To Be a Soldier: A Selective American Military History

By Julian M. Olejniczak

West Point is a geographical location that was of critical importance during the Revolutionary War, the site of our nations first military academy, and the commissioning source of thousands of Army, Army Air Corps, Air Force, and even some Navy and Marine Corps officers who have led our nations young men, and now women, in battle since the Academys founding on March 16, 1802 by President Thomas Jefferson.
This volume contains a very selective military history of the United States that focuses on the Revolutionary War and the contributions of West Point graduates to subsequent wars, but with an emphasis on some of the lesser known persons and events of the past 250 years or so. It also touches upon many of the customs and traditions of the West Point experience.
Many chapters include the stories of unsung or forgotten heroes and heroines. Men like John Stark, Daniel Morgan, Eleazer Derby Wood, Benjamin L.E. Bonneville, Oliver Otis Howard, Henry Ossian Flipper, Calvin Pearl Titus, Charles Young, Norman D. Cota, and Donald W. Holleder plus women like the Warner sisters, Laura Walker, and Emily Perez. One of the final chapters, however, deals within the kindest sense of the terma few rogues of West Point like Edgar Allan Poe, James McNeil Whistler, Hugh S. Johnson, and The Mole.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Feb 6, 2015
• ISBN: 9781499078206

Julian M. Olejniczak

Julian Michael Olejniczak is a career infantry officer who served combat tours in Vietnam with Special Forces and the Vietnamese Rangers and two unaccompanied tours with an infantry division in South Korea. Stateside, he taught literature and philosophy at West Point and offensive tactics at the Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. In the interior of Alaska, he commanded an arctic light infantry battalion and later advised a National Guard brigade in New York. He earned a master of arts degree in literature from the University of Wisconsin and a joint MBA and law degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. After practicing corporate law in Nashville, he returned to West Point as vice president for alumni publications. His military decorations include the Silver Star and the Purple Heart. He also is the author of To Be a Soldier: A Selective American Military History.

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Copyright © 2015 by Julian M. Olejniczak.

Cover photography by Sylvia Anderson Graham.

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Rev. date: 02/09/2015

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Contents

Foreword

Introduction

The Revolutionary War

Battle of Sag Harbor

Battle of/for Bennington

The First Great Chain across the Hudson

Battle of Barren Hill

Battle of Stony Point

Battle of Kings Mountain

Battle of Cowpens

Washington’s Headquarters

Genesis of the Purple Heart Medal

Knox’s Headquarters

The Enemy across the River

Last General Officer of the Continental Line

Unsung Heroes and Heroines

The Burbeck Academy

West Point’s First Military Super Hero, War of 1812

Explorer Benjamin Bonneville

George Horatio Derby a.k.a. John Phoenix

The Praying General

Flipper’s Legacy

Schofield’s Definition of Discipline

The Warner Sisters

I’ll Try, Sir!

The Original Stormin’ Norman

Astronaut Ed White, Class of 1952

An Olympian Called Frenchy

The House that Smith Built

Cadet Ducrot Pepys

The Foxhole on Your Front Lawn

A Woman of Substance

A Man Called Holly

Just another Walk in the Sun

The War of 1812

Fort Dearborn/Chicago Massacre

Battle of Chippawa, 1814

The War with Mexico

Old Fuss and Feathers

Chapultepec

The Civil War

Old Fuss and Feathers Redux

Gettysburg, July 1–3, 1863

A Civil War Thanksgiving on Missionary Ridge, November 26, 1863

Battle of the Crater, July 30, 1864

Reconciliation and the West Point Association of Graduates

Second Man in His Class, Robert E. Lee, Class of 1829

A Tomb at Halicarnassus, Ulysses S. Grant, Class of 1843

In Search of Truman Seymour

Decoration Day

The Spanish-American War

World War I

The United States Enters World War I

The Black Lions of Cantigny

Battle of St. Mihiel

Meuse-Argonne Offensive

The Original Lost Battalion

Armistice Day and the Unknown Soldier

Here Rests in Honored Glory an American Soldier Known but to God.

