1775 (91 page)

Further evidence of British inability to maintain coexisting full-scale campaigns both north and south of the Potomac River can be drawn from
the war chronology of 1778–1779 and the complaints and insights of British generals. The king’s forces were never strong enough to grind down opposition in both regions. Obviously French and Spanish entry into the war in 1778 and 1779 added to Britain’s later southern difficulties, but that had been predictable enough in the earlier years to require a higher standard of realpolitik. William Eden, the secret service chief, later recalled that “the malevolent intentions of France and Spain…were written in legible characters on every line of all foreign intelligence, and upon every foreign transaction official and extra-official.”
⁴

The original southern expedition itself warrants more attention. Not only were its campaigns inept, but in North Carolina the anti-British backlash became a major spur to independence.
⁵
Dunmore’s tactics in Virginia had a similar effect, and Charleston shed any genuine or tactical ambivalence on June 29 as citizens watched the British fleet limp away, leaving HMS
Acteon
abandoned and burning on Middle Ground Shoal.

Bagpipes, Broadswords, Mosquitoes, and Palmettos

Bagpipes and broadswords exemplify the romanticized failure of the Scots Highlanders at Moore’s Creek Bridge on February 27. Mosquitoes in turn symbolize how seven regiments of the regular British Army on the Cape Fear River were stung by insects and sharpshooters alike during four hot May weeks of strategic frustration. Palmettos, nicknamed “cabbage trees” by the redcoats on the Cape Fear, would soon prove that a Charleston Harbor fort built of their spongy wood and sand could beat off the Royal Navy. It was an inglorious five months.

The degree to which Lord North and his Cabinet could mislead themselves about what Loyalist military support could accomplish in the Carolinas rested on more than the assurances of the Earl of Dartmouth and southern royal governors. Lord George Germain, tougher minded by far, had replaced Dartmouth as American secretary in November 1775, and a few weeks later he echoed the same geography: “An armament consisting of seven regiments, with a fleet of frigates and small ships, is now in readiness to proceed to the southern Colonies, in order to attempt the restoration of legal Government in that part of America. It will proceed, in the first place, to North Carolina, and from thence either to South-Carolina or Virginia, as circumstances of greater or less advantage shall point out.”
⁶

Not only was the armada not “in readiness” that December, but the
belief in Loyalists ready to rise en masse was a widely shared fallacy. This was later summed up by Sir John Fortescue, the British military historian: “It was therefore concluded that the mere presence of British troops in certain quarters would be sufficient to rally the entire population to the royal standard; and it was resolved in effect to base the military operations on the presumed support of a section of the inhabitants. Of all the foundations whereon to build the conduct of a campaign this is the loosest…Yet, as shall be seen in the years before us, there is none that has been in more favour with British ministers, with the invariable consequence of failure and disaster.”
⁷
In late 1775, however, policy makers in London were still believers, and they also looked forward to taking control of Charleston Harbor, widely deemed the second objective.

Strictly speaking, Virginia—where the early Revolution, described in
Chapter 22
, was substantially of Lord Dunmore’s shaping—was never drawn into the southern expedition. Clinton, the expeditionary commander, did briefly stop there on his way south in February 1776, but his instructions were for North Carolina. And as we have seen, Dunmore had just been pushed out of Norfolk, and Clinton thought little of his remaining prospects. Nor was Georgia an objective. Several British vessels had arrived off Savannah in January, in belated response to Governor Wright’s summer request, but as things turned out, the governor had to take refuge on one of them. A second small British flotilla arrived in March, principally to seize rice boats to feed Boston’s hungry garrison. The expedition’s only destinations were Carolinian—Cape Fear, and then on to Charleston.

Two varieties of North Carolina Loyalism received the most attention. Such was the circa-1775 recruitment glamour already attached to Scottish Highlanders that London had approved raising a regiment of Royal Highland Emigrants from settlers in North Carolina and northern New York. Predictions that about 3,000 to 5,000 Carolina Highlanders would rally to the king’s standard were excessive, but it was reasonable to assume a core of 500 to 1,000 Highlanders, many veterans of the Forty Five or of the recent French war. Three to four hundred had already been recruited for the Emigrants. Nothing so reassuring could be said about former Regulators.
Chapter 6
has noted how membership in the Sandy Creek Separate Baptist Church, one of the Regulation’s principal seedbeds, plummeted from 600 to 14 as members fled after the fighting at Alamance. Most were not military-minded people. Former governor William Tryon, who in 1771 had
identified the participants as mostly Baptists and Quakers, seems not to have been queried by Dartmouth. Many Regulators had fled west into the mountains after the battle, and few of those remaining in the Piedmont had real followings.

