Proceed, Sergeant Lamb

by Robert Graves

  The situation of these poor wretches was very different from that of the swarm of slaves, the property of revolutionaries, who had joined themselves to us during our march from Charleston. On our approach they had thought themselves absolved from all respect to their masters, and quit of their servitude. The pity that we felt for them, and also the great use to which we could put them as labourers, prevented us from undeceiving them: they might live upon the scraps that fell from our tables, and welcome. They made very good servants and I employed one myself, by name Jonah, who had been ‘raised’ in Virginia and was very expert at fishing and at racoon-hunting in the swamps. These emancipated slaves at first lived a luxurious life with us in the matter of high feeding and short hours. Afterwards they were industriously employed, when orders came to build a magazine near our camp and to unload, from the boats that came up from Charleston, large stores of rum, ammunition, salt provisions, &c. They soon learned to swear—a luxury denied to negroes in servitude—to gamble with dice, and to sing Dr. Watts’ hymns in chorus, which they performed with surprising tunefulness and devotion, though knowing nothing of the Christian religion.

  Our retention of these negroes, who became greatly attached to us, was characterized by the settlers of the Catawba as sheer robbery; they said that we also encouraged desertion and neglect of work among their own slaves. Many thousands of negroes, indeed, were now camp-followers of the various detachments of the Royal army. In order therefore to conciliate the inhabitants, all slaves whose owners were not in arms against us were, if claimed, sent back to their bonds. Thus I soon lost my Jonah, whose freedom unfortunately I could not afford to purchase at the eighty guineas which was his declared value. He was in a lamentable state of mind when informed that he must return to his master, who, he said, was a drunken old wretch and would flog him nearly to death. However, upon my interceding with some of my officers and describing Jonah’s excellent qualities, they agreed to purchase him jointly as a servant for their Mess. When I informed Jonah that he was promoted, from a mere sergeant’s orderly, to being the slave of two captains and three lieutenants, he first fell at my feet and nearly overset me with his embraces; and then capered about, shouting in an ecstasy all the oaths and hymns that he knew, like a poll-parrot before visitors.

  Despite the continual oppressive heat, which seldom broke in a thunderstorm, I was greatly interested in the curiosities of the country. Early in the summer, enormous quantities of fireflies danced about the Camp and its environs, from dusk to dawn at a height of a few feet above the earth. I had seen them before in the North, but never to such entrancing effect. A dozen of them enclosed in a small phial would provide enough light to read even small print by; and a hundred thousand of them, all darting and dipping at once give out an illumination which was perfectly surprising and outshone any artificial fireworks that I have ever witnessed. The hissing rise and fall of the towering rocket was missing to this display, but the perfect silence of the interlacing glints was both beautiful and awesome. The light emitted by any single insect was continuous, but shut off at will from swoop to swoop. As with the glow-worm, the light of the firefly is used for purposes of courtship: it shines no more as the summer advances. Fireflies could be very annoying to sentries and travellers by night, dazzling and distracting their gaze.

  I also saw the humming-bird, the smallest and most beautiful bird in all Creation. It appeared to be jewelled rather than feathered, and fed only on honey. This it extracted from flowers with its long beak, hovering over them like a humble-bee, which in size it did not exceed. The smallest gun-shot would blow the humming-bird to bits; so those who would satisfy their curiosity with a sight of his corpse must put a bladder of water into their musket, which knocked him dead without injury to the feathers. When the honey season was over he hibernated, but whether his lurking-place was earth, wood or water nobody could inform me. I recollect also a Southern thrush, of twice the size of our European bird, that sang at night very finely; and a carrion-bird called the turkey-buzzard whom the natives shot for the sake of his feet—these when dissolved into an oil were very salutary in the sciatica and for easing rheumatic aches and pains.

