeenth century), French Huguenots, and Scottish Highlanders had fled to the Carolinas in order to escape persecution in their homelands years earlier. Settlements of Scotch-Irish, Catholic Irish, Dutchmen, and Swiss also dotted the landscape. In general, people settled close to others of the same nationality, forming independent communities that were divided religiously and politically. Some, like the Presbyterian Scotch-Irish, were devoted Patriots, while others, like the Scottish Highlanders, were fiercely loyal to Britain. The groups often erupted in violent conflict. Savage shootings and hangings became commonplace as the desire for revenge fueled feuds throughout the area.

  With supplies running low, the Maryland Division continued marching toward South Carolina, foraging along the way. The lack of food convinced “a vast number of men to desert to the enemy,” The men ate what they could find—often green corn and unripe fruit. On July 25 the half-starved cavalcade had reached Wilcox’s Iron Works, where they were joined by General Horatio Lloyd Gates, who took over Lincoln’s duties as commander in the South and assumed overall command of the Maryland Division and other units under de Kalb. Washington had wanted Nathanael Greene for the position, but Congress, without consulting the commander in chief, had appointed Gates, who still basked in the glory of Saratoga. Because of his age and disposition, some of the men referred to Gates as “Granny.”

  Initially, Granny’s appearance improved the morale of the men, if for no other reason than his promise to supply them with plenty of “rum and rations.” In the meantime, however, they continued to forage. Gates headed the Marylanders and the rest of his “Grand Army” toward Camden, South Carolina, the center of a web of British outposts that sprawled across the colony. Intelligence from Thomas Sumter and Francis Marion suggested the Grand Army might be able to attack and defeat the garrison at Camden.

  Known as the Swamp Fox, Marion was an early pioneer of guerrilla warfare, leading the local militia in numerous quick, violent attacks on Loyalists and Redcoats. Unlike the swashbuckling composite character Mel Gibson depicted in the movie The Patriot, the real Swamp Fox was physically underwhelming: a frail, stubby fifty-year-old, hobbled by deformed knees and ankles. Reared on a plantation in South Carolina, he helped manage his family’s land before serving in the French and Indian War and taking part in several battles against the Cherokee Indians. Although assigned to Lincoln’s force in Charleston, he was away from the city when it fell to the British, having accidentally broken his ankle and gone to the country to recover. After Lincoln’s surrender, he organized a small unit of men and set about terrorizing the enemy with hit-and-run attacks—despite his painful injury. Using principles he had learned from the Cherokee, Marion hid his men in the swamp and struck his targets hard, sowing terror throughout the region. To catch the slippery Marion, the British dispatched one of their most ruthless fighters—Banastre Tarleton. It was Tarleton who gave Marion his nickname: after pursuing the Patriot through twenty-six miles of Carolina swampland, Tarleton gave up the chase, exclaiming, “As for this damned old fox, the Devil himself could not catch him.”

  Thomas Sumter had also earned himself a colorful nom de guerre, the Fighting Gamecock. Born to Welsh immigrants in Virginia in 1734, Sumter joined the militia, which often battled with nearby Indian tribes. In 1761 he took part in the Timberlake Expedition, an adventure-filled foray into Indian country that brought him into close contact with the Cherokee. He befriended a chief named Ostenaco, and when Ostenaco wanted to meet the king, Sumter accompanied him to London, even though the trip left him bankrupt and landed him in debtor’s prison. Eventually, he became a successful small businessman and plantation owner in South Carolina. When the Revolutionary War broke out, he received a commission as a lieutenant colonel of the 2nd Regiment in the South Carolina Line, but he resigned his commission and returned home after two years of fighting, hoping to live in peace. That dream was shattered in 1780, when British troops attacked
his home, dragged his wheelchair-bound wife out on the lawn, and burned the building to the ground in front of her eyes. Incensed, Sumter struck back, attacking the British repeatedly and often taking risky gambles that paid off. One biographer wrote, “Fearless and inexorable, like a gamecock he struck with fiery gaffs, leaving death and carnage at every pitting. . . . Highly imaginative, the Gamecock was always the grand strategist, instinctively using both men and terrain to baffle the enemy. He was a daring tactician, leading raw militia in hand-to-hand fighting with British regulars.”

