WAR AT SABER POINT by John Knight

Author:John Knight
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781594166709
Publisher: Westholme Publishing
Published: 2020-12-18T00:00:00+00:00

AFTER the destruction of Major Patrick Ferguson’s entire force at Kings Mountain, the sparsely settled Carolina backcountry fell under the control of patriot irregulars. Cornwallis ordered Tarleton to abandon his ineffectual chase of Marion and concentrate instead on Thomas Sumter’s militia, which was threatening the Blackstock Road. This highway was the closest thing to an “interstate” eighteenth-century South Carolina possessed, and the British could not allow such a vital artery to be cut. On November 18, British Legion dragoons and the mounted infantry of the 63rd Regiment were refreshing themselves and their mounts on the Broad River when, in a chance skirmish, some of Sumter’s men on the opposing bank opened fire on them. The British brought up a three-pounder “grasshopper” field gun and scattered the patriots. But Tarleton “did not submit easily to insults”24 and was affronted at their audacity. Putting his men across the river in flatboats that night, he pressed Sumter hard the next day, and as the autumn light faded, Tarleton caught up with him.

The rebel militia was deployed behind a “fence not made with common rails but with small trees notched one on the other.”25 It was an excellent defensive position, anchored by five log houses inside of which sat Colonel Henry Hampton’s riflemen. Tarleton had not intended to bring on a general engagement, as he was outnumbered. Sumter, with the Tyger River at his back, however, did not intend to oblige the Englishman by waiting for his reserves. He sent four hundred of his infantry charging down the hill toward the men of the 63rd, but they loosed a ragged volley at too great a distance. This mistake gave Major John Money, commanding the British regiment, an opportunity to hit them with the bayonet. As his men charged in, they advanced too close to the farm buildings and came under a galling crossfire from Hampton’s men inside, who, as usual, targeted officers, the so-called epaulette-and-stripes men. Money’s troops were soon pinned down by the combined fire from front and flank. Tarleton, seeing the difficulty his infantry was in, ordered a charge to ease this pressure.

It was a courageous but foolhardy maneuver, for he was executing a frontal assault against concealed infantry. The charge also had to be undertaken in column, and this was invariably less effective than one conducted in line on a broader front. The legion cavalry reached the rebels, but at a canter, not a full charge. This time Sumter’s men did not repeat their earlier error. Firing at close range, they devastated the horsemen. One rebel recalled:

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