From November 7 – 14, 1780, in the lowlands of South Carolina, along the Santee River, a cat and mouse game played out between two wily and deadly opponents; rebel leader Colonel Francis Marion and British dragoon commander Lt. Colonel Banastre Tarleton. What occurred over the course of that week could have been drafted by screen writers tasked to write a Hollywood action movie. An ambush was set. A heroine saved the day. A flight and pursuit ensued. Another ambush was laid. And in frustration, dozens of patriot civilian homes and plantations were left in flames, including harvests, and livestock were driven into barns that were torched. Even bodies were dug up and women flogged. But throughout it all, Tarleton came away empty handed. Except to bestow upon the crafty Marion a title symbolic of defiance that would garnish a new nation’s heroic pride that spanned generations; Swamp Fox.
Colonel Francis Marion of the 2nd South Carolina Continental Regiment
By the start of the American Revolution, Francis Marion (1732-1795) was among of class of plantation owners in South Carolina’s coastal lowlands labeled Rice Kings. Like most planters, he had led militias during the French and Indian War (1756-1763) and the Cherokee War (1760-1761). By all accounts the small dark man with thick, misshapen knees and ankles fought well. After the war, he returned to his farm and labored diligently. His financial standing was augmented when he came into a small inheritance.
When rhetoric turned to violence in Massachusetts at Lexington and Concord (April 19, 1775) the thunder of musketry reached the far south. Marion was commissioned a captain of the 2nd South Carolina Continental Regiment on June 17, 1775. Within five months he had risen to major. He once again proved his meddle leading men in battle in the Snow Campaign (Dec. 23-30, 1775). At Charleston, South Carolina, during the successful Battle of Fort Sullivan (June 28, 1776), he aimed cannon against the British invasion fleet. Soon after, Marion was commissioned Lt. Colonel and on September 23, 1776, he led the 2nd South Carolina Continental Regiment as their colonel.
For the next three years Marion remained in South Carolina. As regimental commander he was considered kind, accommodating, and a refined gentleman. Yet so too, he was a strict disciplinarian whose spartan nature and commanding presence garnished him the description as “an ugly, cross, knock kneed, hook-nosed son-of-a-bitch.” Yet in all things military, he proved his genius. When war returned to the south, he and his regiment were among those storming the defenses during the ill-fated Franco-American Siege of Savannah, Georgia (Sep. 16 – Oct. 18, 1779). And when British Commander-in-Chief General Henry Clinton invaded South Carolina in March, 1780, his 2nd Continentals were with the Southern American Army at Charleston. Fate saved the future swamp fox from being among those captured by the British when the American army surrendered on May 12, 1780. A month before the surrender, Marion had jumped from a window and broke an ankle. He and deemed unfit for duty and left the city.
Marion Emerges as Rebel Leader
But unlike most of the Rice King planters and militia leaders, after the American army surrendered, Marion did not accept a British parole. Within a couple months of his injury, Marion, with a dozen followers, began to recruit a small band of local partisan fighters from the Pee Dee and Santee River regions. In mid-summer, word reached Marion that a force of Continental soldiers were marching towards South Carolina, commanded by Major General Jean de Kalb leading Maryland and Delaware reinforcements. Marion rode north in late July, 1780, to offer his services as both former officer and one who knew the lay of the land as well as any. DeKalb immediately sent Marian and his men back to the Pee Dee region to scout and bring back supplies. Marion was not present when the new leader of the Southern Army, Major General Horatio Gates arrived camp on July, 25, 1780. When Marion returned from his mission, Gates treated the dirty, misshapen commander of horse with contempt. Soon after his arrival, Marion and his ‘misfits’ of both white and black militiamen were sent back to the lowlands; Gates was more than happy to be rid them.
Marion did not learn that Gates and the Southern Army were decimated at the Battle of Camden, August 16, 1780, the day prior to his first major action as a rebellious guerilla leader; the Battle of Nelson’s Ferry (also Great Savannah), August 20, 1780. Marion ambushed a detachment of regulars from the 63rd Regiment of Foot in a victory that also freed 147 Continental troops who had been captured at Camden. Within two weeks, Marion struck again at the Battle of Blue Savannah (September 4, 1780). This time he routed and scattered a Tory force five times his number; destroying all British hopes to further recruit loyalists in the low country. So too, Marion gained over 60 new recruits to his band of guerilla fighters. British General Charles Cornwallis, appalled by this new upstart who threatened his eastern flank, took action.
