Southern theater of the American Revolutionary War

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Southern theater
Part of the American Revolutionary War

The Battle of Cowpens by William Ranney
Date1775–1782
Location
Virginia, North and South Carolina, Georgia, East Florida and West Florida
Result

Franco-Spanish-American victory

Belligerents

United Colonies
(1775–1776)

United States
(1776–1782)
 France
(1778–1782)
 Spain
(1779–1782)
Chickasaw
Choctaw
Catawba
Lumbee[1]
Commanders and leaders

Comte d'Estaing

Spanish Empire Bernardo de Gálvez
Augustine Prevost
Strength
Southern Army
Main Army
Rochembeau's expeditionary force
Gálvez's force		 British Southern Army, totalling approximately 8,000 regulars and militia

The southern theater of the American Revolutionary War was the central

North Carolina, and South Carolina. Tactics consisted of both strategic battles and guerrilla warfare
.

During the first three years of the conflict, 1775–1778, the largest military encounters between Continental Army and the British Army had been in the New England and Middle colonies, around the cities of Boston, New York, and Philadelphia. After the failure of the Saratoga campaign, the British Army largely abandoned operations in the north and pursued peace through control of the Southern Colonies.[2] Before 1778, these colonies were largely dominated by Patriot-controlled governments and militias, although there was also a Continental Army presence that played a role in the 1776 defense of Charleston, the suppression of Loyalist militias, and attempts to drive the British from strongly Loyalist East Florida.

The British began to implement their "Southern Strategy" in late 1778, in Georgia. It initially achieved success with the

Battle of Ramseur's Mill, the Battle of Cowpens, and the Battle of Kings Mountain, also served to weaken the overall British military strength. The culminating engagement, the siege of Yorktown, ended with the surrender of British Lieutenant General Charles Cornwallis on October 19, 1781. It was essentially the last major battle of the Revolutionary War.[3][4] Shortly afterward, negotiations between the United States and Great Britain began, resulting in the Treaty of Paris of 1783
.

Early operations, 1775–1778

Detail of a 1770s map showing eastern Virginia and many of the places where conflict occurred in 1775. The map is oriented with North to the bottom and South to the top.

Virginia

In most colonies British officials quickly departed as the Patriots took control. In Virginia, the royal governor resisted. In the

James River. Dunmore saw rising unrest in the colony and was trying to deprive Virginia militia of supplies needed for insurrection. The Patriot militia, led by Patrick Henry, forced Dunmore to pay for the gunpowder. Dunmore continued to hunt for caches of military equipment and supplies in the following months, acts that were sometimes anticipated by Patriot militia, who would move supplies before his arrival.[5]

Dunmore issued an emancipation proclamation in November 1775, promising freedom to runaway slaves who fought for the British. After an incident at Kemp's Landing in November where Dunmore's troops killed and captured Patriot militiamen, Patriot forces defeated Loyalist troops (which included runaway slaves Dunmore had formed into his Ethiopian Regiment) at the Battle of Great Bridge on December 9. Dunmore and his troops retreated to Royal Navy ships anchored off Norfolk; these naval forces bombarded and burned the town on January 1, 1776. Patriot forces in the town completed the destruction of the former Loyalist stronghold. Dunmore was driven from an island in Chesapeake Bay that summer, and never returned to Virginia.[6]

Georgia

Boston, Massachusetts to acquire rice and other provisions. Wright escaped captivity and reached the fleet. In the Battle of the Rice Boats
in early March, the British successfully left Savannah with a number of merchant vessels containing the desired rice supplies.

The Carolinas

Main articles: Snow Campaign and Battle of Sullivan's Island
Sir Henry Clinton
led the British land forces in the failed attack on Charleston.

