Lyman Draper on Loyalists and Patriots

Transcription

1 Lyman Draper on Loyalists and Patriots Lyman Copeland Draper was a historian and librarian who, in 1881, published King s Mountain and Its Heroes: History of the Battle of King s Mountain, October 7th, 1780, and the Events Which Led to It, an extensive account of the battle which included edited and annotated versions of primary sources. As he points out, in spite of the fact that it was unthinkable to most Americans in his day and our own that anyone might choose to be a Loyalist, there were good reasons that some men chose to remain loyal to the King. It is fitting, in this connection, to speak of the character of these Loyalists, here arrayed on King s Mountain, and about to engage in a memorable conflict against their common country for they were all, or nearly all, save Ferguson himself, natives of the Colonies. Now that Dunlap was separated from them, Ferguson's corps of Rangers seem to have been quite as unobjectionable a class of men as the temptations and unrestrained recklessness of war ordinarily permit the military to be; and, though they had fled before Captain Hampton in their retreat from Earle s Ford of North Pacolet, and had recoiled before the galling fire of Shelby and Clarke near Cedar Spring, the summer preceding, yet they were experienced soldiers, and were by many accounted as brave and reliable as any British troops in America. But who were the Tories proper? They were made up of different classes of citizens who sympathized with, or took up arms for the King, and fought against their fellow citizens who were bravely contending for the liberties of their country. Those of them who remained after the war, in their old localities, were sadly abused and villified as long as they lived. They hardly

2 dared to offer an apology for their conduct. They were numerous in many of the States, and have left many descendants, not a few of whom are among the most worthy and respected in the communities where they reside; yet none of them boast of their relationship to the Loyalists. It has been the fashion to stigmatize the Tories without stint and without discrimination, heaping all manner of reproaches upon them and their class generally. The issue of the war, and the general verdict of the Whigs, who had suffered not a little in the seven years conflict, seemed to justify these severe judgments. No one now supposes that he would have been a Tory, had it been the will of Providence that he should have been an actor in the scenes of the Revolution a century ago. As he reads the history of the stirring events connected with the war, he concludes, that had he been there, he would, as a matter of course, have been on the right side, periling life and fortune at every hazard in the cause of freedom. It is easy enough for us to imagine, when we read of deeds of humanity, generosity, and noble daring, that we, too, would have acted in a similar manner had we been in the same situation as those persons were who performed them. Few know, till they are tried, what they would do under certain circumstances. One s associations, surroundings, and temptations oftentimes exert an overpowering influence. Let us judge even the Tories with as much charity and leniency as we can. Some of them were cajoled into the British service, and not a few forced into it under various pretenses and intimidations. Rev. James H. Saye, who has spent his life of over seventy years in Georgia and South Carolina, and had much intercourse with the survivors of the Revolution in his day, made the various

3 classes of Tories a special subject of study and inquiry, including the influences that prompted their unhappy choice, and grouped them into six principal divisions: 1. There were some men in the country conscientiously opposed to war, and every sort of revolution which led to it, or invoked its aid. They believed that they ought to be in subjection to the powers that be; and hence they maintained their allegiance to the British crown. The Quakers were of this class. They were then far more numerous in the Carolinas than now. They were, religiously, non-combatants; and the weight of their influence naturally fell on the wrong side. 2. There were many persons who really knew nothing of the questions at issue in the contest. The world has always been cursed with too large a stock of men of this class, whose days are passed in profound ignorance of everything which requires an exertion of intellect, yet often the most self-conceited beings that wear the human form perfect moles, delighting in nothing so much as dirt and darkness. This class followed their cunning and intriguing leaders in the Revolution, and were easily and naturally led into the camp of the Loyalists. 3. Another class thought the Government of George the Third too good to exchange for an uncertainty. They practically said: Let well enough alone; a little tax on tea won t hurt us; and as for principles and doctrines, leave them to the lawyers and parsons. 4. Another class thought that, however desirable the right of self-government might be, it was then quite out of the question, unless his most gracious Majesty might be pleased to grant it; and they believed that the fleets and armies of Great Britain were perfectly invincible, while defeat and utter ruin to all engaged in it must follow rebellion against the King. 5. There was another class who claimed no little credit for shrewdness and management; who prided themselves on being genteel and philosophical. If they ever had scruples of conscience, they amounted to very little; if any religious principles, they imposed no self-denial, and forbade