  With intimate knowledge of the Carolinas, Marion and ­Sumter advised Gates about the disposition of enemy forces. With limited troops, the British constantly struggled to maintain control over the territory they had seized. Making the best use they could of the region’s topography, the British had established a series of outposts along the rivers and in small towns. While the main body of their forces remained in and around Charleston, they maintained small garrisons in Georgetown, Beaufort, Savannah, Augusta, Ninety Six, and Camden. As the most central of these posts, Camden was a key location, providing a crucial link between the Backcountry and the Lowcountry. If the British were to lose control of Camden, they would lose control of South Carolina.

  With bands of horse-mounted partisans led by men like Marion and Sumter roving the countryside, keeping all these far-flung outposts in supply was a logistical nightmare for the British. Large wagon trains typically supplied many of the garrisons, but the trains were vulnerable to guerrilla raids. Armed with excellent intelligence gleaned from the population, the Patriots sallied from swamps and forests and ambushed the supply trains. The British never knew when and where these lightning raids would fall. Besides attacking the supply network, small partisan forces tied up a large number of British troops and intimidated Loyalists, tamping down their support.

  Gates headed directly for Camden, leading his men along a route that offered little in the way of food and plenty of opposition from Loyalists who lived along the road. His plan, which he failed to share with his subordinates, was to set up a strong defensive position near Camden while partisan forces continued to harass British supply lines. Gates hoped that these attacks would either encourage the British to leave the area or convince them to attack his strong position. However, the actual battle went far differently from what the hero of Saratoga had envisioned.

  Chapter 27

  A “Jalap” and

  a Night March

  Starlight shimmered through the pine branches, faintly illuminating the dusty road on the hot, humid, and moonless night of August 15–16, 1780. Led by the cavalry, the Marylanders marched Indian file with muskets slung over their shoulders. Behind them stretched the North Carolina militia and a winding baggage train nearly a mile long. The men trudged along the Waxhaws Road that linked to the Great Wagon Road, which ran through South Carolina and connected many towns, including the strategic British post of Camden, flanked on either side by an army of pine trees rooted in sandy soil.

  The Marylanders had been journeying through the Carolinas for days, covering scores of miles. With their stomachs empty, the exhausted Continentals and militia of the Grand Army came to a halt and ate a hasty meal: loaves of bread, beef, and about four ounces of molasses for each man. For many, the meal was their last. In the short term, the sweetener produced an unexpected impact. Sergeant Major William Seymour of the Delaware Regiment explained, “Instead of rum, we got a gill of molasses per man served out to us, which instead of livening our spirits, served to purge us as well as if we had taken a jalap [laxative], for the men, all the way as we went along were every moment obliged to fall out of the ranks to evacuate.”

  Into the night the men marched south, confident of victory. Horatio Gates, the “hero of Saratoga,” was rumored to have said, “I will breakfast to-morrow in Camden with Cornwallis at my table.”

  Earlier in the day, Gates estimated the strength of his army to be seven thousand men. Otho Holland Williams, now deputy adjutant general to Gates, knew the number was off by a significant amount and called for the regiments to report their strength. Each unit submitted its numbers; the rolls revealed 3,052 men “fit for duty.” With the figures in hand, Williams soberly submitted the actual numbers to his superior.

  Gates looked at Williams, nodding, and blithely dismissed the totals: “Sir, it will be enough for our purpose.”

  Gates’s force still outnumbered Cornwallis’s, but quantity didn’t necessarily translate into quality. The bulk of the newly formed Grand Army consisted of militia, strengthened by a backbone of veterans from the Maryland and Delaware regiments. Many of these new troops had only recently been farmers and shopkeepers, and now they were facing highly trained British regulars.