South Carolina's population was politically divided when the war began. The lowland communities, dominated by Charleston, sided strongly with the Patriots, while the back country held a large number of Loyalist sympathizers.[7] By August 1775, both sides were recruiting militia companies.[8] In September, a Patriot militia seized Fort Johnson, Charleston's major defense works, and Governor William Campbell fled to a Royal Navy ship in the harbor.[9]

The seizure by Loyalists of a shipment of gunpowder and ammunition intended for the

Cherokee caused an escalation in tensions that led to the first siege of Ninety Six in western South Carolina late November.[10] Patriot recruiting was by then outstripping that of the Loyalists, and a major campaign (called the Snow Campaign due to unusually heavy snowfall) involving as many as 5,000 Patriots led by Colonel Richard Richardson succeeded in capturing or driving away most of the Loyalist leadership. Loyalists fled, either to East Florida or to the Cherokee lands. A faction of the Cherokee, known as the Chickamauga
, rose up in support of the British and Loyalists in 1776. They were finally defeated by militia forces from North and South Carolina.

Crucial in any British attempt to gain control of

Henry Clinton arrived at Cape Fear, North Carolina, in May, he found conditions there unsuitable for a strong post. Scouting by the Royal Navy identified Charleston, whose defenses were unfinished and seemed vulnerable, as a more suitable location. In June 1776, Clinton and Admiral Sir Peter Parker led an assault on Fort Sullivan
, which guarded the Charleston harbor.

Clinton had failed to order a complete reconnaissance of the area. His 2,200 men force was landed on Long Island (adjacent to Sullivan's Island on which the fort was positioned), and they found the channel dividing the two islands too deep to ford.[11] Instead of re-embarking on his boats, he relied on the expedition's naval forces to reduce the fort, which became known after the war as Fort Moultrie. However, the firepower of the British ships was unable to make an impression on the spongy palmetto logs that formed the majority of the fort's defenses, and the bombardment failed in its objective.[12] It was a humiliating failure, and Clinton called off his campaign in the Carolinas.[13] Clinton and Parker argued after the engagement, each blaming the other for the failure of the assault.[13] It is debated that the South was lost by this failure to take Charleston in 1776, as it left the Loyalists unsupported for three years, while allowing the port of Charleston to serve the American cause until 1780.[14]

Failed attempts at British East Florida

Patriots in Georgia attempted several times to defeat the British garrison that was based at

brief skirmish at Alligator Bridge
in late June, combined with tropical diseases and command issues in the Patriot forces, left East Florida firmly in British hands for the war's duration.

British campaign in the South

See also: American Revolutionary War § Strategy and commanders

The Loyalist question

In 1778, the British again turned their attention to the South, where they hoped to regain control by recruiting thousands of Loyalists. Their belief in widespread Loyalist support was based on the accounts of Loyalist exiles in London who had direct access to the British Secretary of State for America, George Germain.[16] Keen to recover their lands and be rewarded for their loyalty to the crown, these men realized that the best way to convince the British to undertake a major operation in the South would be to exaggerate the level of potential Loyalist support. As a group, they had great influence on the British ministers in London.[17] In addition, there were strong business, trading and family ties among some Loyalists and the British in London. The British operated under the expectation that they would find substantial support for their actions, if only they liberated the right areas. While in South Carolina, Cornwallis wrote in a letter to Clinton that "Our assurances of attachment from our poor distressed friends in North Carolina are as strong as ever."[18] For the most part, this assumption was incorrect, as Cornwallis soon realized as the campaign progressed.[19]

British take Savannah

Portrait of General Benjamin Lincoln; by Charles Willson Peale

On April 19, 1778, three row galleys of the Georgia Navy engaged, defeated, and captured a Royal Navy brigantine, an armed British East Florida provincial sloop, and an armed brig.[20]

On December 29, 1778, a British expeditionary corps of 3,500 men from New York, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel

Saint Augustine, taking over outposts along the way. Prevost assumed command of the forces in Georgia; and dispatched Campbell with 1,000 men toward Augusta with the goals of gaining control of that town and the recruitment of Loyalists.[21]

The remnants of the defense of Savannah had retreated to Purrysburg, South Carolina, about 12 miles (19 km) upriver from Savannah, where they were met by Major General Benjamin Lincoln, commander of Continental Army forces in the South. He marched most of the army from Charleston, South Carolina in a move intended to monitor and oppose Prevost. Early in February 1779, Prevost sent a few hundred men to occupy Beaufort in a move probably intended to divert Lincoln's attention from Campbell's movements; Lincoln responded by sending General Moultrie and 300 men to drive them out. The February 3, 1779, Battle of Beaufort was largely indecisive, and both contingents eventually returned to their bases.