As an ex-military man, Governor Martin probably should have doubted London’s assurances of timely December sailing and February arrival. In fact, that winter’s North Atlantic weather turned out to be especially disruptive. However, the governor had strong personal hopes involved, and in January the various Loyalists were told that they were to assemble in Cross Creek and to meet the British fleet on the Cape Fear River by February 15. With no transports from Britain yet sighted, the senior Scottish officers were cautious. Indeed, at a meeting on February 5 they argued for not assembling their forces until March 1, when the fleet should have arrived. It was the strutting handful of ex-Regulators present who scoffed, saying they had 500 men already organized and expected to field about 5,000, mostly American born, and they “insisted on taking up Arms immediately.” The Scots said that under those circumstances, they could only raise “above six or seven hundred men.”
⁸

Over the next three weeks, ex-Regulator participation withered and shriveled. Despite the boast of 5,000, even the 500 already gathered melted away after hearing of a Whig force closing in. As the combined Loyalists gathered on February 20, the number of ex-Regulators on hand was probably 200 to 400, alongside some 900 to 1,000 Scots, for a total of 1,100 to 1,400. Some went home when Martin turned out not to be on hand with 1,000 redcoats as had been rumored. By the time battle was joined on February 27, only 700 to 900 Loyalists were engaged, of whom only 100 to 200 were ex-Regulators. Historians, local experts, and others use varying figures; they also disagree on whether 30 to 50 Loyalists or as many as 70 were killed and wounded. Everyone agrees that only two Americans were killed or wounded.
⁹
The number of Patriots in the battle depends on whether only those on the battlefield are counted (1,050) or whether one includes other forces not far away (1,900).
¹⁰

Precision seems unnecessary. The portrait of a Highlanders’ gallant last hurrah, although overdrawn, has some truth. Flora MacDonald, famous for saving Bonnie Prince Charlie in 1746, who moved to North Carolina in 1774, apparently reviewed the clansmen sitting sidesaddle on a white horse. Just half had muskets, with the result that 75 men armed only with broadswords were the first to charge. Many died crossing the famous bridge from
which Patriots had removed the planking. Not a few fell before the Patriots’ two small artillery pieces—a Dutch three-pounder named Old Mother Covington, which fired canister, and a swivel gun called Mother Covington’s Daughter. One Whig militiaman recalled his first sight of the enemy: “officers well dressed in gay regimentals, banners and plumes waving in the breeze, and all marching in good order, but with a quick step, to the sound of their pibrochs.”
¹¹
Surprisingly, the clash has not been made into an even more inaccurate movie.

British historians who prefer to ignore Moore’s Creek can fairly describe it as a small engagement not involving British regulars. However, almost all ignore the ignominious and uncomfortable month subsequently passed on the Cape Fear River by seven proud regiments of British regulars who ducked sharpshooters and staged their handful of raids at night so as to avoid the American riflemen who lined the river’s many elevated banks. With no Loyalist army coming, the redcoats had no real purpose.

The British ships originally scheduled to arrive in February dropped anchor between March and May. General Clinton, with a frigate, sloop, and three transports holding two companies of infantry, arrived on March 12. Most days he exercised his men on Battery Island, a small place easily protected by his two warships and beyond sharpshooter range from the shore.
¹²
But he could attempt little until the 60-odd other ships and seven regiments, commanded by Commodore Sir Peter Parker and Major General the Earl Cornwallis, dropped anchor between April 18 and May 3. The main fleet was so far behind schedule that even their arrival with Clinton on March 12 wouldn’t have mattered.

