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Pag* 2B-KINGS MOUNTAIN HERALD-TuMday. Oclobw 7. 1980 KM: A Story Of Contradiction » • Cont. from page IB enemy line and rolled it up. It was here that bayonet charges , such as those employed by Ferguson, would have been deadly effective, and Fuller frankly wondered at Ferguson’s failure to adopt such obvious tactics. As it was, British pickets sighted the American column marching to surround the southern part of the ridge, and sounded the alarm. As the British troops hurried to form their battle lines the men in this American column (frontiersmen under Shelby, Campbell and Sevier) launched their premature attack up the slopes along the southern end of the ridge. The men in the other American col umn (those of Cleveland, Ham- bright, McDowell, Williams and Winston) hurried desperately to reach their assigned positions and join in. Their presence was still unknown to the British, and — their sudden appearance at Ferguson’s rear, some fifteen or twenty minutes after the start of battle, would seal his doom. BAYONET ATTACKS It was also here, early in the battle, that Ferguson made what be a fatal decision, though it would appear so only in hind sight. He committed his best troops, his 100-man Provincial Corps under Captain Abraham DePeyster, his second in com mand, to a series of bayonets charges against the attackers. DePeyster sent his men down the slope against Campbell’s and Shelby’s men in attacks which drove the frontiermen clear to the bottom of the hill. Riflemen caught with empty weapons were helpless such an attack; they could only scatter and run. But at Kings Mountain - for perhaps the first time in the war - American militia did not panic at the sight of red coats laiheers were made of sterner stuff, and their leadership in this kind of fighting was excellent. Each unit simply fell instinctive ly into a pattern of retreating .before the menacing bayonets while their comrades pressed the attack from sides and rear. Gt was the same methods their own hunting dogs would use in holding a bear at bay). And all the while they were loading and firing their long rifles with dead ly effectiveness, systematically thinning the ranks, of Ferguson’s splendid Fh'ovincials. Ferguson was guilty of two sins. He had failed to take ade quate precautions against a sur prise attack, which was most un characteristic of him and he had seriously underestimated his op position, which, unfortunately for him, was totally in character! The Scot had formed his Tory militia in battle line along the ridgetop. As additional American units joined in the at tack, spreading in a skirmish line through the woods along its slopes, Ferguson set his men fir ing vollies to drive them back. Eye-witnesses accounts later spoke of the mountain rocking from the shock of the gunfire, and “belching smoke and fire like a volcano.” Much of this volly firing was ineffective, however, for the Whigs were keeping under cover, and green troops have an additional tendency to shoot high when fir ing downhill. "W« morchod with a quick 8t«p. Major Chroniclo boing about ton pacM in front of us Tbon ho raisod his hot from his hood and crisd "Foes to tho hilL" Tho words woro scarcoly uttsrod whsn tho British fired another ▼oUey, and a ball struck Ma jor Cteonicle and he fell; and a second offer a ball struck William Robb, about six feet from the major, and he drop ped. We then odTonced up the hill close to the Tory lines.” Robert Henry (oge 16) "When the Redcoats first charged us with their bayonets 1 was frightened. We all were, and retreoted back down the mountain. I sow Colonel Campbell, on foot, pursuing us. ond colling on us to halt, which we soon did and came back, with him with us, and started back up the hilL" Henry Dickensen, of Campbell's Regiment "When our detachment charged for the first time it fell my lot to put o Rebel cap tain to death, which I did most efectually with one blow of my sword. The fellow was at least six feet high but I had rather the advantage os I was mounted and he on foot," • . Lieut. Alloire of Ferguson's Corps. After the war. Colonel Henry Lee of Virginia, who was not at Kings Mountain, wrote that the hilltop was “ ... more assailable by the rifle than defensible by the bayonet.” This pithy obser vation was not particularly ac curate (even Washington had recommended bayonets tactics for scattering riflemen) but it was colorful enough to influence thinking about the battle for two hundred years. The difficulty for Ferguson was actually two-fold: first, he did not have enough well-trained troops to make such tactics effective against a deter mined foe on rough terrain; and second, he had not yet recogniz ed the nature of the attack against him. The Turning Point Early Southern historians call ed the Battle of Kings Mountain “the turning point of