In the meantime, Campbell had taken control of Augusta without much resistance, and Loyalists were beginning to turn out. While he enrolled more than 1,000 men over a two-week period, he was powerless to prevent the defeat of a sizable number of Loyalists by Patriot militia under

Mark. The younger Prevost turned the tables on Ashe, who was following him south, surprising and very nearly destroying his force of 1,300 in the March 3 Battle of Brier Creek.[22]

Second attack on Charleston

By April, Lincoln had been reinforced by large numbers of South Carolina militia and received additional military supplies through

Rantowles, South Carolina) to cover his retreat. When Lincoln got back to Charleston he led about 1,200 men, mostly untried militia, after Prevost. This force was repulsed by the British on June 20, 1779, in the Battle of Stono Ferry. The rear guard, having succeeded in its objective, abandoned that post a few days later.[23] Prevost's foray against Charleston was notable for his troop's arbitrary looting and pillaging, which enraged friend and foe alike in the South Carolina low country.[24]

Defense of Savannah

In October 1779,

Kazimierz Pułaski, the Polish commander of American cavalry, was fatally wounded.[27] With Savannah secured, Clinton could launch a new assault on Charleston, South Carolina, where he had failed in 1776. Lincoln moved his remaining troops to Charleston to assist in the construction of its defenses.[28]

Third attack on Charleston

Main article: Siege of Charleston
Major operations in the South during 1780

Clinton moved against Charleston in 1780, blockading the harbor in March and building up about 10,000 troops in the area. His advance on the city was uncontested; the American naval commander, Commodore

scuttled five of his eight frigates in the harbor to make a boom for its defense.[29] Inside the city, General Lincoln commanded about 2,650 Continentals and 2,500 militiamen. British Lieutenant-Colonel Banastre Tarleton blocked any hope of reinforcement or resupply with victories at Moncks Corner in April and Lenud's Ferry in early May.[30] Charleston was now surrounded.[31] Clinton began constructing siege lines. On March 11 he commenced the bombardment of the town.[32]

On May 12, 1780, General Lincoln surrendered his 5,000 men—the largest surrender of U.S. troops until the

Battle of Guilford Courthouse in 1781 that the British finally lost this advantage in the South.[34]

Lord Cornwallis took command when Sir Henry Clinton sailed for New York.

The remnants of the southern Continental Army began to withdraw toward North Carolina, but were pursued by Tarleton’s

British Legion, which defeated them decisively at the Battle of Waxhaws on May 29. After the battle, Patriots alleged that Tarleton's forces had killed soldiers who were trying to surrender. The phrase, "Tarleton's quarter"—referring to his reputed lack of mercy, or "quarter"—soon became a rallying cry for the Patriots. Historians still debate whether a massacre occurred, but the belief affected the rest of the campaign. Many Loyalist militiamen were killed by vengeful Patriots shouting "Tarleton's Quarters!" after they surrendered at the Battle of Kings Mountain.[35] Tarleton later published an account of the war.[36]

Cornwallis takes command

After Charleston, organized American military activity in the South virtually collapsed. The states carried on their governmental functions, and the war was carried on by

William R. Davie, Andrew Pickens, and Elijah Clarke. General Clinton turned over British operations in the South to Lord Cornwallis. The Continental Congress dispatched General Horatio Gates, the victor of Saratoga, to the South with a new army, but Gates promptly suffered one of the worst defeats in U.S. military history at the Battle of Camden (August 16, 1780). Cornwallis prepared to invade North Carolina.[37]

Cornwallis's attempts to raise Loyalists in large numbers in North Carolina were effectively crushed when Patriot militia defeated a larger force of Loyalists in the Battle of Kings Mountain on October 7, 1780. Many of the Patriot men had crossed the Appalachian Mountains from the Washington District of North Carolina to fight the British and were so named the Overmountain Men. The British plan to raise large Loyalist armies failed—not enough Loyalists enlisted, and those who did were at high risk once the British army moved on. The defeat at Kings Mountain and the continuing harassment of his communications and supply lines by militia forces in South Carolina forced Cornwallis to withdraw and winter in South Carolina.

