This order was promptly obeyed, and these officers, with their commands, arrived there on the same day with Greene and Morgan. Lieutenant-colonel Lee and his legion, who had been on an expedition to Georgetown, seventy-five miles below Che-raw, overtook them on their march, and that gallant corps was now added to the concentrated strength of the Americans. The army, lying at rest on the slopes around Martinsville, was mustered on the eighth, and amounted to about two thousand men, including five hundred militia. Of this number nearly two hundred were superior cavalry. The army of Cornwallis in pursuit, was between two thousand five hundred and three thousand strong, of which three hundred were mounted men.
Perceiving no prospect of the falling of the river, for the rain continued, Cornwallis marched as rapidly as possible up the western side of the Yadkin to the shallow ford near the present village of Huntsville, in Surrey county, where he crossed. There he was informed of the junction of the two divisions of the American army, and the hope of keeping them separate was extinguished. An attempt to intercept their march toward Virginia, and compel Greene to fight or surrender, was now the chief object of the earl's solicitude. Upon the success of this undertaking depended not only the maintenance of his power in the Carolinas, but perhaps the actual existence of his army. He knew the inferiority of the American army in numbers, and being assured that the rivers which lay between Greene and Virginia were too much swollen to be forded, and the ferries too wide apart to furnish a sufficient number of boats at one point to transport the retreating army across, he felt confident of success. His lordship was now within twenty-five miles of Greene, at Guilford, and nearer the shallow fords of the Dan than he was; and on the ninth of February1781 he resumed his march with vigor, to gain a position in front of the Americans.
* Both divisions of the army were in want of rest. That of Morgan had been almost constantly in motion since the battle at the Cowpens, and had traveled one hundred and fifty miles; that of Huger had traveled one hundred miles from the camp on the Pedee, with bad wagons and poor teams, over an exceedingly wretched road. Many marched without shoes over the frozen ground, and their footsteps were marked with blood for many miles. No one can form an idea of the character of the roads in winter, at the South, where the red clay abounds, without passing over them. Until I had done so, I could not appreciate the difficulties experienced by the two armies in this race toward Virginia, particularly in the transportation of baggage wagons or of artillery.
** This view of the Trading Ford, where Greene, with Morgan and his light troops, crossed the Yadkin, is from the east side of the river. It is just at the foot of an island, about a mile and a half below the great bridge on the road to Salisbury. The river is usually fordable between the island and the stakes seen in the picture; below that point the water is deep. I made this sketch just at dawn on a cold frosty morning (January 5, 1849), the moon shining brightly in the west, and the nearer stars glittering in profusion in the deep sky above.
Greene's Resolution to continue his Retreat.—Light Army organized.— Colonel Williams.—Line of March.
Greene, also aware of the inferiority of his forces, called a council of war,Feb 9when it was resolved to avoid a battle, and retreat as rapidly as possible across the Dan into the friendly districts of Virginia.