Unknown Soldiers of World War II and the Korean War

Unknown Soldier of the Vietnam War

The Army during the Great Depression

The Civilian Conservation Corps

World War II

A Date Which Will Live in Infamy: Pearl Harbor

The First Army Medal of Honor Awarded during World War II

D-Day, the 6th of June 1944

Liberation of Paris: 4th Infantry Division

On the French Riviera, August 14–15, 1944

Christmas 1944 at Bastogne, Belgium

A Contemporary Pilgrimage to Normandy

Bill Mauldin—In Praise of Two Dogfaces, Willie and Joe

Ernie Pyle—Killed in Action

The Last Big Gun on Corregidor

A Contemporary Pilgrimage to Corregidor

The Dawn of the Atomic Age: A New and Terrible Weapon

The Sandia Pioneers

The Korean War

Task Force Smith

The Landing at Inchon

Home by Christmas

An Incident near Kumch’on, North Korea

The Ugly Reality of Unsan

Inchon in Reverse

The Right Way, the Wrong Way, and the Ridgway

Pork Chop Hill, April 1953

Pork Chop Hill, July 1953

The Vietnam War

The First and Last Medals of Honor of the Vietnam War

Six Other Recipients of the Medal of Honor in Vietnam

The Easter Offensive of 1972

Epilogue: The First Vietnamese West Point Graduate

Afghanistan

Helping Hamid Karzai

Yet another Unenviable First

The First Gulf War (Kuwait)

Stormin’ Norman

The Death of the Tawakalna (Republican Guard) Armored Division

Note on the Second Gulf War (Iraq)

Ships, Boats, and West Point

A Ship Named West Point

The Hudson River Reserve Fleet

The Second Military Academy of the United States

Steamboats on the Hudson

Anchors Aweigh, Army!

The Black Knights of the Hudson

Slum and Gravy

Wings of West Point

Two Unenviable Firsts

Army Air Corps Academy

The First Army Air Corps Attack in the Pacific

Berlin Airlift Ends Communist Blockade

The Third Military Academy of the United States

Around and About West Point

The Chapels of West Point

Cadet Chapel Centennial

The West Point Cemetery

West Point Weddings: Then and Now

The Cadet Hostess

The Traditional One-Hundredth Night Show

Marty Maher and Bringing Up the Brass

Dick’s Folly

Bannerman’s Island Arsenal

The Libraries of West Point

The Initial Libraries

A Proper Library without a Home

The Three-Turreted Library of 1841

The Renovations of 1895

A Larger Library for a Larger Corps of Cadets in 1964

Mr. Jefferson’s Library of 2008

Monuments of West Point

Kosciuszko’s Monument

Kosciuszko’s Garden

Battle Monument

The American Soldier Monument

Sedgwick’s Spurs

The Custer Statue Controversy

The French Monument

Carved in Stone

The Many Memorials of West Point

Venerable Cullum Memorial Hall: Then and Now

So Many Other Memorials to the Fallen

New York City

The Incomparable Mama Leone’s

They Remember Mama

Joe King’s Rathskeller

Rogues of West Point

The Eggnog Riot of 1826

Edgar Allan Poe

Whistler’s Mother and Father

The Man who Almost Built the Panama Canal

MacArthur and the Reveille Gun

MacArthur Busts a Popular First Captain

Mole Here

Breaking Ranks at the Graduation Parade

Glossary of Selected Terms

DEDICATION

To my wife and fellow author, Sylvia Graham Olejniczak;

our family; and those dedicated men and women who have served faithfully and courageously in our nation’s armed forces, especially those who gave their last full measure of devotion during armed combat or suffered life-changing wounds.

FOREWORD

T HE UNITED STATES Military Academy in New York State, or simply West Point, celebrated its bicentennial in 2002, a half year after the tragic attack on the United States now known as 9/11. But long before its official founding by Pres. Thomas Jefferson on March 16, 1802, it served a crucial military purpose in our Revolutionary War as one anchor point of the Great Chain across the Hudson River that prevented the British from splitting the rebellious colonies by controlling this vital river linking the British colonies in Canada and the important seaports on the East C oast.

Unfortunately, West Point in September 1780 also was the site of the infamous attempted betrayal of the young rebellion by Benedict Arnold—a daring and courageous early combat leader of the patriot army who later sought to deliver fortress West Point to the British, thereby making his name synonymous with treason.