First Attempt to Catch Marion Fails
One of Marion’s lieutenants, Peter Horry, suggested to Marion that they build a redoubt to command an area. Marion replied, “The open field was our play, that the enemy knew better how to defend forts and entrenched places than we did, and that if we attempted it, we should fall into their hands.” Marion knew guerrilla warfare. He knew how and when to fight his enemy. And of equal importance, some would insist of greater importance, he knew how to avoid a fight.
Cornwallis’ answer to this nuisance along his east flank was a unit whose nose the crafty rebel leader had already bloodied. On August 28, 1780, Cornwallis assigned Major James Wemyss, commanding the 63rd Regiment of Foot, an independent command with orders to go after Marion and organize Tory militia so it could successfully combat rebel threats in the lowlands. He also wrote to Wemyss that he was to march through “the country from Kingstree Bridge to Peedee, and returning by the Cheraws.” He was to remove all weapons from those he believed untrustworthy and of those he was to, “punish the Concealment of Arms and Ammunition with a total Demolition of the Plantation.”
With 200 regulars and 400 Tory partisans, Wemyss marched from Camden, South Carolina on September 5th. He would follow Cornwallis’ orders to a tea and then some. In his hunt for the illusive rebel leader and his fighters, he forged a path of terror and torched destruction sixty miles long and fifteen miles wide. While Wemyss’ men fanned out in vengeful retaliation, the major bullied and threatened men, women, and children; anyone suspected of harboring militia ‘rabble.’ But of horror, he hanged any accused parole breakers without trial. Marion did not the men to confront Wemyss’ large force and quietly slipped over the frontier into North Carolina, releasing his men to go home and see to their families.
If Cornwallis expected Wemyss’ raid to eradicate the rebel menace to his east and restore order, the major failed dismally. In fact, he accomplished the opposite. Word of Wemyss’ atrocities spread rapidly throughout Carolina’s low country. The major quickly joined Tarleton as one of the most despised men of the British army. Settlers who had remained at home grabbed their musket to join local bands of rebels. In fact, Wemyss became one of the southern war’s greatest recruiters; for his enemy. By the end of September, Wemyss had yet to find the sly rebel leader. The situation along the Pee Dee was becoming increasingly dangerous for his detachment. As for raising Tory regiments, the countryside was too deep in rebellion to be secured by loyalist militia. The leader of the 63rd had no other choice.
Wemyss wrote to Cornwallis that his mission was accomplished, and marched back to Camden, arriving just as His Lordship received news of the devastating loss at the Battle of King’s Mountain (Oct. 7, 1780), that annihilated the British western flank. As for Marion, once the British left, he slipped back into South Carolina and called out his men who readily joined him, along with a new throng of recruits; thanks to Major James Wemyss.
Marion Strikes Back at Battles of Black Mingo and Tearcoat Swamp
Just as Wemyss’ departed the region, at the Battle of Black Mingo Swamp (Sept. 29, 1789) Marion’s band was at it again. This time the former Continental officer’s target was a force of Tories that were actively recruiting militia. On September 28th, Marion learned of a group of Tories camped at Shepard’s Ferry on the south side of the Black Mingo Swamp; forty miles inland from the coast and west of the Great Pee Dee River. These were comprised of a detached company of the Craven and Berkeley County Regiment of Loyalist Militia, commanded by Colonel John Coming Ball; another Rice King. Marion wasted no time preparing his men to attack that night. Shortly after midnight on September 29th, in a quick and decisive stroke, Marion’s men overwhelmed the Tories, killing and wounding several and driving what remained into the swamp where additional bodies were later found floating among the reeds.
Over the next few weeks, Marion devised a pattern that defined his battle tactics for the rest of the war; comb the countryside seeking new militia recruits, search out an enemy appropriately camped out in a swamp or moving through a swamp, then in the dead of the night, overwhelm your opponent in a three-prong attack from center and flanks. Do so suddenly, forcefully, and brutally. His next large scale attack was on a Tory force actively recruiting loyalists, labeled the Battle of Tearcoat Swamp (October 25, 1780).
