Tales, Traditions and Romance of Border and Revolutionary Times

by Edward Sylvester Ellis

"This is none of your business, sir; they are before me! Sergeant of the guard, bring me a file of men with loaded arms and fixed bayonets."

"I was silent," added Horry. "All our field-officers in camp were present, and they had put their hands to their swords in readiness to draw. My own sword was already drawn."

In the regular service, with officers bred up to the severe sense of authority considered necessary to proper discipline, the offender would probably have been hewn down in the moment of disobedience. The effect of such a measure, in this instance, might have been most unhappy. The esprit du corps might have prompted the Major's immediate followers to have resisted, and, though annihilated, as Horry says they would have been, yet several valuable lives would have been lost, which their country could ill spare. The mutiny would have been put down, but at what a price!

The patience and prudence of Marion's character taught him forbearance. His mildness, by putting the offender entirely in the wrong, so justified his severity, as to disarm the followers of the criminals, who were about sixty in number.

Horry continues: "The purpose of the officers was, to call upon these men for support—we well knew they meant, if possible, to intimidate Marion, so as to compel him to come into their measures of plunder and Tory killing. The affair, fortunately, terminated without any bloodshed. The prudence of the General had its effect. The delay gave time to the offender for reflection. Perhaps, looking around upon their followers, they saw no consenting spirit of mutiny in their eyes; for, though many of the refugees were present, none offered to back the mutinous officers—and when the guard which was ordered appeared in sight, the companion of the offender was seen to touch the arm of the other, who then proffered the sword to Marion, saying:

"'General, you need not have sent for the guard.'"

Marion, refusing to receive it, referred him to the Sergeant of the guard, and thus, doubly degraded, the dishonored Major of the Continentals disappeared from sight, followed by his associate.

Another one of Marion's bravest men was Sergeant Jasper, of whom the readers of a former number have already heard in connection with the melancholy and romantic story of the young Creole girl, who followed him to camp, in the disguise of a soldier, and sacrificed her life to preserve that of the man she loved, by rushing in between him and the shot aimed at his breast.

Sergeant William Jasper, at the time of the affair which we are about to relate, belonged to the Second regiment of the South Carolina militia, having enlisted under Marion, who was then a Captain. Jasper, from the day of his entering the camp, had been proverbial for his bravery. His coolness and valor in times of emergency, and more than all, his utter disregard of danger, had won for him the golden opinions of his comrades, with the esteem and confidence of his commander. Jasper possessed remarkable talents and capacity for a scout. Bold, active and shrewd, with a frame capable of every endurance—the result of a hardy, backwoods life—and retaining those noble qualities of bravery and generosity which were the shining points of his character, he was admirably adapted for that dangerous but important branch of the service. Combining, in happy harmony, so many virtues, it is not surprising that he won the affections of his associates, and the entire confidence of his commander, who was so assured of his fitness that he granted him a roving commission, with full power to select from the brigade such men and as many as he should think proper. But of these he never, or seldom, selected more than six or eight, preferring, by this small band, celerity and secrecy. He was almost universally successful, often penetrating the enemy's camp, or cutting off his rear or advanced guard, and then returning with his prisoners, or his information, according to the circumstances of the case. So rapid were his movements, that he has been known to disappear from the camp and return again with his prisoners, ere his absence was noticed by the commandant. He would often enter the enemy's camp as a deserter, and complaining of the ill usage he had received from his countrymen, so gain upon their confidence, that he would completely disarm them of his real intentions, and after satisfying himself of their strength, position, intentions, and the like, would return and report his knowledge to the commander. On one of these occasions, he remained in the enemy's camp eight days, and then returned, after first informing himself of every thing necessary that could be of any use to his General. This game, however, could be played but once. Never at a loss how to proceed, he, with his usual promptness, devised other ways and means to gain his information.

It was while he was in the employment of one of these roving expeditions, that he prepared to again enter the camp of the British at Ebenezer. It so happened that he had a brother at this post, who was in the employ of the enemy—a melancholy instance among many other cases of a like nature, which occurred during the war—who was a Tory, and who held the same rank in the British army that he possessed in the American. The brothers were equally dear to each other, though opposite in political sentiment.