As both a historic location and the site of our nation’s first military academy and school of engineering, West Point is an essential part of American military history. This volume, however, is a very selective military history. In these pages you will find some famous names and incidents, but for the most part you will find many far lesser known stories and forgotten American heroes (and heroines). There are many other persons, places, and events that meet these criteria in addition to those included here, but these others will have to wait for another volume.

Many friends and professional acquaintances provided encouragement and personal and historic information for this volume, and a number of them are cited as appropriate, but any errors found herein are wholly my own.

INTRODUCTION

W EST POINT IS a geographical location that was of critical importance during the Revolutionary War, and is the site of our nation’s first military academy, and the commissioning source of thousands of Army, Army Air Corps, Air Force, and even a few Navy and Marine Corps officers. These men—and more recently women—have led our nation’s young men and women in battle since the academy’s founding on March 16, 1802, by Pres. Thomas Jefferson and its coming of age under early superintendent Sylvanus Thayer, class of 1808, now considered the Father of the Military Aca demy.

This volume contains a very selective military history of the United States that focuses on the Revolutionary War and the contributions of West Point to subsequent wars, but with an emphasis on some of the lesser known persons and events of the past 240 years or so.

A goodly portion of this book is based upon the writings of J. Phoenix, Esquire, a pen name used by the author for a weekly electronic newsletter that debuted in January 2003 and terminated in April 2011 and was otherwise used in print from 2003 to the present. Many chapters include the stories of unsung or forgotten heroes and heroines. Men like Return Jonathan Meigs, John Stark, Daniel Morgan, Eleazer Derby Wood, Benjamin L. E. Bonneville, George H. Derby, Oliver Otis Howard, Henry Ossian Flipper, Charles Young, Benjamin O. Davis Jr., Calvin Pearl Titus, Norman D. Cota, and Donald W. Holleder, plus women like the Warner sisters, Laura Walker, and Emily Perez. One of the final chapters, however, deals with—in the kindest sense of the term—a few rogues of West Point, like Edgar Allan Poe, James McNeil Whistler, Hugh S. Johnson, and the Mole.

Thayer%20Statue%20_0001_edited-1.jpg

Col. Sylvanus Thayer, class of 1808.

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR

T HE EARLY BATTLES fought by the young Continental army in the vicinity of New York City were a series of tactical defeats and narrow escapes that left the city firmly in British hands and forced the retreat of Washington into Pennsylvania and Valley Forge. One battle on Long Island, however, was an unqualified success, mainly due to the leadership of Lt. Col. Return Jonathan Meigs, of Middletown, Connecticut, and 170 Connecticut raiders under his com mand.

Battle of Sag Harbor

In the early morning hours of May 23, 1777, with the aid of two local patriots, he and his men captured the British commander of the garrison at Sag Harbor, New York, and the fort constructed there. Attacking by stealth, primarily using bayonets, they fired only a single shot. That the redcoats had built their fort on the high ground overlooking the harbor did not inspire loyalty among the colonists, as that was the site of the local cemetery, and many graves had been desecrated in the process.

With six redcoats dead and another fifty-three captured, Meigs moved upon the harbor. Eventually detected and taken under fire, the men from Connecticut nevertheless burned over a dozen British ships containing rum, grain, and supplies. Picking up another thirty-seven prisoners, the small force returned to Connecticut without having lost a single man. Meigs later commanded a regiment under Gen. Mad Anthony Wayne in the capture, again by bayonet alone, of the British fortifications at Stony Point, New York. Perhaps Meigs suggested the attack by stealth. In any event, the battle of Sag Harbor was the only successful attack for the Continental army in the New York City area from the initial British occupation until their departure at the end of the war.

If you are wondering about his unusual first name, Return, it is because of something his mother said to his father. For some time, Jonathan Meigs (the father) had unsuccessfully courted a young Quaker beauty. Rebuffed yet again, he was about to mount his horse and ride off when she finally relented and called out, Return, Jonathan. This unexpected, but most welcome, comment thus provided a name for their firstborn son.