Gates was replaced by Washington's most dependable subordinate, General Nathanael Greene. Greene assigned about 1,000 men to General Daniel Morgan, a superb tactician who crushed Tarleton's troops at the Battle of Cowpens on January 17, 1781. As after Kings Mountain, Cornwallis was later criticized for detaching part of his army without adequate support.[38] Greene proceeded to wear down his opponents in a series of skirmishes and military movements referred to as the "Race to the Dan" (so named because the Dan River flows close to the border between North Carolina and Virginia); each encounter resulted in a tactical victory for the British but gave them no strategic advantage, while attrition took its toll.[39]

Cornwallis knew that Greene had divided his forces and wanted to face either Morgan's or Greene's contingent before they could rejoin. He stripped his army of all excess baggage in an effort to keep up with the fast-moving Patriots. When Greene learned of this decision, his gleeful response was "Then, he is ours!"[40] Cornwallis's lack of provisions as a consequence played a role in his later difficulties.

Portrait of General Nathanael Greene by John Trumbull

Greene first engaged Cornwallis in the

Hannibal by a slow war of attrition.[41] Greene eventually felt strong enough to face Cornwallis directly—near New Garden, North Carolina (modern day Greensboro, North Carolina). Although Cornwallis was the tactical victor in the Battle of Guilford Court House, the casualties his army suffered forced him to retreat to Wilmington, North Carolina, for resupply and reinforcements.[42]

Major operations in the South during 1781

While Cornwallis was unable to completely destroy Greene, he recognized that most of the supplies that the American forces were relying on were coming from Virginia, a state that up to this point in the war had been relatively untouched. Against the wishes of Clinton, Cornwallis resolved to invade Virginia in the hopes that cutting the supply lines to the Carolinas would make American resistance there impossible.

Lord George Germain in a series of letters that left Clinton out of the decision-making process for the Southern Army, despite his nominally being its overall commander.[45] Without informing Clinton, Cornwallis marched north from Wilmington into Virginia to engage in raiding operations,[46] where he eventually met the army commanded by William Phillips and Benedict Arnold, which had engaged in raiding activities there.[47] These raids resulted in massive destruction of tobacco fields and curing barns, as the colonists used tobacco to fund their war efforts. The British destruction of about 10,000 hogsheads of tobacco (roughly 10 million pounds) in 1780 and 1781 became known as the Tobacco War.[48][49]

When Cornwallis left Greensboro for Wilmington, he left the road open for Greene to begin the American reconquest of South Carolina. This he achieved by the end of June, in spite of a reverse sustained at

siege of Ninety-Six, which he was only forced to abandon when word arrived that Rawdon was bringing troops to relieve the siege. However, the actions of Greene and militia commanders like Francis Marion drove Rawdon to eventually abandon the Ninety Six District and Camden, effectively reducing the British presence in South Carolina to the port of Charleston. Augusta, Georgia was also besieged on May 22, and fell to Patriot forces under Andrew Pickens and Harry "Light Horse" Lee on June 6, reducing the British presence in that state to the port of Savannah.[50]

Greene then gave his forces a six weeks' rest on the High Hills of the Santee River. On September 8, with 2,600 men, he engaged British forces under Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Stewart at Eutaw Springs. Americans who fell in this battle were immortalized by American author Philip Freneau in his 1781 poem "To the Memory of Brave Americans." The battle, although tactically a draw, so weakened the British that they withdrew to Charleston, where Greene penned them in for the remaining months of the war.[51]

Yorktown

Main article: Siege of Yorktown
The surrender of British troops at Yorktown; French engraving; 1781
General Washington receives Cornwallis's sword from Charles O'Hara; sculpture from the facade of the Capitol Building in Washington.