On October 24th, scouts informed Marion of a large force of Tories that were bivouacked in the fork of Black River with the Tearcoat Swamp on their back; most likely thinking the swamp would serve as a shield from attack. These men, estimates ran from 90 to 200 strong, were under the command of Lt. Colonel Tynes. They were recruiting, training, and arming loyalists in the High Hills area between Salem and Nelsons Ford, S. Carolina. Tynes had a large supply of weapons procured from the Camden battlefield to hand out to new militia. Unaware they had been spotted by Marion’s scouts, the loyalists had not posted sentries to keep guard while they, as the scouts worded it, “feasted and others were at cards.” After midnight on October 25th, Marion’s force of 152 militia crept up on the Tories. In another three-prong attack, Marion’s fighters swarmed over the surprised loyalists, killing, wounding, and capturing more than half while the rest scattered into the swamp. As a bonus, the large cache of weapons intended for Tory use fell into Marion’s hands.
For Lt. Colonel George Turnbull, the British commander in the region, Tearcoat was the last straw. He wrote to Cornwallis expressing his outrage over Marion and requested the British commander release his favorite mastiff to go after the rebel leader. Cornwallis agreed and on November 5th, ordered Lt. Colonel Banastre Tarleton, along with his detached Legion of cavalry and mounted militia, to ride to the Pee Dee and put an end to the rebellious pest.
Lt. Colonel Bloody Ben Tarleton Attempts to Trap Marion
In the eight months since Lt. Colonel Banastre Tarleton (1754 – 1833) arrived in South Carolina, he had notched a brutal string of victories including the battles of Monck’s Corner, Lenud’s Ferry, and Fishing Creek. By the fall of 1780, he bore the distinction of becoming the most hated British officer of the war. Driven, ruthless, and single-minded, his sudden and savage ‘take no prisoners’ attacks earned him the titles of ‘Bloody Ben,’ and Tarleton’s Quarter. He was fueled by a determined ego that sought out his prey no matter the circumstances, terrain, odds, and with no concern for his own troops; often literally driving them into the ground on the trail of rebels and fame.
True to Tarleton’s swift, aggressive style, he would use his Legion’s cavalry, but quickly confiscated enough horses to mount his infantry. At the head of 400 seasoned veterans, Tarleton pointed his column east and rode hard to gain the scent of his prey. Marion’s intelligence system was key to his survival. He soon learned of Tarleton’s mission and approach and over the next several days, maneuvered his band of fighters to surprise the hated Englishman. British intelligence was nearly as good as the patriots in a country strife with civil war. Tarleton learned the general location of Marion’s force and on November 7th, arrived at General Richard Richardson’s plantation, on the left bank of the Santee River. Richardson had led South Carolina’s state militias since the beginning of the war and fought the early major battles. He was captured at Charleston, imprisoned where his health declined, and was sent home. He died recently and was buried on his farm.
The region upon which the Santee River flowed was spacious, flat, and choked with wetlands; perfect to conceal guerrilla militia to stage an ambush and surprise attack. But so too, Tarleton displayed another side of his military talents beside headlong frontal assaults. The Legion commander had brought two small cannon, 3-pounders called grasshoppers, each weighing around 500 pounds that often accompanied cavalry. Soon after arriving at the plantation, he positioned them to enfilade a killing field and set defensive positions in and around the plantation. With the ambush set, he spread the word throughout the region that most of his Legion had been ordered back to Camden. Patrols were sent out and ordered not to display any aggression, but to ride cautiously and show a “token of fear.” Campfires were kept burning and the British waited, hoping to draw Marion into the trap, like a moth to a flame.
Though Marion was among the most cautious of the rebellion’s leaders, the ruse had worked. He had heard the rumors. He saw the glow in the night sky of reflected campfires. And moved his men closer to investigate. But intrigue and with an ‘on the edge of your seat’ moment, the wily rebel commander was saved from destruction. Mary Richardson, widow of the general, sought to warn the approaching militia. Her son, a captain of Continental troops also named Richard, was hiding out on the farm. Somehow she helped him slip by Tarleton’s pickets. The son came upon Marion two miles from the farm. He told the rebels that just ahead were 400 soldiers laying on arms. They were alert and well prepared for an attack. Marion was quick to respond. He and his men turned their mounts and galloped away, not stopping until six miles from the plantation.