Battle of/for Bennington

British general John Burgoyne’s invasion of New York from Canada had reached Fort Edward (east of present-day Glens Falls, New York) by late July 1777, and he planned to capture Albany and join British forces advancing from New York City and the Mohawk Valley. Fortunately for the patriots, his supply lines from Canada were growing longer and more difficult to defend; his German mercenary cavalrymen lacked horses; and his army was short of food, wagons, and draft animals. He determined to solve most of these problems by sending Lt. Col. Friedrich Baum, a German, in command of a mixed force of about one thousand Canadians, British sharpshooters, Tories, German mercenaries, and Indians to capture the presumably poorly defended American storehouses at Bennington, Vermont. His unmounted cavalrymen, in addition to normal military gear, were encumbered with swords, long coats, and heavy cavalry helmets, all of which slowed their march through the forested terrain. Although the patriot militia forces were not deemed to pose a significant military threat, Baum nevertheless was instructed to avoid any significant losses to his forces. In that task, he would fail completely.

Vermont’s Council of Safety was aware of the British forces in the area and had requested help from adjacent states. New Hampshire sent 1,500 troops under John Stark from what is now Charlestown, New Hampshire. Stark had served with Roger’s Rangers during the French and Indian Wars and distinguished himself at Bunker Hill, Trenton, and Princeton. Frustrated by seeing less-experienced and less-qualified men promoted over him for political reasons, he returned to his farm in New Hampshire but quickly marched to the sound of the guns when informed of the British threat. A smaller force of Vermont militia under Seth Warner, another experienced officer who had served gallantly at Montreal and Fort Ticonderoga, also was positioned near Bennington.

Baum started his forty-mile march to Bennington on August 11 and, when about eight miles west of Bennington on August 14, fought an engagement with a rebel scouting party. From captured members of the scouting party, he learned that he was outnumbered and immediately dispatched a messenger to request reinforcements from the main force under Burgoyne. He then marched a few miles east and entrenched his men in a strong defensive position on a hill overlooking the Walloomsac River, about five miles from Bennington but still within New York state. After a day of heavy rain delayed all operations, Stark sent two columns against Baum’s flanks and rear on August 16, while the remainder attacked the front of the British positions at 3:00 p.m. Many of Baum’s men fled or surrendered immediately, but the unmounted cavalrymen held their positions stubbornly. Baum himself was killed during the two-hour battle.

No sooner had the hill been taken than the British reinforcements under Lt. Col. Heinrich von Breymann arrived. Fortunately, however, Warner’s Green Mountain Rangers arrived in time to blunt this attack. Stark then turned the British cannon against Breymann’s reinforcements and forced them to withdraw. Warner’s Rangers pursued them until nightfall, inflicting additional losses on the British. Besides Baum, over two hundred of his men were killed and many others taken prisoner. Burgoyne was denied desperately needed supplies, his available forces were diminished by about 10 percent, and the invaders gained new respect for the fighting ability of the colonial forces. After two unsuccessful battles at Saratoga, New York, Burgoyne surrendered on October 17, 1777. Two months after the battle, Stark belatedly was promoted to brigadier general by a now grateful Congress and eventually retired as a major general.

Prior to the battle, it is alleged that John Stark said, There are the Red Coats, and they are ours, or this night Molly Stark sleeps a widow! He also called what is now Vermont Route 9 running east and west through Bennington the Molly Stark Trail, and that is how it is now formally designated. In addition, her name is memorialized on a number of Vermont schools, parks, streets, and businesses—even though her major contribution to the American Revolution was that of a good wife and mother—and one from New Hampshire at that. But John Stark is known for coining an even more famous phrase. Unable to attend a celebration on the thirty-second anniversary of the battle, he sent a few words to be read that echoed his earlier sentiment about Molly Stark becoming a widow: Live free or die. Death is not the worst of evils. The first four words, of course, we now know as the official New Hampshire state motto.

That is the story of the crucial battle for, not of, Bennington, Vermont, that was fought entirely in New York by patriot forces mainly from New Hampshire and Vermont. It was not a turning point of the Revolutionary War, but it facilitated the victory at Saratoga that eventually convinced France to send General Rochambeau and his French forces to support the American colonies in their rebellion against a common enemy: Great Britain.

