The Waxhaw Massacre, 29 May 1780

Upon the outbreak of war in 1775, Abraham Buford, a native of Culpeper County, Virginia, organized a company of minutemen. By May 1778 he had achieved the rank of Colonel in the Continental Army, and assumed command of the 11th Virginia Regiment in September the same year. In April 1780 Buford was reassigned to lead the 3rd Virginia Regiment southward into the Carolinas. He was to relieve General Benjamin Lincoln in Charleston while that port city continued under British siege. After Buford entered the South Carolina backcountry of the Waxhaws, however, he received news of Lincoln’s surrender to the British, and he turned his Virginia troops northward again, as ordered. 

The Waxhaws, a geographic region in the Piedmont of the Catawba River valley, was named for its earliest known inhabitants—the Waxhaw Indians. The tribe had been decimated by war and disease, and by 1715 the area was essentially uninhabited. By 1740 Scots-Irish and other immigrants had entered the land and established settlements. The fertile hunting ground of the Waxhaws spanned, after the border was eventually drawn, the North and South Carolina state lines. 

Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton was a British cavalry officer with a reputation for ruthless brutality that earned him the nicknames “Bloody Ban” and “Butcher.” On 29 May 1780 Tarleton’s force of about 130 cavalry, 100 infantry, and 40 British “Green Dragoons” overtook Colonel Buford’s 350 (or 380, per Tarleton) Virginia Continentals in the woods near Lancaster, South Carolina. As evidenced in their exchanged dispatches, Buford, at the outset, declined Tarleton’s option to surrender. Only after an early onset of heavy casualties did Buford order his troops to raise a flag of surrender. 

Buford now perceiving that further resistance was hopeless, ordered a flag to be hoisted and the arms to be grounded, expecting the usual treatment sanctioned by civilized warfare. This, however, made no part of Tarleton’s creed. His ostensible pretext, for the relentless barbarity that ensued, was, that his horse was killed under him just as the flag was raised. He affected to believe that this was done afterwards, and imputed it to treachery on the part of Buford; but, in reality, a safe opportunity was presented to gratify that thirst for blood which marked his character in every conjuncture that promised probable impunity to himself. Ensign Cruit, who advanced with the flag, was instantly cut down. Viewing this as an earnest of what they were to expect, a resumption of their arms was attempted, to sell their lives as dearly as possible; but before this was fully effected, Tarleton with his cruel myrmidons was in the midst of them, when commenced a scene of indiscriminate carnage never surpassed by the ruthless atrocities of the most barbarous savages. 

The demand for quarters, seldom refused to a vanquished foe, was at once found to be in vain; —not a man was spared—and it was the concurrent testimony of all the survivors, that for fifteen minutes after every man was prostrate. They went over the ground plunging their bayonets into every one that exhibited any signs of life, and in some instances, where several had fallen one over the other, these monsters were seen to throw off on the point of the bayonet the uppermost, to come at those beneath.

—Letter from Dr Robert Brownfield* to William Dobein James, excerpt

Local residents who had not fled tended to the casualties. The same afternoon of the battle 84 dead were buried together in a mass grave. The following day 25 more were buried in a second mass grave. The wounded were taken to nearby Waxhaws Church for care. Mrs Elizabeth Jackson served there as a nurse along with her sons, 16-year-old Robert and 13-year-old Andrew, who would carry these memories with him as a commander into the War of 1812.

“Tarleton’s Quarter” became a rallying cry among the Patriots, albeit a sarcastic one, which translated to: no quarter whatsoever. The slogan gained a motivational momentum, driving many much-needed new recruits into the partisan militia. The backcountry Scots-Irish communities were particularly responsive. Loyalist recruitment declined in inverse proportion. Loyalist desertions increased in step.

The Waxhaws battle became historically controversial. After breaking Buford’s line Tarleton’s dragoons slaughtered many partisans that reportedly had surrendered and asked for quarter, literally hacking them down and apart with their sabres. Some sources, such as partisan Surgeon’s Mate Robert Brownfield and Buford’s Adjutant Henry Bowyer, claimed that Buford raised a white flag, however belated, that was ignored by Tarleton. 