  There were noble fish in the Catawba River, and excellent eels in the smaller creeks. In the swamp crept the terrapin, a small sort of turtle which makes the best-tasting soup in the world—unless that were the oyster soup which we enjoyed at Harlem near New York from the fine oyster-beds contiguous. But I must mention two very troublesome insects to set against these other beautiful and beneficial creatures: viz. the wood-tick and the seed-tick. The wood-tick was a sort of bug which infested the bushes of the swamp. He drank blood through his proboscis like a vampire and swelled to a huge size before dropping off. He fastened especially upon the cattle. The seed-tick, also called the chigger, was much worse; he lurked in the long grass and attacked the feet and ankles. He was small enough to creep into the pores of the skin, where he would throw up blisters constantly for days on end. To rub the affected part was very dangerous, because the inflammation sometimes mortified. I myself had three such blisters, very painful, on my right ankle, which I got from going out injudiciously in grass one early morning without my cloth gaiters. I was advised to avoid duty for a day or two and meanwhile to cure my foot in tobacco smoke, like a herring in a chimney, in order to fumigate the pores and kill the vermin. This had the desired effect.

  The continuance of the war had become most tedious; and its unpopularity in the army in America, as well as among the merchants and manufacturers at home, was reflected in the price of officers’ commissions which had descended to less than one quarter of their peace-time value. In the officers’ mess the toast was no longer drunk: ‘A glorious war and a long one.’ It was now: ‘A speedy accommodation of our present unnatural differences.’ There was much talk of a truce—the Empress Catherine of Russia was offering to act in the capacity of mediatrix. It was considered evident that the whole of America could not be conquered while Britain had also to face, single-handed, the united navies and armies of France and Spain; and the Ministry was therefore willing to compound, if King George would consent, by granting the Northern States their independence while we retained our conquests in the South. The Americans feared that they would be forced to accept these terms if we continued to hold Charleston: for present possession in all legal disputes, private or public, is a title very difficult to shake. The Revolution was now languishing for lack of money, and of soldiers willing to engage themselves for long periods; and the news of Charleston had made a very sharp impression on the common people. It was therefore resolved by Congress to restore public confidence by a daring use of their fast-dwindling forces. A pretended invasion of Canada would be undertaken, in order to draw off our New York troops, and then an expedition would strike southward at our small army with as much speed as was commensurate with safety.

  General Washington recommended Major-General Nathaniel Greene, the American Quartermaster-General, to command this expedition; but General Horatio Gates, whose laurels were still green from Saratoga, impressed upon Congress that only himself was fit for the command, and that his popularity with the troops was such that they would mutiny were any other leader appointed. General Washington’s recommendation was overruled and in July of that year, 1780, General Gates came marching towards us with as many regular troops as General Washington could spare from his small army, and whatever militia he could pick up by the way.

  It will be remembered that Captain Gale had sneered at General Washington as an ‘old Fabius’, Fabius being the name of a Roman general who by avoiding an engagement with the Carthaginian invaders had restored the broken fortunes of Rome. General Washington’s Fabian policy was equally derided by General Gates who, as it was expressed, had lately ‘been brought forward on the military turf by his backers in Congress and run for the generalissimoship’.

  It is reported that, on his way from Philadelphia, General Gates passed through Frederick Town in Maryland, where he fell in with his
fellow-General, Charles Lee.

  ‘Where are you going?’ asked Lee.

  ‘Why, to take Cornwallis,’ replied Gates.

  ‘I am afraid,’ said Lee, ‘that you will find him a tough steak to chew.’

  ‘Tough, sir!’ cried Gates. ‘Tough, is it? Then, by Heavens, I’ll tender him. I’ll make piloo of him, Sir, and eat him alive.’

  General Lee bawled after Gates as he rode off: ‘Take care, General Horatio Gates! Take care, lest your Northern laurels degenerate into Southern willows.’

  The army that Gates now commanded had been assembled for some weeks at Hillsborough in North Carolina. The regulars were regiments from the States of Maryland and Delaware; the militia had been recruited in North Carolina, and the army by the later addition of a Virginian regiment was brought up to about four thousand. After issuing a proclamation inviting the patriots of Carolina to ‘vindicate the rights of America’, and holding out an amnesty to all those who had been forced ‘by the ruffian hand of conquest’ to give their paroles, he hastened against us.