The First Great Chain across the Hudson

Most visitors to West Point are aware of the thirteen huge iron links displayed at Trophy Point and the story of the Great Chain that blocked the Hudson River there during the Revolutionary War. It was an immensely heavy chain (about sixty-five tons), forged in the general vicinity of West Point and laboriously emplaced in the spring and retrieved each winter. Some described it as a great chain supported on a series of log rafts. Others saw it as a series of huge log rafts held together by a very sturdy chain. In fact, it was both. The main chain was larger and more aptly described as supported by large rafts (of forty-foot logs). There was, however, a double chain of somewhat smaller links that appeared to be holding together a series of log rafts on the New York City side of the Great Chain. Called a boom, this barrier would be struck first by any ship attempting to run up to Albany, thus reducing the force of impact on the Great Chain. As the British ships maneuvered against the chain, they would be taken under fire by a number of batteries of cannon in small fortified positions on both shores. In any event, emplacing and recovering it required a herculean effort twice a year from 1778 through 1782.

But most nonhistorians may only be vaguely aware that the West Point chain was not the first chain emplaced across the Hudson during the Revolutionary War. It was the second. An earlier chain had been emplaced to the south, quite near the present location of the Bear Mountain Bridge, and about three hundred soldiers of the Fifth New York Regiment, one hundred soldiers of Lamb’s Artillery, and three hundred militiamen defended the partially constructed Forts Montgomery and Clinton. They were supported by several American warships on the Hudson River itself (the frigates Congress and Montgomery plus two galleys and a sloop). The forts were commanded by Generals George and James Clinton, and on October 6, 1777, over two thousand British, Hessian, and Loyalist troops surprised the American garrison by attacking overland from the west. Their attack was intended as part of a planned three-pronged British effort, with General Burgoyne attacking down the Hudson from Canada, and St. Leger attacking through the Mohawk Valley. General Howe was to command the attack north up the Hudson from New York City, but he decided to move against Philadelphia instead.

In his place, yet another Clinton, British general Sir Henry, undertook to sail up the Hudson and make a great show of landing troops at Verplanck’s Point, about six miles south of Peekskill on the east bank of the Hudson. It seemed obvious to the patriots that he intended to attack General Putnam’s force guarding supplies at Peekskill. But it was a ruse. Under the cover of a dense fog on the morning of October 6, most of the British force crossed over to the west bank. Lt. Col. Mungo Campbell led one attacking force, assisted by a Loyalist guide, Beverly Robinson, who led the force through the now-abandoned village of Doodletown to attack Fort Montgomery from the west. Another division, under Major General Vaughn, was positioned to attack Fort Clinton. Although the Americans sent out scouting parties, discovered the British forces, and moved men and cannon to block the attack, no reinforcements were sent from across the river because of the lingering fear of an attack against Peekskill.

The British attack began, supported by British ships on the river bombarding the forts and the American warships. At about five o’clock, Campbell approached Fort Montgomery under a flag of truce and requested that the fort surrender to spare unnecessary bloodshed. Lieutenant Colonel William S. Livingston supposedly replied that if the British wanted to surrender to him, they would be treated fairly, but he intended to continue to defend. In the ensuing assault, Campbell was killed leading a column of British soldiers, but the Americans were overcome by sheer force of numbers. By dusk, both forts had fallen, and approximately 260 Americans were taken prisoner. Both American generals escaped, but James Clinton was wounded. George Clinton later would become the first governor of New York and the fourth vice president of the United States. The American warships were set afire to prevent their capture.

Although the two forts were lost, their cannon captured, and the chain dismantled, Sir Henry Clinton’s attack north to assist General Burgoyne was disrupted, and he lost at least 190 soldiers killed or wounded. On October 17, 1777, Burgoyne would surrender his force at Saratoga, and France finally would enter the war on the American side.

Battle of Barren Hill

Another little-known battle, fought on May 20, 1778, was commanded by a French volunteer, the Marquis de Lafayette, and took place at Barren Hill (now Lafayette Hill), just northwest of Philadelphia. Sent from Valley Forge on May 18 with just over two thousand Continentals to maintain surveillance of the British garrison in Philadelphia and determine their intentions, Lafayette soon found himself the target of a British plan to surround and capture his entire force with well over nine thousand highly trained redcoats. As the Pennsylvania militia fled in disorder, Lafayette selected a regimental force of about five hundred soldiers recently trained by Von Steuben, provided them with several artillery pieces, and attached a force of fifty newly recruited Oneida Indians to assist them. Their mission was to confound the enemy forces and cover the withdrawal of the main force to safety across the Schuylkill River. As the British paused to determine the intentions of this small but determined force with cannon, Lafayette rallied the bulk of his forces and led them down a concealed road unknown to the redcoats. Other small patrols skirmished and added to the confusion of the vastly superior enemy force that had expected to surprise a much smaller rebel force and capture them by sheer superiority of numbers. When the main body was safely across the river, the covering force withdrew with minor casualties.