With the patience of a spider expecting its victim to wonder into his web, Tarleton remained vigilant through the night. Just before dawn, a Tory prisoner who had escaped from Marion’s band told Tarleton that a “treacherous woman,” had warned his prey. Like Marion, Tarleton’s actions were swift. In the early morning light of November 8th, Tarleton ordered his troops to mount up and the chase was one.
Pursuit, Another Ambush is Set, and Marion Becomes the Swamp Fox
Marion was cognizant that one of his Tory prisoners had escaped and assumed Tarleton would soon be on his trail. He rapidly led his men in a northeasterly direction, away from the Santee and into a region of multiple swamps and wetlands. Marion knew the backroads. The passages through the swamps. It was not long before scouts informed him his enemy was just behind. But he stayed far enough ahead to avert any action. From Jack’s Creek northwest of Nelson’s Ferry, the guileful leader’s path wove through marshes and quagmires thick with pestilence. He pushed on in this manner over several miles of twisted roads along the Pocotaligo Swamp, near the present site of Manning, South Carolina. Tarleton, hot on Marion’s heels, drove his men relentlessly. With cumbersome supply wagons and artillery in tow, he kept a pace that wasted the horses and they began drop. Like frantic hounds on the scent, men whipped their animals beyond their breaking and one by one, lost their mounts; forced to trot along to keep up until they too fell along the wayside exhausted. Yet Tarleton would not let up in his hell-bent pursuit.
Once Marion reached the Ox Swamp, he turned east into it and bore north some eight miles to the Black River and Benbow’s Ferry. By then Marion’s men had ridden thirty-five miles in seven hours. They too were feeling the strain. The rebel leader called a halt at Benbow’s Ferry. He examined the terrain then nodded to his officers. This was where the chase would end. Men were ordered to fell trees across the slender road leading to the ferry. Militiamen positioned themselves in woods or pressed up behind hastily built barricades. Sentries were posted far enough ahead to give ample warning. Orders were issued that in the event of retreat, they were to scatter and rendezvous at set locations. The ambush set, they had but to wait. But Tarleton never came.
Tarleton was eight miles from reaching his prey, staring into the dark and foreboding Ox Swamp, where his scouts reported the rebel menace had gone. Tarleton had pushed his men beyond tolerance in the seven-hour pursuit that covered twenty-seven miles. It must have sunk in that he had reached the limit of his command’s endurance. But before the flamboyant leader of British Legion gave up the chase and turned back toward Richardson’s Plantation, he scorned Marion. Parson Weems and other nineteenth century romantic writers’ recorded Tarleton’s frustration with a serpentine dialogue, lavishly decorated that was customary to sell books. Leaving the padded fluff aside, accounts generally agreed that Tarleton stared into the murky gloom and called out, “…as for this damned old fox, the devil himself could not catch him!” And with that phrase was born “The Swamp Fox.”
Santee River Valley Torched, a Proclamation, and Tarleton Recalled to Pursue the Gamecock
Though Marion had slipped from his grasp, Tarleton was not through. Boiling with rage, he took out his vexation on the patriot settlements along the Santee. First on his list was the ‘treacherous woman,’ who had warned Marion of his ambush. He ordered that the body of Mrs. Richardson’ husband, Brigadier General Richard Richardson, be dug up. While Tarleton’s men plundered the home, Mrs. Richardson was forced to cook him dinner before she was flogged, according to Marion. To add spice to what Mel Gibson’s The Patriot would centuries later embellish, Mrs. Richardson’s cattle, hogs, and poultry were herded into the barn and set on fire; except Hollywood had the dastardly villain herd the townspeople into a church before doors were lock and the building torched. That done, Tarleton’s desert was served, watching the Richardson home go up in flames.
In all, Tarleton’s indignation was satisfied by Major Wemyss’ previous example; with the same results. Thirty to forty plantations and homes were plundered and burned, harvests were torched along with all outbuildings; from Jack’s Creek to the High Hills of Santee. Patriots who he thought had secured and assisted the rebellious rabble were taught, as Tarleton later wrote, the “Error of Insurrection,” with a touch of personalized terror. As primary accounts agreed women and children, along with the elderly escaped the carnage with only the clothes on their back, gathering pitifully under open skies, huddled around campfires. Marion later wrote “…he spares neither Whig nor Tory.”