  This was our position. South Carolina, though apparently pacified, was in a state of extreme unrest. Besides the matter I have mentioned, of the negroes who had run off to follow the drum, there was great dissatisfaction caused by the pressing of the planters’ horses, for the use of our cavalry and transport: they feared that they would not be paid sufficient compensation, if any. Moreover, enormous stocks of rice, indigo, tobacco and other riches of the province were seized from the houses of absentee Whigs and sold to Loyalists at below the market price. The submission made by the people was therefore only nominal, and when a levy was raised among the young unmarried men, who alone were required to serve, it soon appeared that they had no notion of taking up arms in support of their King; nor could they be persuaded by any means to become good soldiers. To hold the vast territories of South Carolina and Georgia we had no more than four thousand dependable troops, of whom near a thousand were now sick of fever.

  Thus, because of the detachments that had to be left to garrison Charleston and other places of importance, and to guard our lines of communication, we could only bring against the Americans about seven hundred regular troops, and twelve hundred volunteers and militia. Lord Cornwallis, when he came up from Charleston to command us in person, found our striking forces concentrated in the neighbourhood of Camden. He might have retired behind the Charleston lines, but this course did not commend itself to him. We had sick at Camden in the hospital, and the magazine contained powder and provisions that we could not afford to abandon. A retreat also would encourage the South Carolina militia to renounce their new allegiance and to be revenged for their surrender at Charleston. Indeed, two regiments had already mutinied and carried some of our sick away into North Carolina.

  Upon arriving at the borders of North Carolina, General Gates was advised that the longer of the two possible routes which he could take in his advance against us was the better: this was a westerly circuit by Charlotte and Salisbury through fertile country inhabited by revolutionaries. He chose instead to come direct at us through a country of sandy hills and what were called pine-barrens, interspersed with swamps.

  A prisoner from his army later told me: ‘It was a country poor enough to have starved a forlorn-hope of caterpillars. Hearts alive, what hope had we at this August season when the old corn-crop was gone and the new not yet in? Especially in a miserable piney-wood Tory desert, where even in peace-time many a family must starve, unless they can hit lucky—knock down a squirrel from the pines or pick up a terrapin from the swamp! We chewed the corn still green, stripped from the thin patches that we came across, and sinned against our bellies with unripe peaches. A few half-starved Tory cattle, met in the woods, we butchered; and one day my mess made a soup of an old bitch fox and the powder we kept for our queues. On the night before we came against you we were still very hungry; and, for want of rum, General Gates ladled us out molasses. That may be good enough fare for a Yankee, but it turns any honest Southern stomach inside out; by jing, many of us were mighty sick that night and fell out along the road by companies!’

  On August 13th, the American army reached Rugeley’s Mills, about fifteen miles to our north. This was a place that the Royal Welch Fusiliers knew very well; for we had been sent forward there a few days previously, but soon withdrawn to Camden lest we be overwhelmed. On August 15th, at ten o’clock at night the order was given us to march against General Gates and surprise him at dawn in his encampment, if he were still there—for Lord Cornwallis had information that at this very hour General Gates was to march against Camden and surprise us at dawn in our own encampment. We set off in the most profound silence, with orders not to sing, whistle or raise our voices above a whisper. But the loud undisciplined noises of night birds and insects from the swamps would have made the most animated discourse inaudible at twenty paces. At midnight we came to a river called Saunders’ Creek, and this occasioned some delay, the front of the column waiting for the rear to catch up. There was a scouting party ahead, of Tarleton’s Greens, a volunteer force of mixed cavalry and infantry, very bold and bloodthirsty men. Their uniforms were light-green, they wore waistcoats without skirts, and black cuffs and capes, and were armed with one sabre and one pistol apiece. The spare pistol-holsters were receptacles for their bread and cheese. Behind them came a half-battalion of regular light infantry, then ourselves, then The Thirty-Third (Lord Cornwallis’ own regiment) and then the rest of the army. About two in the morning, when we had made some nine miles, halting every now and then to await reports from our scouts, we heard a brisk sound of firing ahead of us. We were soon informed by a Green, who galloped back, that his scouting party had met enemy cavalry, and had instantly charged them. The enemy were in greater force, however, than the Greens had bargained for, and an officer being wounded they broke off the skirmish.

