MARION THE SWAMP FOX AND GENERAL GREENE
FAR away back in old English history there was a famous archer named
Robin Hood, who lived in the deep woods with a bold band of outlaws like
himself. He and his band were foes of the nobles and friends of the
poor, and his name will never be forgotten by the people of England.
No doubt you have read about the gallant archer. No man of his time
could send an arrow so straight and sure as he. But we need not go back
for hundreds of years to find our Robin Hood. We have had a man like him
in our own country, who fought for us in the Revolution. His name was
Francis Marion, and he was known as the "Swamp Fox"; for he lived in the
swamps of South Carolina as Robin Hood did in the forests of England,
and he was the stinging foe of the oppressors of the people.
I have already told you about the war in the North, and of how the
British, after doing all they could to overthrow Washington and conquer
the country, found themselves shut up in the city of New York, with
Washington like a watch-dog outside.
When the British generals found that the North was too hard a nut to
crack, they thought they would try what they could do in the South. So
they sent a fleet and an army down the coast, and before long they had
taken the cities of Savannah and Charleston, and had their soldiers
marching all over Georgia and South Carolina. General Gates, the man to
whom Burgoyne surrendered, came down with a force of militia to fight
them, but he was beaten so badly that he had to run away without a
soldier to follow him. You can imagine that the British were proud of
their success. They thought themselves masters of the South, and fancied
they had only to march north and become masters there, too.
But you must not think that they were quite masters. Back in the woods
and the swamps were men with arms in their hands and with love of
country in their hearts. They were like wasps or hornets, who kept
darting out from their nests, stinging the British troops, and then
darting back out of sight. These gallant bands were led by Marion,
Sumter, Pickens, and other brave men; but Marion's band was the most
famous of them all, so I shall tell you about the Swamp Fox and what he
did.
I fancy all of my young friends would have laughed if they had seen
Marion's band when it joined General Gates' army. Such scarecrows of
soldiers they were! There were only about twenty of them in all, some of
them white and some black, some men and some boys, dressed in rags that
fluttered in the wind, and on horses that looked as if they had been fed
on corncobs instead of corn.
Gates and his men did laugh at them, though they took care not to laugh
when Marion was at hand. He was a small man, with a thin face, and
dressed not much better than his men. But there was a look in his eye
that told the soldiers he was not a safe man to laugh at.
Marion and his men were soon off again on a scout, and after Gates and
his army had been beaten and scattered to the winds, they went back to
their hiding places in the swamps to play the hornet once more.
Along the Pedee River these swamps extended for miles. There were
islands of dry land far within, but they could only be reached by narrow
paths which the British were not able to find. Only men who had spent
their lives in that country could make their way safely through this
broad stretch of water plants and water-soaked ground.
Marion's force kept changing. Now it went down to twenty men, now up to
a hundred or more. It was never large, for there was not food or
shelter for many men. But there were enough of them to give the British
plenty of trouble. They had their sentries on the outlook, and when a
party of British or Tories went carelessly past out would spring
Marion's men, send their foes flying like deer, and then back they would
go before a strong body of the enemy could reach them.
These brave fellows had many hiding places in the swamps and many paths
out of them. To-day they might strike the British in one place and
to-morrow in another many miles away. Small as their force was they gave
the enemy far more trouble than Gates had done with all his army.
Marion's headquarters was a tract of land known as Snow's Island, where
a creek ran into the Pedee. It was high and dry, was covered with trees
and thickets, and was full of game. And all around it spread the soaking
swamp, with paths known only to the patriot band. Among all their hiding
places, this was their chosen home.
You may be sure that the British did their best to capture a man who
gave them so much trouble as Marion. They sent Colonel Wemyss, one of
their best cavalry officers, to hunt him down. Marion was then far from
his hiding place and Wemyss got on his trail. But the Swamp Fox was hard
to catch. He lead the British a lively chase, and when they gave it up
in despair he followed them back. He came upon a large body of Tories
and struck them so suddenly that hardly a man of them escaped, while he
lost only one man. Tories, you should know, were Americans who fought on
the British side.
The next man who tried to capture Marion was Colonel Tarleton, a hard
rider and a good soldier, but a cruel and brutal man. He was hated in
the South as much as Benedict Arnold was in the North. There is a good
story told about how he was tricked by one of Marion's men. One day as
he and his men were riding furiously along they came up to an old
farmer, who was hoeing in his field beside the road.
"Can you tell me what became of the man who galloped by here just ahead
of us?" asked one of them. "I will give you fifty pounds if you put me
on his track."