“The officers commanding platoons on Beaufort’s left, being all killed, and the command thrown into confusion, Adjutant Bowyer was ordered to advance with a flag, and to say to Tarleton, that he was willing to accept the terms offered before the action began. The Adjutant remonstrated by saying, that as the firing still continued, the execution of the order would be impracticable, exposing the bearer of the flag to the shot of both parties. Beaufort repeated his orders, in positive terms, and the Adjutant rode forward, with a handkerchief displayed on the point of his sword. When close to the British commander, he delivered Beaufort's message, but a ball at the moment striking the forehead of Tarleton’s horse, he plunged and both fell to the ground, the horse being uppermost. Extricated by his men from so perilous a position, the exasperated Colonel rose from the ground, and ordered the soldiers to despatch him. They immediately gathered round, and several cuts were made at him, which he had the good fortune to parry and avoid. By this time, Captain John Stokes and Lieut. Willison, who occupied a position opposite to that where the Adjutant was surrounded by the British Dragoons, and saw the danger impending over him, directed their platoons to fire at the group. They were well obeyed, and the bullets thrown among the party around the Adjutant, frightening the horses, gave him an opportunity of dashing through them, and effecting his escape unhurt. His horse was seriously wounded, but not sufficiently so to prevent his carrying his master to a place of security. The overwhelming force of the British then prevailed, and a dreadful massacre of the detachment followed. The rage of the British soldiers, excited by the continued fire of the Americans, while a negotiation was offered by flag, impelled them to acts of vengeance that knew no limits."

—Adjutant Henry Bowyer

Banastre Tarleton’s 1787 account set the scene for a massacre. His horse had been shot from under him during the initial volley. While Tarleton was briefly pinned beneath the horse, word rapidly, and most mistakenly, spread among his men that their commander had been killed.

“The loss of officers and men was great on the part of the Americans, owing to the dragoons so effectually breaking the infantry, and to a report amongst the cavalry, that they had lost their commanding officer, which stimulated the soldiers to a vindictive asperity not easily restrained.”

—Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton

The vengeful slaughter was not restrained. Of Colonel Buford’s approximately 350 men, 113 were killed and 203 captured, 150 of whom were so badly wounded that they were left behind. Tarleton’s casualties were 5 killed and 12 wounded. The affair became known as the Waxhaw Massacre. “Buford” would become the countersign at Kings Mountain later the same year. In January 1781, the patriot watchword for the Battle of Cowpens would be “Buford's Play.”

* Dr Robert Brownfield served as a Surgeon’s Mate in the regiment of Colonel Abraham Buford.

The Waxhaw Massacre, Prelude

Sir,
Resistance being vain, to prevent the effusion of human blood, I make offers which can never be repeated:— You are now almost encompassed by a corps of seven hundred light troops on horseback; half of that number are infantry with cannon, the rest cavalry: Earl Cornwallis is likewise within a short march with nine British battalions.

I warn you of the temerity of farther inimical proceedings, and I hold out the following conditions, which are nearly the same as were accepted by Charles town: But if any persons attempt to fly after this flag is received, rest assured, that their rank shall not protect them, if taken, from rigorous treatment.

1st ART. All officers to be prisoners of war, but admitted to parole, and allowed to return to their habitations till exchanged.

2d ART. All continental soldiers to go to Lamprie’s point, or any neighbouring post, to remain there till exchanged, and to receive the same provisions as British soldiers.

3d ART. All militia soldiers to be prisoners upon parole at their respective habitations.

4th ART. All arms, artillery, ammunition, stores, provisions, waggons, horses, &c. to be faithfully delivered.

5th ART. All officers to be allowed their private baggage and horses, and to have their side arms returned.

I expect an answer to these propositions as soon as possible; if they are accepted, you will order every person under your command to pile his arms in one hour after you receive the flag: If you are rash enough to reject them, the blood be upon your hand.

I have the honour to be,
(Signed) BAN. TARLETON,
Lieutenant colonel, commandant
of the British legion.

Wacsaws, May 29, 1780.

Colonel Buford, &c. &c.

________________

Wacsaws, May 29, 1780.

Sir,
I reject your proposals, and shall defend myself to the last extremity.

I have the honour to be, &c.
(Signed) ABR. BUFORD, Colonel.

Lieut. Col. Tarleton,
Commanding British legion.

