[Victory of Eutaw Springs.]
NATHANIELI GREEN (sic) EGREGIO DUCI COMITIA AMERICANA. (The American Congress to Nathaniel Greene, a distinguished general.) Bust of General Greene, in uniform, facing the left.
SALUS REGIONUM AUSTRALIUM. (The safety of the southern regions.) A winged Victory holds a crown of laurel in her right hand, and a palm branch in her left; one foot is resting on a trophy of arms and flags of conquered enemies. Exergue: HOSTIBUS AD EUTAW DEBELLATIS DIE VIII SEPT (Septembris) MDCCLXXXI. (The enemy vanquished at Eutaw on the 8th of September, 1781.) DUPRÉ.[45]
The legend of the reverse of this medal, as originally proposed by the French Academy of Inscriptions and Belles-Lettres was, SALUS PROVINCIARUM AUSTRALIUM.
Nathaniel Greene was born at Potowhommet, Warwick County, Rhode Island, May 27, 1742. He began life as a blacksmith, but entered the "Kentish Guards" as a private in 1774. He was made brigadier-general of the Rhode Island contingent to the army before Boston, in May, 1775, and a brigadier-general in the Continental Army, June 22, 1775, and remained in active service throughout the war. In 1776 he commanded in Long Island as a major-general; and fought at Trenton, Princeton, the Brandywine, Germantown, Monmouth, Newport, and Springfield. He was quartermaster-general from March 2, 1778, to August, 1780; and was commander of the army, in September, when Arnold's treason was discovered. The same year he was appointed commander-in-chief of the southern department, retook the two Carolinas and Georgia, and won the battle of Eutaw Springs, September 8, 1781, for which victory Congress gave him a vote of thanks and a gold medal. After the war he removed to a plantation, which the State of Georgia had given him, on the Savannah river, and died there of a sunstroke, June 19, 1786.