"Do you mean the man on a black horse with a white star in its
forehead?" asked the farmer.
"Yes, that's the fellow."
"He looked to me like Jack Davis, one of Marion's men, but he went past
so fast that I could not be sure."
"Never mind who he was. What we want to know is where to find him."
"Bless your heart! he was going at such a pace that he couldn't well
stop under four or five miles. I'm much afeard I can't earn that fifty
pounds."
On rode the troop, and back into the woods went the farmer. He had not
gone far before he came to a black horse with a white star in its
forehead. This he mounted and rode away. The farmer was Jack Davis
himself.
That was the kind of men Tarleton had to deal with, and you may be sure
that he did not catch any of them. He had his hunt, but he caught no
game.
While Marion was keeping the war alive in South Carolina, an army was
gathering under General Greene, who was, next to Washington, the best of
the American generals. With him were Daniel Morgan, a famous leader of
riflemen, William Washington, a cousin of the commander-in-chief, and
Henry Lee, or "Light-horse Harry," father of the famous General Lee of
the Civil War.
General Greene got together about two thousand men, half armed and half
supplied and knowing nothing about war, so that he had a poor chance of
defeating the trained British soldiers. But he was a Marion on a larger
scale, and knew when to retreat and when to advance. I must tell you
what he did.
In the first place Morgan the rifleman met the bold Colonel Tarleton and
gave him a sound flogging. Tarleton hurried back to Lord Cornwallis, the
British commander in the South. Cornwallis thought he would catch Morgan
napping, but the lively rifleman was too wide-awake for him. He hurried
back with the prisoners he had taken from Tarleton, and crossed the
Catawba River just as the British came up. That night it rained hard,
and the river rose so that it could not be crossed for three days.
General Greene now joined Morgan, and the retreat continued to the
Yadkin River. This, too, was crossed by the Americans and a lucky rain
again came up and swelled the river before the British could follow.
When the British got across there was a race for the Dan River on the
borders of Virginia. Greene got there first, crossed the stream, and
held the fords or crossing-place against the foe. Cornwallis by this
time had enough of it. Provisions were growing scarce, and he turned
back. But he soon had Greene on his track, and he did not find his march
a very comfortable one.
Here I must tell you an interesting anecdote about General Greene. Once,
during his campaign, he entered a tavern at Salisbury, in North
Carolina. He was wet to the skin from a heavy rain. Steele, the
landlord, knew him and looked at him in surprise.
"Why, general, you are not alone?" he asked.
"Yes," said the general, "here I am, all alone, very tired, hungry, and
penniless."
Mrs. Steele hastened to set a smoking hot meal before the hungry
traveler. Then, while he was eating, she drew from under her apron two
bags of silver and laid them on the table before him.
"Take these, general," she said. "You need them and I can do without
them."
You may see that the women as well as the men of America did all they
could for liberty, for there were many others like Mrs. Steele.
I have told you that General Greene was one of the ablest of the
American leaders, and you have seen how he got the best of Cornwallis in
the retreat. Several times afterwards he fought with the British. He was
always defeated. His country soldiers could not face the British
veterans. But each time he managed to get as much good from the fight as
if he had won a victory, and by the end of the year the British were
shut up in Charleston and Savannah, and the South was free again.
Where was Cornwallis during this time? Greene had led him so far north
that he concluded to march on into Virginia and get the troops he would
find there, and then come back. There was fighting going on in Virginia
at this time. General Arnold, the traitor, was there, fighting against
his own people. Against him was General Lafayette, a young French
nobleman who had come to the help of the Americans.
I suppose some of you have read stories of how a wolf or some other
wild animal walked into a trap, from which it could not get out again.
Lord Cornwallis was not a wild animal, but he walked into just such a
trap after he got to Virginia. When he reached there he took command of
Arnold's troops. But he found himself not yet strong enough to face
Lafayette, so he marched to Yorktown, near the mouth of York River,
where he expected to get help by sea from New York. Yorktown was the
trap he walked into, as you will see.
France had sent a fleet and an army to help the Americans, and just then
this fleet came up from the West Indies and sailed into the Chesapeake,
shutting off Yorktown from the sea. At the same time Washington, who had
been closely watching what was going on, broke camp before New York and
marched southward as fast as his men could go. Before Cornwallis could
guess what was about to happen the trap was closed on him. In the bay
near Yorktown was the strong French fleet; before Yorktown was the army
of American and French soldiers.
There was no escape. The army and the fleet bombarded the town. A week
of this was enough for Lord Cornwallis. He surrendered his army, seven
thousand strong, on October 19, 1781, and the war was at an end. America
was free.