* Colonel Lillington. with the Wilmington battalion of minute-men, arrived at the bridge about four hours before Caswell, with his larger foree, made his appearance. Caswell, who was the senior officer, took command of the whole patriot army.
Battle at Moore's Creek.—Feat of Mrs. Slocum.—Effect of the Battle.—Humanity of the Whigs.—Governor Martin.
for General M'Donald was too ill to leave his tent. Finding a small intrenehment next the bridge quite empty, they concluded the Americans had abandoned the post. They had advanced to within thirty paces of the breast-work, when the Whigs, though unused to war, arose from their concealment, bravely confronted the foe, and for ten minutes the contest was fierce and bloody. Captain M'Leod was killed at the beginning of the battle. Captain John Campbell, the next in command, soon fell, mortally wounded. At that moment, Lieutenant Slocum, of the patriot army, with a small detachment, forded the stream, penetrated the swamp on its western bank, and fell with vigor upon the rear of the Loyalists. * The Scotchmen were routed and dispersed, and many of them were made prisoners. Among the latter were General M'Donald, and also the husband of Flora. The Loyalists lost seventy men in killed and wounded; the Americans had only two wounded, and one of them survived. ** Colonel Moore arrived soon after the engagement ended, and that evening the men of the united forces of the patriots slept soundly upon the field of their victory.
The effect of this defeat of the Loyalists was of vast importance to the Patriot cause in North Carolina. It exhibited the courage and skill of the defenders of liberty, and completely broke the spirit of the Loyalists. It prevented a general organization of the Tories, and their junction with the forces under Sir Henry Clinton, which arrived in the Cape Fear in May, upon which the royal power in the South depended for vitality. The opposers of that power were encouraged, and the timid and wavering were compelled to make a decision. The kindness extended to the prisoners and their families won the esteem of all, and many Loyalists were converted to the Republican faith by the noble conduct of the victors. ** The plans of the governor, and of Sir Henry Clinton and Lord William Campbell, were, for the time, completely frustrated, and Martin **** soon afterward abdicated government, and took
* Mrs. Ellett relates a noble instance of female heroism whieh this battle developed. The wife of Lieutenant Slocum, whose home was sixty miles distant from the scene of conflict, had dreamed, after her husband and his neighbors had departed with Caswell, that she saw him lying dead upon the ground. She awoke in great distress, arose, saddled a horse, and rode at full gallop in the direction the troops had taken. Through that thinly-settled and swampy country she pressed on, and at nine o'clock in the morning she heard the firing. As she came near the battle-ground, she saw a body lying in her husband's cloak, but it proved to be another man, who was wounded. She alighted, washed his face, bound up his wounds, and was administering comfort to another wounded man, when Caswell and her astonished husband came up. With true womanly feeling, she interceded for the life of the prisoner, attended to the wounded Loyalists through the day, and at midnight started for home. She did not tell her husband of her dream until his return. She rode one hundred and twenty-five miles in less than forty hours, and without one interval of rest! A mother's love, for she "wanted to see her child," impelled her to return with speed. The Carolinas were full of such heroic women as Mary Slocum when the storm of the Revolution swept over them.—See Mrs. Ellett's Domestic History of the Revolution, page 46; II omen of the Revolution, i., 317—321.
** The patriots captured thirteen wagons, three hundred and fifty guns and shot-bags, about one hundred and fifty swords and dirks, and fifteen hundred excellent rifles.—Gordon, ii., 37.
*** The Provincial Congress Issued a manifesto on the twenty-ninth of April, respecting the Loyalists, in the wounds whieh a separation from husbands, fathers, and the dearest relations has made. They are the rightful pensioners upon the charity and bounty of those who have aught to spare from their own necessities for the relief of their indigent fellow-creatures; to such we recommend them." Had such noble sentiments governed Cornwallis and his officers when they subdued the Carolinas, a few years later, they might have made their victory permanent. General M'Donald and his son, who held a colonel's commission, were granted liberal paroles of honor; and, during the summer, the general and twenty-five of his fellow-prisoners were exchanged at Philadelphia.
**** Governor Josiah Martin was a soldier by profession, and, in 1770, had risen to the rank of major in the British armv. When Tryon was transferred to New York in 1771, Martin was appointed governor of North Carolina, and was the last royal chief magistrate of that colony. He was a man of considerable ability, urbane in manners, and sincerely desirous of promoting the best interests of the colony. After going to New York with Sir Henry Clinton, when driven from the colony, he joined the army, under Cornwallis, and was in the battle near Camden, where Gates was defeated. He was with Cornwallis in Virginia, as late as March, 1781, when impaired health caused him to leave. He went to New York, spent a part of the summer at Rockaway, on Long Island, and then sailed for England. He died in London, in July, 1786. Samuel Martin, who fought a duel with the celebrated John Wilkes in 1763, was the governor's brother. His father was Colonel Samuel Martin, of Virginia, who lost a large estate by confiscation. Judge Martin, the historian of North Carolina, computes the population of that state, when Governor Martin fled and the royal power ended, at one hundred and fifty thousand, more than one fifth of whom were slaves.
Organization of Civil Government.—Proclamation of Sir Henry Clinton.—Desolation of Howe's Plantation.
refuge on board the Bristol, the flag-ship of Sir Peter Parker. * Royal government in North Carolina now ceased forever, and a brighter era in the history of the state was opened.