  We were now ordered to shake out from our column and form a line across the road; which we did, though it was very dark, with no moon that I remember. Soon we perceived the dim forms of the enemy advancing, also in line, and opened platoon fire. For about a quarter of an hour there was a brisk exchange of volleys; but since neither side knew what was in opposition, or would venture to charge until the main body of its own army could form up in support, this fire soon ceased. General Cornwallis was delighted to find that the position in which we now found ourselves was most favourable, being narrowed by swamps on either hand, which prevented us from being outflanked by the superior numbers of the enemy. Had we started our march but an hour later, General Gates would have been able to seize a most advantageous position near Saunders’ Creek; but we had forestalled him.

  We rested on our arms all night. The ground was sandy, with scrub and a few very straggling trees. The nearest human dwelling was a wretched farm about a mile away.

  I was the youngest sergeant in the Regiment and the proud honour therefore devolved upon me of carrying one standard of the Regimental Colours. The Goat did not come with us into action, for he had been bled so badly by the wood-ticks that he could hardly stand, much less march fifteen miles. My position was in the middle of the right wing, which consisted of ourselves, the Light Infantry, and The Thirty-Third. In the centre were our artillery—but only light pieces, two six-pounders and two three-pounders. The left wing, commanded by young Lord Rawdon (accounted as at once the ugliest man in Europe and the bravest), consisted of the infantry of the Greens; five hundred undependable American Loyalists; and The Volunteers of Ireland, a regiment which had been raised at Philadelphia during our occupation. These compatriots of mine were almost all deserters from the American army. Many of them, Dublin men, had been customers at my father’s shop and knew me as a child. Colonel Ferguson, their commander, was troubled one day that a volunteer had been caught in the act of deserting back to the enemy; he did not wish to order a flogging and therefore left the man’s fate to be adjudged by his comrades—they tucked him up at once from the nearest tree. In reserve stood the Seventy-First H
ighlanders and the cavalry of the Greens, with two more six-pounders.

  Colonel Balfour, by the bye, was not with us, being now Governor of Charleston, and the Regiment was therefore commanded by Captain Forbes Champagné, our senior captain. Being the eldest regiment we held the right of the line, according to tradition.

  As soon as daylight appeared we saw the enemy drawn up in two lines, very close to us. There was a dead calm, with a little haziness in the air. Opposite us were the Virginian militia who had joined the enemy only the day before; with the North Carolina militia posted next to them, facing The Thirty-Third who were on our left. We recognized these corps by their facings. Only a few random shots had been exchanged when General Gates, dissatisfied with the position of the militia, ordered them to re-form on a more extensive front. This movement was intended to prelude an assault, but Lord Cornwallis, observing what General Gates was about, decided ‘to catch him on one foot’, as a boxer would say, and desired Lieutenant-Colonel Webster of The Thirty-Third, who led the right wing, to advance forthwith. The order was sung out: ‘Make ready, present, fire!’ and the whole line crashed out in a volley which filled the air with acrid smoke. The enemy replied in a ragged manner; then came ‘Charge bayonets!’ and all around me, slap! every Fusilier’s hand came smartly against the sling of his musket as if it were a parade for the King’s birthday. The officers, pale and resolute, drew their hangers and with a huzza we went forward at a run in perfect alignment. There was not enough air to shake out the silken folds of the standard in display of Rising Sun, Red Dragon, White Horse and Three Feathers, but I wagged the staff as I ran. The heaviness of the air also prevented the smoke from rising; and, the action becoming general all along the line, so thick a darkness overspread the field that it was impossible to see the effect of the fire on either side. The Virginian militia, uncertain whether to continue the extending movement which had been ordered them, or whether to stand their ground, or whether to advance immediately against us, were thrown into total confusion. First some, and then all, ran back to the protection of their second line; but the North Carolina militiamen, who were posted there, caught contagion and ran too. Another North Carolina regiment, however, opposed to The Thirty-Third, behaved very well and fought to their last cartridge; for they had an excellent commanding officer, a General Gregory. Men of all races, I believe, are equally brave in battle if led by dependable and beloved officers.