Like a skillful general, having decided upon this daring change, Greene acted quickly. He marched with all speed for Camden, one hundred and sixty miles distant. His object was to break the British hold upon South Carolina.
A brighter day was now dawning, and the sunshine of hope was soon to appear. The adroit activities of Marion, Sumter, and Pickens, and the skill and vigor of Greene and Morgan were now bringing their harvest, and they gave the patriots new life and cheer.
At Hobkirks Hill, near Camden, Greene attacked the British. He was defeated, but it was a fruitless victory.
"We fight, get beat, rise, and fight again," wrote Greene to a friend.
One by one the strong posts of the enemy in South Carolina fell into our hands. The British hold on both the Carolinas was slowly but surely broken. The enemy wisely kept near the coast. The last battle of the long and stubborn struggle was fought at Eutaw Springs, S. C., in September, 1781. The contest was desperate on both sides; but the British, badly crippled, retreated in the night to Charleston.
232. Greene's Brilliant Campaign in the South.—Greene had with the scantiest of means done a great work in his southern campaign. He had driven Cornwallis to Virginia, to meet his fate at Yorktown. He had cleared both Carolinas of the British and restored them to the patriots.
In few if any campaigns carried on with small armies was ever so effective and brilliant work done as did General Greene with his little force of patriots. Most mortifying was it to the haughty British commanders to know that they had been out-generaled, out-marched, and in the long run, out-fought by a Yankee blacksmith.
The war in the south was now soon over. Savannah was captured in July, 1782; in December, 1783, the British left Charleston. It was a proud day for Greene and Morgan and Marion when they followed with their army on the heels of the departing foe. As the patriots marched in, happy thousands cheered, and floral wreaths flew from crowded windows.
The noble Greene lived only a few years after he had carried the Revolution to a triumph in the south. He died in 1786 from the effects of a sunstroke.
Among the great generals of the American Revolution, it is generally admitted that Greene ranked, in military genius, second only to Washington.