(Source: Lieutenant-Colonel [Banastre] Tarleton, A History of the Campaigns of 1780 and 1781, in the Southern Provinces of North America, 1787, Dublin)

Ramsour's Mill: America's First Civil War

From The History of South Carolina in the Revolution, 1775-1780, by Edward McCrady, published 1901, Macmillan & Co., ltd., South Carolina, pp. 587-588:

That there were great differences of sentiment in regard to the Revolution even among the people of the Low Country of South Carolina has abundantly appeared in the pages of this history. Friends and families were divided in opinion as to its cause, and still more so in regard to the course of events which had followed resulting in the Declaration of Independence. But these differences in the Low Country had caused little bloodshed by native Carolinians at the hands of each other. Few of the Tories in this section took up arms against their fellow-countrymen. In the new field of war [i.e., the back country], alas! as at Ramsour's Mill, the people who had not been interested in the questions which brought on the trouble were to fight every one against his brother, and every one against his neighbor. The most dreadful internecine strife was now to rage throughout the country beyond the falls of the rivers. The Scotchmen in Charlestown—especially the Scotch merchants, had almost unanimously opposed the Revolution; and so had the many Scotch traders in the Piedmont region. The Scotchmen in Charlestown, however, contented themselves with passive resistance to the Revolutionary party until the fall of the town, and then did little more than congratulate Sir Henry Clinton upon his victory over their rebellious fellow-townsmen; but in the Up Country they rose with the advance of the British and with heroism and determination took part in the war. It would be well if the historian was bound to add nothing more in regard to their conduct; but truth requires the statement that the heroism of these people in maintaining their loyalty to their King was tarnished by deeds of cruelty and bloodthirstiness. It will indeed appear, as we follow the fortunes of the war in their section, that South Carolina experienced all the dire effects which from civil discords flow.
Before Tarleton had overtaken Buford the Tories in this section had begun to gather and organize. As early as the 26th of May—that is, three days before the massacre in the Waxhaws, a party of them had collected at Mobley's Meeting-house, about six miles west of Winnsboro in the present county of Fairfield; to meet this Colonel William Bratton of York and Captain John McClure of Chester gathered the Whigs and defeated and dispersed them. A similar uprising at Beckham's Old Field in the vicinity of Fishing Creek, in what is now Chester County, had been put down with equal ease, the Rev. John Simpson, then the Presbyterian minister of the congregation in that neighborhood, being one of the principal movers in the affair. We have no account of the casualties on either side of these affairs.

Sumter Rides (in the Nick of Time)

from The Road to Guilford Courthouse, by John Buchanan, ©1997, John Wiley & Sons, pp. 120-121:

In September 1778, with South Carolina no longer in immediate danger from either the British or the Cherokee, Thomas Sumter resigned his commission and turned to his private affairs. He remained at Great Savannah with his family during the fighting between Benjamin Lincoln and Prevost around Charleston and the surrender of the city to the British. Then Sumter removed with his family to their summer home farther up country in the High Hills of Santee. But the war caught up with him there, too, and along with thousands of other men in the Carolinas he was faced with a critical decision.
On 28 May 1780 his son Tom was out riding when a neighbor galloped up with news that Banastre Tarleton and the British Legion were heading their way. It was Tarleton's famous dash to the Waxhaws in pursuit of Buford. Young Tom Sumter rode home to warn his father. From his immediate reaction, it appears that Thomas Sumter had known for some time precisely what he would do at such a time. While Soldier Tom, his African body servant, saddled their horses, Sumter donned his old regimentals. He kissed his wife and son goodbye, and then he and Soldier Tom rode off to war. He had no rank, no men, no prospects. Thomas Sumter, Jr., wrote to his own son many years later: "He left us on the 28th of May, 1780, only a few hours before Tarleton's legion passed us in pursuit of Buford."
It was well that he left quickly. The British knew of him, and Tarleton sent Captain Charles Campbell to bring him in. Mary Sumter was sitting in a chair inside her home. The dragoons of the Legion picked up the chair and carried her in it outside and set it on the lawn. Then they looted the house and the smokehouse. Then they set the house on fire. Gathered in a small group on the lawn, Mary Sumter, and her son Tom, and the house servants watched the house burn. The story is told that a Legion dragoon with a guilty conscience slipped a smoked ham under her chair.

