Jim Piecuch - Three Peoples, One King: Loyalists, Indians, and Slaves in the Revolutionary South, 1775–1782

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2008 James Piecuch

Cloth edition published by the University of South Carolina Press, 2008 Paperback and ebook editions published in Columbia, South Carolina, by the University of South Carolina Press, 2013

www.sc.edu/uscpress

22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

The Library of Congress has cataloged the cloth edition as follows:

Piecuch, Jim.
Three peoples, one king : loyalists, Indians, and slaves in the revolutionary South, 1775-1782 / Jim Piecuch.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-57003-737-5 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Southern StatesHistoryRevolution, 17751783. 2. South CarolinaHistoryRevolution, 17751783. 3. GeorgiaHistoryRevolution, 17751783. 4. United StatesHistoryRevolution, 17751783British forces. 5. American loyalistsSouthern States. 6. Indians of North AmericaSouthern StatesHistory18th century. 7. SlavesSouthern StatesHistory18th century. I. Title.
E230.5.S7P54 2008
973.3140975dc22
2008006203
ISBN 978-1-61117-192-1 (pbk)
ISBN 978-1-61117-193-8 (ebook)

To all those courageous Americanswhite, red, and blackwho gave their lives during the Revolution in the hope of creating a different future for America within the British Empire

ILLUSTRATIONS

FIGURES

MAPS

PREFACE

Certain terms used in this book require a brief explanation. When referring to those American colonists who supported the British, I have used the term Loyalists throughout the text, forgoing use of the synonym Tories, which had a derogatory connotation in the Revolutionary era. When quoting from sources, however, I left the terms Tory and Tories unaltered. I have used the terms Whigs, rebels, and Americans interchangeably when referring to those colonists who supported the Revolution. To maintain consistency with the documentary sources, I have used the term Indians rather than Native Americans. The terms blacks, slaves, and African Americans are used interchangeably. In those rare instances involving blacks who were not slaves, I have indicated their free status. Charleston, South Carolina, was spelled Charles Town, Charlestown, and Charleston during the 1770s and 1780s; I have left the original spelling intact in quotations but used Charleston uniformly in the text.

In manuscript collections in which each page is numbered, such as the Cornwallis Papers, I have given only the number of the first page of the cited document in the endnotes. The information or quotation from that document may appear on a subsequent page or pages. To reduce the length of the endnotes, I have employed several abbreviations for sources and archives. A list of these abbreviations precedes the notes.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The completion of a work of this magnitude requires the assistance of many people. I would like to thank Professor James Axtell of the College of William & Mary for his guidance and support, along with Professors James Whittenburg and Ronald Schechter of William & Mary and Eliga Gould of the University of New Hampshire for their advice.

I am grateful to the David Library of the American Revolution, the Institute of Southern Studies at the University of South Carolina, and the William L. Clements Library for providing fellowship support, and to the College of William & Mary for providing several research grants. Many archivists and librarians also provided valuable assistance, and although space does not permit me to list them all, Sam Fore and Henry Fulmer of the South Caroliniana Library, John Dann and the staff of the Clements Library, Kathy Ludwig and the staff of the David Library, Linda Baier of the Harriet C. Irving Library at the University of New Brunswick, and the staffs at the Library of Congress, the Georgia Historical Society, and the Earl Gregg Swem Library at the College of William & Mary merit special thanks.

Anne Yehl also deserves thanks for an outstanding job in assisting me with research.

In conclusion I want to express my gratitude to my wife, Lori, and son, Joey, for their patience and support, and to my Siberian huskies, Shyleea and Max, who knew that a long run in the woods can be the best remedy for writer's block.

Introduction

ON THE MORNING OF DECEMBER 14, 1782, the weak winter sun revealed dozens of British ships clogging the waters of Charleston harbor in South Carolina, waiting for the shift of the tide that would carry them over the bar and out into the Atlantic. Throngs of people, blacks as well as whites, crowded the decks, the murmurs of thousands of voices drowning out the sounds of water lapping against wooden hulls, of masts and spars creaking in the wind. The passengers discussed with sadness the events that had led them to this point, and the uncertain future that lay ahead.

Hundreds of miles to the west, in towns scattered throughout the wilderness between the Appalachians and the Mississippi River, thousands of Native Americans also pondered their past and their future. Like their black and white counterparts aboard the evacuation fleet, they had committed themselves to supporting the royal cause in the American Revolution. That cause was now irretrievably lost. Yet all of those who had fought for itblack, red, and white Americans; British and German soldiershad made great efforts on behalf of King George III. The proof of their commitment could be found in the thousands of graves that seeded the soil of South Carolina, Georgia, and East and West Florida, from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi, from the Gulf of Mexico to the Ohio River. It could be found in the ashes of burned Indian towns, in the bloody scars left by whips across the backs of slaves who had fled to the British, in the once-prosperous farms and plantations lying desolate after having been confiscated by the victorious American rebels.

In that gloomy December, white Loyalists, African Americans, and Native Americans all wondered how things had gone so very wrong, how the hopes they had entertained for their future within the British Empire, which had dimmed and flared so many times during the past seven and one-half years, had finally been extinguished. Had they themselves failed to do enough? Did the British government fail them? Or were there other reasons for the distressing outcome of the war? Whatever conclusion they reached, one thing was certain: this was not the fate that anyone among them had envisioned in 1775.

British officials had certainly not expected such an outcome either. From the start of the American Revolution, King George III and his ministers believed that the support of the numerous southern Loyalists, Indians, and slaves would enable the army to restore royal authority in Georgia and South Carolina with relative ease. Yet, despite a promising start when British forces finally launched a campaign in the South at the end of 1778, the effort eventually failed. In the aftermath of defeat, British leaders devoted little effort to an analysis of the reasons for the failure of their southern operations, focusing instead on blaming their political opponents, or avoiding blame themselves, for the lost war.

Historians, however, have since sought to explain why the British failed to regain control of South Carolina and Georgia. Most attribute the British defeat to a fundamental error in planning the southern campaign: officials in London grossly exaggerated the extent of loyalism in the South.

Only a few historians believe that British officials had been fairly accurate in their appraisal of Loyalist strength in the South. John Shy insisted that the British assessment of the numbers of southern Loyalists was at least partially correct, writing that British estimates of American attitudes were frequently in error, but seldom were they completely mistaken.

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