But for a moment, let us suppose that the British war machine had delivered Clinton and Cornwallis in early February, so that the Loyalists gathering in the hinterland could be reassured that transports had just arrived with the 15th, 28th, 33rd, 37th, 46th, 54th, and 57th regiments. It would have sufficed for two or three officers and 25 redcoats to accompany Governor Martin to Cross Creek on February 15. If so, one can imagine some 3,000 Loyalists moving down the Cape Fear to Brunswick and Wilmington—a powerful army, once merged with the seven British regiments. In the words of one North Carolina historian, “The Moore’s Creek Bridge Campaign, viewed from a perspective of nearly two hundred years, assumes greater importance than in 1776. Had the loyalists reached the sea, it is not unreasonable to suppose that their ranks would have been swelled considerably
by the Tories of the coastal areas. If a junction had been made with Governor Martin, and arms in sufficient number acquired, large numbers of loyalists and Regulators would have flocked to the royal standard.”
¹³

Reality, as we saw in
Chapters 12
and
13
, was that the British Army and Royal Navy of late 1775 were overextended administratively and logistically. The Cape Fear expedition was further undercut by several major miscalculations and intelligence failures. Whether or not Loyalists ever fought their way to the seacoast, large warships and transports in the area were handicapped. They could not go up the river to Wilmington; only smaller ships and sloops could do that. The catch was that sloops like HMS
Cruizer,
even if they got past river obstacles, were not heavily enough armed; the batteries of six- and nine-pounders at Wilmington could drive them back.

What’s more, the banks and bluffs up to 70 feet high that lined parts of the river favored Patriot riflemen. The initial British assumption was that to be safe, vessels had to keep 200 yards from shore, but it soon became clear that 400 yards were needed for safety against sharpshooters. The redcoats’ only accomplishments came from frustrated commanders’ indulgences: burning or pillaging the plantations and homes of leading Patriots, including Robert Howe and William Hooper. On May 1, General Clinton ordered the destruction of what was left of Fort Johnston because it had become a haven for American riflemen. The next day, Clinton landed ten companies of redcoats to capture the 50 to 60 sharpshooters, but all that could be found were horses’ tracks. The riflemen were back the next day.
¹⁴
On May 3, Clinton wrote to Germain that his army was unlikely to achieve much. No water routes beckoned; the weather was bad and soon to become intolerable; there were no horses for his artillery.
¹⁵
In addition, Loyalists, being jailed and suppressed, could not be enlisted; by contrast, rebel troops were massing.

In late May, probably after he and Parker and Cornwallis had made a decision to move on to Charleston, Clinton relocated most of his troops to the environs of the old fort, where they kept pine trees burning during the night for illumination to keep the sharpshooters from getting too close.
¹⁶
From time to time, rumors circulated about British intent to burn Wilmington, and Patriot commanders feared an attack.
¹⁷
In fact, Clinton and Cornwallis had both had enough of North Carolina. On May 31, the fleet sailed for Charleston.

For the British, an underlying and little-recognized problem was that as of late 1775, Wilmington, Brunswick, and the southeastern counties—Brunswick, New Hanover, Onslow, Craven, and Duplin—were the
principal muster ground of the Revolution in North Carolina. This region had bred a disproportion of the Revolutionary leadership, and in April 1776, when General Clinton promised a pardon to all who would come in and swear allegiance, the two men he excluded—Cornelius Harnett and Robert Howe—were both from Cape Fear.
¹⁸
From the autumn of 1775, when talk began to grow of a British southern expedition that would invade North Carolina through Cape Fear, the local Patriot leadership had busied itself preparing to meet such a force.

More than any other part of the province, the southeastern counties embraced military mobilization. In August 1775, the Provincial Congress had authorized two Continental regiments and minutemen. At Moore’s Creek Bridge, the Patriot forces were made up of Craven County (New Bern) militia, New Hanover (Wilmington) militia and minutemen, and smaller contingents from nearby Duplin, Onslow, and Bladen counties. In April 1776, the Provincial Congress sought to counter the additional British regiments expected by establishing four new Continental regiments in addition to the existing pair.
¹⁹
In December, Robert Howe had taken one regiment of North Carolina Continentals to help the Virginians beat Lord Dunmore in Great Bridge and Norfolk; and in June, as soon as Commodore Parker had sailed for Charleston, portions of several North Carolina Continental regiments marched south to help in the defense of Charleston. Arousing eastern North Carolina was a British mistake.