Upon arrival in Virginia, Cornwallis took command of the existing British forces in the region, which had been commanded first by turncoat

Major General William Phillips. Phillips, a good friend of Cornwallis, died two days before Cornwallis reached his position at Petersburg.[52] Having marched without informing Clinton of his movements (communications between the two British commanders was by sea and extremely slow, sometimes up to three weeks), Cornwallis sent word of his northward march and set about destroying American supplies in the Chesapeake region.[53]

In March 1781, in response to the threat of Arnold and Phillips, General Washington had dispatched the

siege train arrived from Newport, Rhode Island, his position became untenable. Cornwallis surrendered to General Washington and the French commander the Comte de Rochambeau on October 19, 1781.[54]

Cornwallis reported this disaster to Clinton in a letter that opened:

I have the mortification to inform Your Excellency that I have been forced to give up the posts of York and Gloucester and to surrender the troops under my command by capitulation, on the 19th instant, as prisoners of war to the combined forces of America.[55]

Consequences

With the surrender at Yorktown, the full participation of French forces in that battle, and the resulting loss of Cornwallis's army, the British war effort ground to a halt. The sole remaining British army of any size remaining in America was that under Sir Henry Clinton in New York. Clinton, paralyzed by the defeat, made no further action and was replaced by

North Ministry collapsed, a peace-oriented government took power, and no further major operation on the American continent occurred for the rest of the war. While Saratoga had started the decline of British fortunes in the Revolution, Yorktown was its death knell.[57]

Heritage

The Southern Campaign of the Revolution National Heritage Corridor was established in the National Heritage Area Act in 2022.[58] The National Heritage Area will help preserve and promote tourism at several dozen historic sites along an 8-mile-wide corridor in North Carolina and South Carolina.[59][60][61]