Gen. Lord William Howe, commander of the forces in Philadelphia, had prepared an elegant dinner party for the night of May 20 to celebrate the British victory and the capture of Lafayette. The young Marquis was to be the guest of honor before being taken back to London as a prize prisoner of war, but Howe was to be disappointed. This unsuccessful David and Goliath engagement proved so embarrassing to the British that it was not even mentioned in some of their subsequent reports and histories of the Revolutionary War. The British forces then withdrew toward New York City, according to their plan, constantly observed by Washington’s patrols. On June 28, 1778, the forces would meet in the Battle of Monmouth Courthouse, the last major battle of the Revolutionary War fought in the north. There, Maj. Gen. Charles Lee, ordered ahead to attack, split, and stop the British column to give Washington time to mass the rest of his forces, instead permitted his subordinate units to attack piecemeal. Eventually they fell back under pressure, much to the consternation of Washington, who rallied Lee’s forces, added his own forces, and attacked in an intense heat that caused a number of nonbattle casualties. The contest between approximately equal numbers was a draw but again proved the value of the discipline and training provided by Von Steuben at Valley Forge during the preceding winter. The British units left the field in Washington’s hands and continued their withdrawal.

Battle of Stony Point

Stony Point is a rocky promontory that juts about a half mile into the Hudson River about seven miles south of West Point. It, and another small fortress across the river at Verplanck’s Point, effectively controlled the King’s Ferry crossing site. Only lightly fortified by the patriots, both sites were attacked and captured by the British in late May of 1779 and heavily fortified. Due to having three sides protected by water and steep cliffs, Stony Point was believed impregnable when properly fortified and manned with an adequate force. Although Washington was reluctant to be drawn into a major battle, he ordered Brig. Gen. Mad Anthony Wayne to retake Stony Point by stealth.

Wayne took a well-trained force and proposed a three-pronged assault with a strong diversionary attack along the most obvious avenue of approach from the west; a supporting attack from the watery north; and the main attack from the equally watery south, where abatis of felled trees did not extend all the way into deeper water. They could be bypassed at low tide. In order to prevent detection due to the inadvertent firing of a weapon, only the diversionary attack was allowed to carry loaded firearms.

Not without difficulty, both actual attacks made it into the British defenses and effectively cut off the six companies of the British Seventeenth Regiment of Foot that were ordered to make an ill-advised bayonet charge into the diversionary attack from the west. Significantly, Wayne’s attacking forces surprised the British defenders in another way by immediately offering them fair treatment or quarter if they surrendered. The British were as impressed by the clemency shown to their soldiers as they were by the discipline and tactical brilliance of the attack itself. Of eleven medals awarded by Congress during the war, three were awarded to the leaders of this attack. The storming of Stony Point is considered by some to be the beginning of the end of the Revolutionary War, as it was the last major action to be fought in New York. Nevertheless, shortly after Washington rode out on July 17 to shake the hand of every soldier who had participated in the attack, Stony Point was abandoned, and all participants returned to the defenses at West Point and elsewhere.

Battle of Kings Mountain

The year 1780 was not a good one for Gen. George Washington. In February, British general Sir Henry Clinton invested Charleston, South Carolina, and on May 12 the town was forced to surrender. On May 29, Butcher Tarleton pursued and overcame a force under Col. Abraham Buford at a place that later would be named Buford, South Carolina. The aftermath of the battle would become known as the Waxhaw Massacre because of some prisoners of war slain by the impetuous British commander, and Tarleton’s quarter (meaning no mercy whatsoever) entered the patriot lexicon. The massacre was short-lived and then halted, but the name remained.

On August 16 of that ill-fated year, Lt. Gen. Horatio Gates engaged British forces near Camden, South Carolina, and subsequently lost the majority of the Army of the South. Gates himself fled the battlefield and the state. Flushed with victory, a force of Loyalists under the command of a Scottish officer in the British army, Patrick Ferguson, moved west to destroy other patriot bands and secure the South for the Crown.

