OPERATIONS IN GEORGIA.
After Lower Georgia had submitted to Colonel Campbell, he resolved to prosecute his success by an advance into Upper Georgia. In this expedition he met with few interruptions. On his approach to Augusta, the second city of the province, the American troops fled from the town, and the inhabitants took the oath of allegiance to the British monarch, and formed themselves into companies for their own defence. Campbell was now not far from a part of North Carolina where the majority of the population were known to be royalists, and he detached Lieutenant-colonel Hammond, with two hundred infantry mounted on horseback, to encourage them to take up arms. The progress of the royal arms in the Southern States was alarming, and the provincials resolved to arrest it. In the month of January, congress despatched General Lincoln to take the command of some regiments raised in North-Carolina, and to unite them with the remnant of the army of Georgia. Lincoln took post on the north bank of the river, about fifteen miles above the town of Savannah. He was thus posted and preparing for action when Colonel Campbell made his expedition into Upper Georgia. Soon after this Campbell returned to England, and Augusta was evacuated, as being too distant a post to be supported. Lincoln now marched along the northern bank of the river, with a view of crossing it and reconquering Georgia. In the meantime General Prevost left Savannah, and marched for Charlestown, the capital of South Carolina, in the hope of taking it by surprise. He appeared before that city on the 11th of May, and on the following day it was summoned to surrender. The summons was unheeded, and Prevost having viewed the lines, which could not be forced without a great loss of men, and knowing that the garrison was more numerous than his troops, and that Lincoln was hastening to its relief, retired towards Georgia. He took possession of John’s Island, which was separated from the continent by a small inlet of the sea, commonly called Stone River. His intention was to have remained in that island until ammunition should arrive from New York, but discovering that Lincoln was advancing to Lower Georgia, he departed for Savannah, to defend the fortress, leaving Colonel Maitland, with a garrison of eight hundred men, to protect St. John’s. An attempt was made by General Lincoln to cut off this force, but his attack was bravely repulsed, and the American general, dispirited by his non-success, attempted no further operations until the arrival of the French fleet under d’Estaing.