On the 11th of November, while many of the torched homes were still smoldering, Tarleton issued a proclamation that promised pardons to all who denounced the rebellion. It also held a threat stating that “It is not the wish of Britons to be cruel or destroy, but it is now obvious to all Carolina that Treachery Perfidy & Perjury will be punished with instant fire and sword.” Having issued the proclamation, Tarleton, like his predecessor Major Wemyss, wrote to Cornwallis and declared his mission accomplished; that the pesky rebel leader had been vanquished from the low lands to be of no further concern. Pleased by his prized pit bull’s audacity in another success, Cornwallis had another fire to put out. On November 14th, he recalled Tarleton and his Legion back to Camden. He was to deal with another recurring thorn in his side. General Thomas Sumter, the Gamecock, had thrashed the 63rd Regiment at Foot at the Battle of Fishdam Ford (November 9, 1780) and wounded and captured none other than Major James Wemyss. And whenever his master called, in true heroic style, Tarleton leapt on his horse and galloped his Legion west; to the rescue.
Aftermath
While Tarleton rode west to chase after Sumter, another mounted brigade trailed him at a respectable distance; led by none other than Marion. Assured the hated officer had departed, Marion turned to what he had perfected; search and destroy loyalist bands before they could fully form to terrorize patriot homes and farms. He turned back to the east and within a few days, was engaging Tories in the region around Georgetown. When Major General Nathanael Greene assumed command of the Southern Continental Army in early December, unlike his predecessor General Gates, Greene recognized Marion’s key assets and kept close contact with the Swamp Fox both in intelligence and military support. For the next two and a half years, until the war’s conclusion, Marion would play an active role in the final defeat of British interests in the south.
Though bloodthirsty to the bone leading his Legion in numerous rebel defeats, Tarleton’s actions in two key situations would inadvertently prove to be of immense benefit to the rebellious Americans. The young, aggressive cavalryman made his mark on December 13, 1776 at Widow White’s Tavern, New Jersey, when he captured Major General Charles Lee, second in command of the American Army. His action was applauded by his British superiors, but time would show otherwise. Removing an obstinate, self-serving braggard who persistently defied Washington’s orders, allowed the Commander-in-Chief to maintain a stronger command of his army which many scholars believe was paramount to the salvation of the American rebellion at Trenton, December 25, 1776.
The second action of benefit to the American cause occurred shortly after Tarleton left the Swamp Fox to resume his assaults on Tory militia. When given the reins to go after General Thomas Sumter, he did so in his usual fashion by pushing his men to the extreme, followed by a bold and aggressive attack. But in this case, at the Battle of Blackstocks (November 20, 1780) Tarleton was defeated, though he convinced his superiors it was another incredible victory for the cunning cavalryman. But before the green-coated partisans turned their backs, leaving the field of honor to Sumter and his militiamen, Sumter was severely wounded. Again, by removing one who believed they alone could win the war and often refused to coordinate with Continental officers, newly Southern Theatre commander General Greene was able to find militia leaders ready and able to work with the Continental Army for the general defeat of the enemy. Many scholars believe this solidified Brigadier General Daniel Morgan’s plans for the defeat of Tarleton at the Battle of Cowpens (January 17, 1781); an action, like Trenton, that changed the course of the war in the American’s favor.
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RESOURCE
Buchanan, John. The Road to Guilford Courthouse: The American Revolution in the Carolinas. 1997: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., New York, NY.
Commager, Henry Steele & Moris, Richard B. The Spirit of ‘Seventy-Six, The Story of the American Revolution as Told by Participants. 1958: 1775: Harper Collins Press. 1995: Da Capo Press, New York, NY.
Crawford, Alan Pell. This Fierce People, The Untold Story of America’s Revolution in the South. 2024: Alfred A. Knopf, New York, NY.
James, William Dobein. General Francis Marion And His Guerilla Fighters Of The American Revolution. 1821: Gould & Riley, Charleston, South Carolina.
Walter, Edgar. Partisans and Redcoats: The Southern Conflict That Turned the Tide of the American Revolution. 2001: Harper Collins, New York, NY.