Siege of Ninety Six
The siege of Ninety Six was a siege in western South Carolina late in the
The area is now protected as Ninety Six National Historic Site and was designated a National Historic Landmark. Many of the surviving Loyalists were later relocated by the Crown and granted land in Nova Scotia, where they named their township Rawdon to commemorate their rescuer.
Background
The
With the assistance of militia commanders Thomas Sumter, Francis Marion, and Andrew Pickens, the Patriot forces took a number of British outposts in the backcountry of South Carolina; others were abandoned to them. By mid-May, the only places in the state with significant British garrisons were Ninety Six, in the northwestern part of the state, and the port of Charleston, nearly 200 miles southeast on the Atlantic coast.
Order of Battle
The order of battle for the forces involved in the battle was:[2]
Continentals
- Commanding Officer, Major General Nathanael Greene
- Lee's Legion (150 mounted & foot)
- 1 Company from the Delaware Regiment
- 4 6-pounder cannons
- South Carolina Militia commanded by Brigadier General Andrew Pickens
- North Carolina Militia
- Maryland Brigade, commanded by Colonel Otho Holland Williams
- Virginia Brigade, commanded by Brigadier General Isaac Huger
- 1st Virginia Regiment - Lt. Col. Richard Campbell
- 2nd Virginia Regiment - Lt. Col. Samuel Hawes (resigned, May 30), Maj. Smith Snead
British
- Commanding Officer, Lieutenant Colonel John Harris Cruger[3]
- 1st Battalion of De Lancey's Brigade
- 2nd Battalion of New Jersey Volunteers
- South Carolina Loyalist Militia from the Ninety Six District
- 3 3-pounder cannons, but no artillerists
British Defenses
The British outpost at Ninety Six was garrisoned by 550 experienced
Siege
Greene and about 1,000 men arrived outside Ninety Six on May 22, the same day that
By June 3 Greene's men had dug a trench within 30 yards (27 m) of the Star Fort. They used a tactic similar to one used by Gen. Marion to
On June 7 Lord Rawdon left Charleston with 2,000 British forces to relieve the siege. The next day, Pickens and Lee arrived, having successfully captured Augusta on June 6. Greene did not learn of Rawdon's move until June 11. With the situation becoming critical, Greene decided to try an assault on the fort. (Cruger learned of Rawdon's approach the next day when the messenger, posing as a Patriot, got close enough to the fort to race the remaining distance on his horse.)[4]
Assault
Greene planned to have one party capture the smaller redoubt, while a larger attack force went after the Star Fort, where some men would pull down the sandbags to expose the defenders to fire from the tower. When the attack began on June 18, all went to plan at first—the smaller redoubt was taken, and men successfully penetrated the abatis and pulled down the sandbags. At this point, Cruger launched a counterstrike with a pair of
Aftermath
Greene's losses amounted to 150 men, while Cruger's casualties were under 100. Greene retreated toward Charlotte, North Carolina, allowing Rawdon to join forces with Cruger. Rawdon sent a sizable force after Greene, but heat and the toll of the long forced marches slowed them. The force was recalled to Ninety Six, which Rawdon then abandoned.
General Greene blamed the failure of the operations against Ninety Six in part on Sumter and Marion, who failed to act in support of his operations in a timely manner. Later, other officers blamed Greene and Lee for failing to cut off the defenders' water supply at the Spring Branch.
Writing in his memoirs, Lee singled out Col.
When Greene learned of Rawdon's retreat from Ninety Six, he tried to pull all of the elements of the Patriot military forces together to attack Rawdon before he reached Charleston. He failed because of Sumter's and Marion's apparently tardy movements. Greene rested his men for most of July and August in the
Legacy
Ninety Six National Historic Site was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1973.
Many of the Loyalists who were saved by Rawdon in the siege were resettled by the Crown in Nova Scotia. They named the township Rawdon, Nova Scotia, after Lord Rawdon to commemorate his having rescued them. The entire De Lancey's Brigade, which protected the Loyalists until Rawdon's arrival, was disbanded in Woodstock, New Brunswick, Canada in 1783.
Citations
- ^ A Brave Soldier of the Revolution, Acadiensis. Vol. 2. p. 238
- ^ George Nafziger, The Siege of Ninety-Six 22 May-19 June 1781, United States Army Combined Arms Center.
- ^ "Patriot siege of Ninety Six, South Carolina begins". HISTORY. Retrieved 2020-08-26.
- ^ Pancake, p. 213
Cheese pg3
General bibliography
- Morrill, Dan (1993). Southern campaigns of the American Revolution. Nautical & Aviation Publishing. ISBN 1-877853-21-6.
- Pancake, John (1985). This Destructive War. University of Alabama Press. ISBN 0-8173-0191-7.
- Reynolds, William R. Jr. (2012). Andrew Pickens: South Carolina Patriot in the Revolutionary War. Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company. ISBN 978-0-7864-6694-8.