These having arrived, he immediately pursued the enemy; but the advanced position of Lord Cornwallis, and the bad state of the roads, determined him to halt, in order to indulge his troops with that repose which they so much needed. Having abandoned the pursuit of the enemy, General Greene found himself encircled with new difficulties. Of that part of the Union over which General Greene’s command extended, the enemy was in force in three large and important sections. South Carolina and Georgia being entirely in possession of the enemy, and Cornwallis had taken post in the maritime district of North Carolina, and part of Virginia was occupied by a powerful detachment of British troops, under the command of General Phillips. Greene, under all these difficulties, was at a loss to determine in which of these points he should act in person, and on consulting with officers, he found them greatly divided in opinion. He accordingly decided to penetrate South Carolina, and after dividing his army into two columns, attack and harass the enemy at their different posts, without permitting them to concentrate their forces, and thus recover that rich and important member of the Union.
General Greene commenced his march South, and arrived at Hobkirk’s Hill, in front of Camden, the head-quarters of Lord Rawdon, then the commander-in-chief of the British forces in that section. In order to prevent supplies from being brought in, and to take advantage of such favorable circumstances as might occur, he encamped at about a mile from the town. Lord Rawdon’s situation was extremely delicate. His supplies also were very precarious; and should General Greene’s reinforcements arrive, which were hourly expected, he might be so closely invested as to be at length obliged to surrender. In this dilemma, the only expedient that presented itself, appeared to be a bold attack; for which purpose he armed every person with him capable of carrying a musket, not excepting even his musicians. On the 25th of April he made the attack upon General Greene in his camp.
The defense was obstinate, and for some time appeared to be in favor of America. At one time Lieut. Colonel Washington, who commanded the cavalry, had not less than two hundred British prisoners.
However, by the inadvertence of one of the American regiments, victory was snatched from General Greene, who was compelled to retreat, with a loss of about two hundred killed, wounded, and prisoners. The British general lost about two hundred and fifty-eight. The evacuation of Camden, with the vigilance of General Greene, and the several officers under him, gave entirely a new complexion to affairs in South Carolina, where the British ascendency declined more rapidly than it had been established.
Nearly every fort, with the exception of fort Ninety-Six, garrisoned by the enemy, with military stores and artillery, fell into the hands of the Americans.
The next attempt was the siege of Ninety-Six, but which proved unsuccessful, and Greene was obliged to retreat over the Saluda. Lord Rawdon now prepared to evacuate the garrison of Ninety-Six, and return to Charleston; and General Greene became in reality the pursuing party, exceedingly anxious to bring the enemy to battle. But this did not take place till September; the British at that time were posted at Eutaw Springs, where General Greene, who had assembled about two thousand men, prepared to follow and attack them.
The American force was drawn up in two lines; the first, composed of Carolina militia, was commanded by Generals Marion and Pickens, and Colonel de Malmedy. The second, which consisted of continental troops from North Carolina, Virginia and Maryland, was commanded by General Sumpter, Lieutenant-Colonel Campbell, and Colonel Williams. As the Americans approached toward an attack, they fell in with some advanced parties of the enemy, at about three miles ahead of the main body.
These being driven back, the action soon became general. In the very heat of the engagement General Greene ordered the Maryland and Virginia continentals to charge with trailed arms. This decided the fate of the day. “Nothing,” says Dr. Ramsay, “could surpass the intrepidity of both officers and men on this occasion. They rushed on in good order through a heavy cannonade, and a shower of musketry, with such unshaken resolution that they bore down all before them.” The British were broken, closely pursued, and upward of eleven hundred of them killed and taken prisoners; the loss of the Americans was about five hundred.
Judge Johnson, in his life of General Greene, says—“At the battle of the Eutaw Springs, Greene says, that hundreds of my men were naked as they were born. Posterity will scarcely believe that the bare loins of many brave men who carried death into the enemy’s ranks at the Eutaw, were galled by their cartouche-boxes, while a folded rag or a tuft of moss protected the shoulders from sustaining the same injury from the musket. Men of other times will inquire by what magic was the army kept together? By what supernatural power was it made to fight?”
General Greene in his letter to the Secretary of War says—“We have three hundred men without arms, and more than one thousand so naked that they can be put on duty only in cases of a desperate nature.”