the American Revolution,” taking their cue, apparently from Thj^mas Jefferson, whose actual quote called it “ ... the joyful an nunciation of that turn in the tide that terminated the Revolu tion in our Independence.” The Revolution had many ups and downs, of course, but without diminishing the impor tance of Kings Mountain, most modem historians believe that if the war had a single turning point it was the American vic tory at Saratoga in 1777, which brought France into the war on the Colonies’ side. Kings Moun tain has more recently, and more accurately, been described as the “turning point of the war in the South.” indicative, as Jefferson pointed out, of a turn of the tide in British affairs, but not by itself overwhelmingly responsible for the ultimate victory. Though total defeats such as the Tories suflered the rare in war, the main value of Kings Mountain was probably psychological. It was a re^ morale-booster for Southern Whigs during the worst year of the war, and it virtually wrecked Tory morale in the Carolina back country. It brought much- needed time for the defeated Southern American army to regroup itself. But most impor tant it destroyed whatever little faith the British military leader ship had in the worth of Tory militia, and did so at a time when the Redcoats needed American numpower to win the war. Sir Henry Ginton, the British Commander-in-Chief, wrote in his memoirs that Kings Moun tain had ruined all hopes for Loyalist support. He considered the defeat a disaster for his overall plans, and blamed Lord Cornwallis for detaching Ferguson to the frontier with in sufficient support. Cornwallis, in turn, in his memoirs, blamed Ferguson for overconfidence in his Tory militia. Cornwallis’ most recent biographer, perhaps overstating the case in defending his subject’s actions, said that Ferguson’s overconfidence at Kings Mountain was not only largely responsible for the loss of both Carolinas to the Crown, but had also paved the way for Cornwallis’ own defeat at Yorktown. He wrote “Major Ferguson’s rock-piled grave sym bolizes more than the Scot’s own death. It is, in fact, the grave of the last British hope of subdue- ing the United States.” PRISONERS ESCAPE American military leaders on the scene at that time took a somewhat dimmer view. General Nathaniel Green, the Southern Commander, com plained to Washington a few months after the Kings Moun tain battle that most of its military effectiveness had been dissipated by the careless handl ing of the British prisoners by the North Carolina state authorities. Prisoners were a valuable commodity, to be ex changed for American languishing in British prisons, and Greene complained that of the hundreds taken, only sixty remained in custody! The state was ill-equipped to feed or handle prisoners of war. The victors at Kings Mountain had hanged a few of the most- hated Tory leaders, paroled others, allowed many to enlist on the American side and guarded the rest so carelessly that perhaps as many as several hun dred had escaped! Adding insult to injury, Greene said, was the fact that over two hundred of the Tories released to join American units had already deserted and rejoin ed the enemy. Proof that Kings Mountain did not entirely solve the Tory problem can be seen from fact that in the spring of 1781, some six months after the battle, Greene wrote Washington that affairs in North Carolina remain ed in a deplorable state. The country was being laid entirely to waste, he said, and the Whigs and Tories seemed determined to destroy one another. And in June of that same year. North Carolina’s new governor, Thomas Burke, reported that the state was still involved in a dead ly civil war. British forces held Wilmington, and Tories roamed the eastern half of state at will. On September 13, Burke himself and his staff would be captured in a Tory raid on Hillsborough. Clinton believed that a too- hasty invasion of North Carolina had cost Cornwallis the Photo Courtesy Tennessee State Museum w- As pressure mounted along the slopes, Ferguson was forced to recall his Provincials from the southern end of the ridge to pre vent their being cut off. As historian Lyman Draper describ ed it “Ferguson’s men were tyginning to fall i>n every hand. The major had sent Captain DePeyster with some of the Pro- vincii Rangers to reinforce a threatened point. To reach the post assigned him, however, the valiant captain had to pass through a blaze of riflery, losing most of his men in the effort. Then Major Ferguson ordered his small calvary detachment, twenty men under Lieutenant Taylor, to mount and press for ward to assist DePeyster. But as fast as they mounted they were mostly picked off by the Whig marksmen.” By now, the other American troops had completed the en circlement and joined in the at tack from the rear. These were the troops under