Ferguson also was the inventor of the Ferguson rifle, considered a vast improvement over rifles of the period. It was common knowledge that rifles were more accurate than the muskets in common use, but the rifles took much longer to reload. Ferguson changed all that. Not only could his rifle be reloaded from the rear while concealed in a prone firing position. In a demonstration for the king and queen, he was able to fire six rounds in a single minute—faster even than a musket. About one hundred of his rifles were produced and subjected to trial by fire, in a security role, at the Battle of Brandywine on September 11, 1777.

Unfortunately, Ferguson was seriously wounded during the battle. When he returned to active service, he discovered that his unit of riflemen had been disbanded and his rifle rejected by the British army. It is unlikely that any of his rifles participated in the Battle of Kings Mountain, but one of the few surviving Ferguson rifles is now on display at the battle site. Ironically, while Ferguson’s Loyalists were armed with muskets, the patriots who fought against him included so-called Over Mountain Men, who came east from the far western portion of North Carolina that is now Tennessee, armed mainly with more accurate hunting rifles. Included among them was one John Crockett, whose son Davy later would become famous for his frontier exploits and less so for his later attempts to close the elitist military academy at West Point while serving as a member of the House of Representatives. Most of the patriots were from North Carolina (which included Tennessee at the time), but Georgia, Virginia, and South Carolina also contributed units.

Apparently Major Ferguson—fiery Scot that he was and supremely confident in his ability to train his Loyalists to the standards of British regulars—had been a bit too acrimonious in his threats to lay waste to the patriot lands and hang their leaders. It convinced men like Colonels Isaac Shelby (later Kentucky’s first governor), William Campbell, James Williams (killed in action during the battle), John Sevier (later Tennessee’s first governor), and Frederick Hambright to seek out Ferguson before he could make good on his threats. When they found him, he had been informed of their approach and took up a defensive position on Kings Mountain, a foot-shaped plateau that rose about sixty feet above the heavily wooded land surrounding it. As at the Battle of Bennington earlier, the patriots were forced to attack a hastily prepared British defensive position. Ferguson’s force included some Loyalists from New York and New Jersey but was composed mainly of men recruited from the Carolinas.

After a forced march in the rain, the patriot forces arrived at about noon on October 7, 1780, and began their attack a few hours later. The units of Sevier and Campbell attacked the highest ground repeatedly, while the other units supported by fire and sniped at the Loyalists. Several times the patriots were driven back by bayonet charges, but eventually they swarmed the high ground. Ferguson, wearing a plaid shirt over his military uniform and rallying his troops with a silver whistle, suddenly fell from his horse with several bullets in his torso. He would be the only British soldier to fall in the battle. All other participants were colonists, divided between patriots and Loyalists. As some Loyalists attempted to surrender, they were cut down, whether in retaliation for the earlier Waxhaw Massacre or not, it is difficult to say. Nevertheless, order was restored quickly. Since the patriots had surrounded the position early on, it is believed that not a single Loyalist escaped death or capture. Of these, 225 were killed, 163 wounded, and 716 captured. Only twenty-eight patriots were killed and sixty-eight wounded. Later, a number of Loyalists were tried and several hanged for arson and other crimes. Word of the victory reached the Continental Congress at Philadelphia a month later, on November 7, 1780.

Battle of Cowpens

At an obscure crossroad in South Carolina known simply as Cowpens (near the current city of Spartanburg), another little known but crucial battle for American independence was fought on January 17, 1781. It would become known as America’s battle of Cannae (216 BC), making Daniel Morgan America’s Hannibal.

In 1779–80, the British marched south, occupying Savannah, Georgia, and Charleston and Camden, South Carolina, while capturing much of the southern Continental army. Washington countered by sending Nathanael Greene to take command. Greene split his army, sending Daniel Morgan southwest of the Catawba River to spirit up the people and to annoy the enemy in that quarter. Cornwallis responded by sending Lt. Col. Banastre Tarleton to destroy Morgan. Tarleton was only twenty-six, but he was feared and hated for his butchering of Continental soldiers attempting to surrender at the Waxhaws. The merciless British officer in Mel Gibson’s motion picture The Patriot was based on him.

On January 12, 1781, Tarleton’s scouts located Morgan in South Carolina’s backcountry and began an aggressive pursuit, at one point forcing Morgan’s men to abandon their breakfast in order to escape. With the flood-swollen Broad River six