References

  1. ^ "Indian Patriots from Eastern Massachusetts: Six Perspectives". February 4, 2015.
  2. ^ Hibbert, C.; Redcoats and Rebels; p. 235.
  3. ^ Russell, David Lee; The America Revolution in the Southern Colonies; 2009.
  4. ^ McBrayer, Rachel. "Southern Strategy". The Digital Encyclopedia of George Washington. Mount Vernon, Virginia: Mount Vernon Ladies' Association. Retrieved August 29, 2019.
  5. ^ John E. Selby, The Revolution in Virginia, 1775–1783 (1988) ch. 1
  6. ^ Selby, The Revolution in Virginia, 1775–1783 (1988) ch. 2
  7. ^ Alden, pp. 199–200
  8. ^ Cann, p. 204
  9. ^ McCrady, pp. 68–69
  10. ^ Cann, pp. 207–213
  11. ^ Bicheno, H: Rebels and Redcoats, p. 158
  12. ^ Hibbert, C: Redcoats and Rebels, p. 106
  13. ^ Bicheno, H: Rebels and Redcoats, pp. 154, 158
  14. ^ Coleman, K: A History of Georgia, pp. 77–78
  15. Wikidata Q59397598
  16. ^ Ritcheson, C.; "Loyalist Influence on British Policy Toward the United States After the American Revolution"; Eighteenth-Century Studies; Vol. 7, No. 1; Autumn, 1973; p. 6. Jstor link
  17. ^ "Letter from Cornwallis to Clinton, August 6th 1780", Clinton Papers; Clements Library, University of Michigan.
  18. ^ Wickwire; Cornwallis, the American Adventure; p. 315.
  19. ^ Wood, Virginia Steele (2006). "The Georgia Navy's Dramatic Victory of April 19, 1778". Georgia Historical Quarterly. 90 (2): 165–195. Retrieved February 15, 2018.
  20. ^ Morrill (1993), pp. 46–47
  21. ^ Morrill (1993), pp. 48–50
  22. ^ Morrill (1993), pp. 53–54
  23. ^ Wilson, p. 112
  24. ^ Hibbert, C.; Redcoats and Rebels; p. 246.
  25. ^ Hibbert, C.; Redcoats and Rebels; p. 245.
  26. ^ Rodgers, T.; "Siege of Savannah During the American Revolutionary War"; Military History; March 1997; p. 6. HistoryNet resource Archived 2007-09-30 at the Wayback Machine
  27. ^ Bicheno, H: Rebels and Redcoats, p. 166
  28. ^ Bicheno, H: Rebels and Redcoats, p. 171
  29. ^ Wickwire, Cornwallis, the American Adventure, p. 131
  30. ^ Hibbert, C, Redcoats and Rebels, p. 266
  31. ^ The Siege of Charleston; Journal of Captain Peter Russell, December 25, 1779, to May 2, 1780; The American Historical Review; Vol. 4, No. 3; Apr., 1899; p. 490. Jstor link
  32. ^ Boatner; Encyclopedia of the American Revolution; p. 213.
  33. ^ Mackey, The War for America, 1964
  34. ^ Wickwire; Cornwallis, the American Adventure; p. 258,
  35. ^ Tarleton; A History of the Campaigns of 1780 and 1781 in the Southern Provinces of North America; 1787.
  36. ^ Jim Piecuch, The Battle of Camden (2006).
  37. ^ Clinton, H.; The American Rebellion; 1783.
  38. ^ Terry Golway, Washington's General: Nathanael Greene and the Triumph of the American Revolution (2005) ch 10.
  39. ^ Morrill (1993), p. 140
  40. ^ Livy; ad Urbe Cond.; xii, xviii.
  41. ^ Golway, Washington's General: Nathanael Greene and the Triumph of the American Revolution (2005) pp. 248–260.
  42. ^ Cornwallis; An Answer to Sir Henry Clinton's Narrative. Note: Cornwallis wrote this pamphlet shortly after the war in explanation of his actions.
  43. JSTOR 26298725
    . Retrieved October 20, 2021.
  44. ^ Cornwallis Correspondence, Public Record Office
  45. ^ Clinton, H.; The American Rebellion. Note: This lack of notification was one of Sir Henry Clinton's main arguments in his own defense in the controversy that followed the surrender at Yorktown.
  46. ^ Franklin B. Wickwire and Mary B. Wickwire. Cornwallis and the War of Independence (1971)
  47. doi:10.1146/annurev-polisci-051017-103748
    .
  48. ISBN 978-1851094318
    .
  49. ^ George W. Kyte, "Strategic Blunder: Lord Cornwallis Abandons the Carolinas, 1781." Historian 22.2 (1960): 129–144.
  50. ^ Bicheno; 2001. Note: Bicheno strongly emphasizes that Cornwallis' absence from the South made the American reconquest merely a matter of time.
  51. ^ Wickwire; Cornwallis, The American Adventure; 1970.
  52. ^ Benton Rain Patterson, Washington and Cornwallis: The Battle for America, 1775–1783 (2017) pp. 289–300.
  53. ^ Patterson, Washington and Cornwallis: The Battle for America, 1775–1783 (2017) pp. 301–330.
  54. ^ Cornwallis to Clinton, 20th October, 1781, Cornwallis Papers, Public Record Office
  55. ^ Wientraub; Iron Tears 2005.
  56. ^ Andrew Jackson O'Shaughnessy, The Men who Lost America: British Leadership, the American Revolution, and the Fate of the Empire (2014) pp. 41–43, 76–78
  57. ^ "National Heritage Area Act". Congress.gov. December 22, 2022.
  58. ^ T&D, Special to The. "Revolutionary War corridor in S.C. gets OK". The Times and Democrat. Retrieved December 26, 2022.
  59. ^ "Southern Campaign of the Revolution National Heritage Area Suitability / Feasibility Study" (PDF). National Park Service. July 2014.
  60. ^ "Editorial: Promising progress on promoting the South's Revolutionary War sites". Post and Courier. Retrieved December 26, 2022.

Sources

Further reading

See also: Bibliography of South Carolina history
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Southern_theater_of_the_American_Revolutionary_War&oldid=1204957918"