4 no sensual gratification. If they had a spark of patriotism or love for their King, it could only be kindled by fuel from the Government coffers. The needle is no truer to the pole than were these people to the prospect of gain. War is usually a great distributor of money; they wanted a liberal share, and wanted to acquire it easily. On the fall of Charleston, when Sir Henry Clinton issued his proclamation, these money-worshipers discovered in it a bow of promise. Pardon was offered to all rebels with one exception; and that exception embraced many persons of large estates, and a still greater number possessing comfortable means. Here the shadow of a golden harvest flitted before their longing eyes. The excepted Whigs had property enough to make many rich, if informed against by the zealous advocates of the crown; or, if plundered and appropriated without taking the trouble of making any report of the matter. Feelings of humanity and tenderness were not cultivated or regarded it was enough that the proscribed Whigs had wellcultivated farms, negroes, horses, cattle, or other desirable property, and that they had, in their estimation, justly forfeited all by rebelling against the King and his Government. This class became the sycophants to Royal authority, and the army of plunderers during the war; and once hardened in pillaging, they soon became reckless of life and virtue. 6. There was yet another class which had a large following among the Tories a class, too, which either on account of its numbers, industry, or general influence, gave character to a large portion of the whole fraternity. When a Revolutionary soldier was asked, What sort of men were the Tories?, the almost invariable reply was, A pack of rogues. An eminent example of this class was found in the person of Plundering Sam Brown, already described, a notorious robber years before the war commenced; yet, like other men who had wealth or the means of acquiring it, he had numerous friends and followers. Me had the shrewdness to perceive that the field was well suited to his tastes and habits; and accordingly rallied his retainers, joined

5 Ferguson, and for a time proved an efficient ally. Though he had been an outlaw for many years, yet few brought to the Royal standard a larger share of talent for cunning and inhumanity for the position assigned him. He now enjoyed the liberty of plundering under the sanction of law and authority, and of arresting, for the sake of reward, those who had long been known as the stanch de fenders of honesty and justice. The notorious Captain David Fanning, Bloody Bill Bates, and Bloody Bill Cunningham were men of the same infamous character unfeeling, avaricious, revengeful, and bloody. Here, then, were the conscientious class of Loyalists; an ignorant class; an indifferent class; a cowardly class; a covetous, money-making class; and a disappointed, roguish, revengeful class. It must not be supposed that these characteristics were never combined. Several of them had a natural affinity for each other, and were almost invariably found united in the same person. The non-combatants, the cowards, and the indifferent were not found among those arrayed on King s Mountain; but Ferguson s force, aside from the young men who had enlisted under his standard, and a few worthy but misguided people, was largely made up of the worst characters which war evolves from the dregs of mankind. In the confronting ranks was a very different class of men. Those from the Holston, under Campbell, were a peculiar people somewhat of the character of Cromwell s soldiery. They were, almost to a man, Presbyterians. In their homes, in the Holston Valley, they were settled in pretty compact congregations; quite tenacious of their religious and civil liberties, as handed down from father to son from their Scotch-Irish ancestors. Their preacher, Rev. Charles Cummins, was well fitted for the times; a man of piety and sterling patriotism, who constantly

6 exerted himself to encourage his people to make every needed sacrifice, and put forth every possible exertion in defense of the liberties of their country. They were a remarkable body of men, both physically and mentally. Inured to frontier life, raised mostly in Augusta and Rockbridge Counties, Virginia, a frontier region in the French and Indian war, they early settled on the Holston, and were accustomed from their childhood to border life and hardships; ever ready at the tap of the drum to turn out on military service; if, in the busiest crop season, their wives, sisters, and daughters could, in their absence, plant, and sow, and harvest. They were better educated than most of the frontier settlers, and had a more thorough understanding of the questions at issue between the Colonies and their mother country. These men went forth to strike their country s foes, as did the patriarchs of old, feeling assured that the God of battles was with them, and that He would surely crown their efforts with success. They had no doubts nor fears. They trusted in God and kept their powder dry. Such a thing as a coward was not known among them. How fitting it was, that to such a band of men should have been assigned, by Campbell s own good judgment, the attack on Ferguson's choicest troops his Provincial Rangers. It was a happy omen of success literally the forlorn hope the right men in the right place. Lacey's men, mostly from York and Chester Counties, South Carolina, and some of those under Shelby, Sevier, Cleveland, Williams, Winston, and McDowell, were of the same character Scotch-Irish Presbyterians; but many of them, especially those from the Nolachucky, Watauga, and lower Holston [Rivers], who had not been very long settled on the frontiers, were more of a mixed race, somewhat rough, but brave, fearless, and full of adventure. They were not a whit less patriotic than the Virginians; and were ever ready to hug a bear, scalp an Indian, or beard the

7 fiercest Tories wherever they could find them. Such, in brief, were the salient characteristics of the mountaineers, and the men of the up-country of the Carolinas, who were about to engage in deadly conflict with Ferguson and his motley followers. Excerpted from Lyman C. Draper, King's Mountain and Its Heroes: History of the Battle of King's Mountain, October 7th, 1780, and the Events Which Led to It (Cincinnati: P.G. Thomson, 1881):