Winston, Lacy Hill, Chronicle and Hawthorne. It was a beautifully-timed but ac cidental envelopment which could never have been executed on purpose! As the American circle was completed, the volume of fire power directed into the British lines, increased tremendously. Panic began to spread among the greener Tory troops. Now, “ much too late, Ferguson tried to organize a movement to cut his way off the hilltop. He had already committed his most dependable troops, the Provin- citil Regulars, to action on the other end of the line, however, and with panic ow disrupting his ranks he could not regroup the Regulars to spearhead the drive. Desperately the British com mander attempted to lead the way himself with the few men he could gather together, telling DePeyster to follow with those he could muster. As he rode into the American line, however, the British Commander was blasted from the saddle by a volly of rifle Are, along with several others. DePeyster was left with no alter native but to surrender, in an ef fort to stop further bloodshed. This proved difficult to do, however, and the indiscriminate shooting and killing continued for a disgracefuUy-long period. Then, finally, the Battle of Kings Mountain was over. It lasted approximately one hour, and involved perhaps two thou sand men in a struggle for an obscure hilltop whose presene was not even marked on the few colonial maps. Yet its effects would be felt throughout two centuries of American history. 1. M.Q. FvTfu«»ri‘» I 4'*) lA'hsir** t-VrfUMOa killvit | I 0. M. MotiUinvnt M. Now Moiiiimt-nt tt. K«rvaKoii't CJraYv Position Of Troops Troop Numbers A Mystery ^ ByEDSMITH Perhaps the biggest mystery about the Battle of Kings Moun tain is that of the numbers of troops involved in the fighting, and the casualties they suffered. It has always been a characteristic of warfare—from the dawn of history to Vietnam and today’s fighting in Iran—for both sides to play tricks with the numbers. This was particularily true during the Southern phase of the American Revolution, where large numbers of ir regulars participated in contests which were often poorly reported on afterwards. Guer rilla leaders generally kept one eye on the enemy and one eye on the propaganda value of their “victories”, minimizing their own numbers and casualties and maximizing those of the enemy. Losers, too, tended to exaggerate the numbers of their van quishers, as an excuse for losing in spite of their own valient ef forts. Frankly, we don’t know how many men took part at Kings Mountain—on either side—or the exact numbers of casualties they suffered. Exact troop numbers, may not have been as important to the outcome of the battle, however, as was the fighting caliber of the men in volved. The majority of Ferguson’s Tory militia were re cent recruits, farm youths relatively untrained in formal, linear tactics. A majority of the American side were fron tiersmen, skilled marksmen fighting their own kind of fight on a familiar type of terrain. When the chips were down, this made the difference. The Whigs—bolstered by remarkable performances from their leaders—kept coming back for more. The Tories—dispite the remarkable example set by their officers and Provincial regulars—cracked when the pressure mounted. The official report, signed by Colonels Campbell, Shelby, Sevier, Qeveland, etc., listed 1,125 men in the British force, and gave their own numbers at slightly over 900. They reported the enemy casualties at 225 kill ed, 163 wounded, and around 700 prisoners. They listed their own casualties as 28 dead and 62 wounded. Thirty years after the battle, however. Colonel Shelby admit ted that their report had been “inaccurate” and “indefinite”; that the numbers had been altered. . .“to give tone to the public reports.” Historians now believe that Ferguson’s men numbered closer to 900 than 1,100 but accept the figure of around 385 killed and wounded as being fairly accurate a casualty rate of over one-third of the British troops involved. It is now believed that perhaps a few men on the hilltop may have escaped, but practically all those who survived the battle were captured, making Kings Moun tain one of the most complete victories in American history. In all likelihood, the American force exceeded 1,200 men, perhaps running as high as 1400 to 1800 men. Captain DePeyster, Ferguson’s second- in-command, always insisted that the Americans numbered 2500 men or enough to “sur round the mountain” and “over whelm” the British forces. Sur viving Tory accounts of the bat tle claimed that the American casualties. . .