  On Gates’s orders, William Smallwood and the Marylanders marched toward Camden, but the plan of attack didn’t sit well with the senior Marylander. A North Carolinian militiaman “overheard Gates and Smallwood arguing about the battle plan.” Williams recalled the consternation of his fellow officers as well: “Others could not imagine how it could be conceived that any army consisting of more than two-thirds militia, and which had never been once exercised in arms together, could form columns and perform other manoeuvers in the night, and in the face of the enemy.”

  Only a few miles away from the Marylanders, General Cornwallis was rallying his men and preparing them for a night march of their own—which set them on an unexpected collision course with the Grand Army. Cornwallis intended to seek out the Americans but had no idea how close they were. After the troops were mustered in, Cornwallis addressed his men: “Now, my brave soldiers, now an opportunity is offered for displaying your valour, and sustaining the glory of the British arms;—all you who are willing to face your enemies;—all you who are ambitious of military fame stand forward; where there are eight or ten to one coming against: let the men who cannot bear to smell gun-powder stand back, and all you who are determined to conquer or die turn out.”

  John Robert Shaw, a member of Cornwallis’s own 33rd Regiment of Foot, recorded the earl’s fiery speech and noted that nearly all the men turned out “except a few who were left to guard the sick and military stores.”

  The Redcoats were on the march.

  Suddenly, the crackle of small-arms fire between the advance guards from both armies broke the silence of the hot August night. The two opposing forces that had unknowingly lumbered toward each other for several hours met.

  In the darkness, a Frenchman, Colonel Charles Armand Tuffin, called “Colonel Armand,” who had a checkered past prior to the war, led the American cavalry. In France, Armand had served in the Garde de Corps, the king’s elite personal guard, but had injured Louis XVI’s cousin in a duel—an incident that led to his exile to America. With Washington’s permission, he had raised a cavalry legion. Around midnight, Armand’s legion acted as a screening force, hit the vanguard of Cornwallis’s army, took several casualties, retreated, and “threw the whole corps into disorder; which, recoiling suddenly in front of the column of infantry discovered the 1st Maryland Brigade. The Marylanders held the line and “executed their orders gallantly.” The unanticipated collision shocked both armies. “The enemy, no less astonished than ourselves, seemed to acquiesce with a sudden suspension of hostilities,” Williams recalled.

  After taking a few prisoners, Williams determined that Cornwallis was leading the British. He then pressed the prisoners for additional information. The Brits revealed that Cornwallis commanded about two thousand troops, which lay about six hundred yards in front of the Patriots. Williams delivered the information to Gates, whose “astonishment could not be concealed.”

  On Gates’s orders, Williams called a council of war. Hastily, Williams contacted each of the officers and asked them to assemble in an area behind the rear of the Patriot force. The first officer he approached was Baron de Kalb, who commanded the Maryland Division and the attached Delaware Regiment. When Williams told him
the details of the troops that lay before them, de Kalb ominously replied, “Well, And has the general [Gates] given you orders to retreat the Army?”

  Despite his misgivings, de Kalb remained silent during the council of war. As soon as they had all arrived, Gates communicated “the unwelcome news” of the enemy’s position and then asked, “Gentlemen, what is best to be done?”

  An uneasy silence hung over the meeting, and all the men “remained mute for a few moments.” Gallant but headstrong, Brigadier General Edward Stevens, in charge of the Virginia militia, finally answered, “Gentlemen, is it not too late now to do anything but fight?”

  De Kalb and the rest of the officers said nothing. With no additional advice offered, the men returned to their respective commands.

  They had only a few hours to attempt to get some sleep before the morning’s battle.

  Chapter 28

  Camden

  As the first rays of dawn poked through the pines on August 16, 1780, the Americans formed their battle line.

  “Don’t shoot until you see the whites of their eyes,” officers repeated as the order went up and down the American lines.

  A wall of scarlet appeared. “We see them a-coming, extending their lines as low as ours.” Dawn soon gave way to the early morning sun, and Otho Holland Williams noticed what he thought was confusion in the enemy lines. He approached Horatio Gates, who “seemed disposed to wait events—he gave no orders.”