“were as great as our own.” Perhaps this, to<^, is an exaggeration, but certainly the Whig forces suffered more killed and wounded than they reported. Due to the irregular nature of the expedition—with each commander responsible on ly for the lives of his own unit—no central accounting had to be given. It is entirely possible that not even the American com manders themselves knew the exact total of their numbers in the battle of their losses! Individual marksmanship played a key role in the fron tiersmen’s victory. History records that after the battle dozens of dead Tories were found scattered along the hilltop, behind rocks and trees. Over a score were shot cleanly through the head. Wrote a victorious Whig. .“After the fight was over, the situation of the poor Tories was really pitiable. The dead lay in heaps on all sides while the groans of the wounded were heard from every direction. 1 could not help turning away from the scene in horror.” Another remembered that. . .“We had to encamp on the ground with the dead and wounded, and pass the night amid their groans, lamentations and the constant cry of “Water, water. The cries of the Tories, he remembered laconically, were. . .” little heeded.” Since medical attention was in very short supply, many of the wounded ultimately died. war, but it now appears that direction had as much to do with it as timing. Had Cornwallis marched further eastward, toward Cross Creek (Fayet teville) instead of Charlottetown, where Tory support was indeed far greater and supplies available by sea, he might have met with greater success. Kings Moun tain, or a similar disaster for his plans, might have been avoided, and the Revolution itself might have ended on a far different note. Instead, as the Historical Evaluation Section of the U.S. Army War College concluded in its study in 1928: “Kings Moun tain was the outstanding victory of the Americans in 1780. Turn to page 3B Took Part In Executions Cont. from page IB generosity and cruelty. On one occasion he hanged a captive so badly wounded that witnesses were begging him not to. On another occasion he hanged one captured Tory on the spot, then offered the man’s youthful brother (considered a lesser scoundrel) the chose of hanging or cutting his own ears off with a rusty skinning knife. The victors at Kings Moun tain condemned 36 of their most notorious Tory captives to death by hanging, in retaliation to the recent execution of some South Carolina Whig “terrorists” by Lord Cornwallis. Nine men were hanged—three at a time, side by side—before the Whigs sickened of the task and commuted the sentences of th^ rest. Those were tough times, in volving people tough enough to survive in an environment that was brutal even in the absense of partisan warfare. In their defense it should be stated that central government authority had weakened_to the point of col- 'Ikpse whfiiTIie~war moved in land, and acts of guerrilla war fare began on both sides. Vigilante Justice prevailed in the name of self-defense. And often those guilty of the worst ex cesses—and those delt with most severely when caught—were in deed more opportunities and outlaws than sincere supporters of either King or Independence. Contemporary writers in South Carolina would write that .. .“the barbarities committed by (Tory) Captain Christian Houck were beyond belief’, speaking of men murdered, homes burned and wives and infants left destitute of food, clothing or shelter in mid-winter. And in the Catawba Valley-Lincoln County area of North Carolina similar charges were made about the Moore brothers, “Plundering Sam” Brown, “Bloody Bill” Cun ningham and their followers. Most of them ultimately met violent ends at the hands of outraged Whigs. Even the British authorities did their part to stir up animosities amid the civilian population. Sir Henry Clinton issued a heavy-handed proclama tion forcing neutrals to be active in supporting the Crown—thus tipping many in the opposite direction. Lord Cornwallis ex ecuted at least a few civilians ar bitrarily designated as deserters or terrorists, and imprisoned others. Professional soldiers like Major Wemyss went out of his way to bum every Presbyterian church he could find, calling them (not without cause) “sedi tion shops”. Seven months after Kings Mountain, the Southern American Commander General Nathaniel Greene wrote to General Washington that. . .‘The animosity between the Whigs and Tories of the state (North Carolina) renders their situation tmiy deplorable. There is not a day passes that there are not some who fall sacrifice to this savage disposition. The Whigs seem determined to extir pate the Tories, and the Tories the Whigs. Some thousands have fallen in this way in this quarter, and the evil rages with more violence than ever. If a stop can not be put to these massacres the country will be depopulated in a few months more, as neither Whig nor Tory can live!” I) 3 I) I) € • ^ I m I • •I f
The Kings Mountain Herald (Kings Mountain, N.C.)
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Oct. 7, 1980, edition 1
14
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