A Homecoming of Sorts

American Revolution Flags Sell for $17.4M
By RICHARD PYLE
The Associated Press
Thursday, June 15, 2006; 10:01 AM
NEW YORK -- An anonymous bidder paid nearly $17.4 million Wednesday, Flag Day, for four rare flags from the American Revolution. The remarkably intact regimental standards captured by a British officer in 1779-80 were put up for auction by one of his direct descendants 225 years later.
"These are inspirational, an extraordinary window into the birth of our country," said David Redden, a vice chairman of Sotheby's, which conducted the sale.
Redden said that during wars of the 18th century, the primary targets in a battle were the opposing commanders and their units' flags, as trophies of victory.
"You can imagine the soldiers carrying them, who suffered grievous wounds and made sacrifices to defend what were sacred objects," he said. "You look at them, and you really get a sense of looking at something that has a great deal of spiritual significance."
The final sales price for the four flags was well over Sotheby's pre-sale estimate of $4 million to $10 million. The buyer, who bid by telephone, asked not to be identified, Sotheby's spokeswoman Lauren Gioia said.
Only about 30 Revolutionary War flags are known to exist, and all except the four sold at auction are in museums or other institutional collections, Sotheby's said. Most are in fragments, with only bits of historic information available about them.
The four flags, by contrast, are in good condition and their histories were well documented by Lt. Col. Banastre Tarleton, a firebrand British officer who captured them in battles nearly a year apart.
On July 2, 1779, the 24-year-old Tarleton led his cavalry unit, known as the Green Dragoons, in a surprise attack on the Continental Army's 2nd Light Dragoons, a Connecticut regiment also known as Sheldon's Dragoons, at Pound Ridge.
The redcoats routed the Americans, capturing supplies, weapons and the unit's battle flag–a banner with 13 red and white stripes and a field with a painted thundercloud.
Nine months later and almost 600 miles to the southwest, Tarleton did it again on May 29, 1780, capturing three flags belonging to a Virginia regiment led by Lt. Col. Abraham Buford, in a clash at Waxhaws, on the line between North and South Carolina.
In a postwar memoir, Tarleton said "upwards of 100 officers and men were killed and "three colours ... fell into the possession of the victors."
The three flags, Sotheby's said, are "the only intact set of American battle flags surviving" from the Revolutionary War.
The main flag is of gold silk, depicting a beaver gnawing on a palmetto tree, the state symbol of South Carolina. The others are gold and blue silk, bearing the word "Regiment."
Sotheby's identified the seller of the flag collection as Capt. Christopher Tarleton Fagan, a direct descendant of the officer whose forces captured them.
The Connecticut Dragoons flag, with an estimated presale value of $1.5 to $3.5 million, was sold for $12.36 million. The group of three Buford flags, known as the Waxhaws Colors, went for $5.056 million, after a presale estimate of $2.5 to $6.5 million.

Francis Marion (1732–1795)

Francis Marion was a Lieutenant Colonel in the Continental Army and, later, Brigadier General in the South Carolina Militia during the American Revolutionary War. He became known as the "Swamp Fox" for his ability to use decoys and ambushes to disrupt enemy communications, capture supplies, and free prisoners. His strategic use of guerrilla tactics helped set in motion the decline of open battles in the conflict. Before the Revolutionary War, he was a sailor.

Marion is considered one of the fathers of modern guerilla warfare, and is credited in the lineage of the U.S. Army Rangers.

When Charleston fell on 12 May 1780, Francis Marion escaped capture because he had broken an ankle in an accident and had left the city to recuperate. Following Gen. Isaac Huger's defeat at Moncks Corner and the Waxhaw Massacre of Col. Abraham Buford's men by British Lt. Col. Banastre Tarleton and his Green Dragoons, Marion organized a small troop, at first consisting of between 20 and 70 men—the only force then opposing the British Army in the state. At this point, he was still nearly crippled from the slowly-healing ankle.

He joined General Horatio Gates just before the Battle of Camden, but Gates sent him to take command of the Williamsburg Militia in the Pee Dee area, asking him to undertake scouting missions and impede the expected flight of the British after the battle. Marion thus missed the battle, but was able to intercept and recapture 150 Maryland prisoners, plus about twenty of their guards, who had been en route from the battle to Charleston. The freed prisoners, thinking the war already lost, refused to join Marion and deserted.

However, with his militiamen, Marion showed himself to be a singularly able leader of irregulars. Unlike the Continental troops, Marion's Men, as they were known, served without pay, supplied their own horses, arms, and, often, their own food. All supplies that were not obtained locally were captured from the Loyalist forces.

Marion rarely committed his men to frontal warfare, but repeatedly surprised larger bodies of Loyalists or British regulars with quick surprise attacks and equally quick withdrawal from the field. After the surrender of Charleston, the British garrisoned South Carolina with help from local Tories, except for Williamsburg, which they were never able to hold. The British made one attempt to garrison Williamsburg at Willtown, but were driven out by Marion at the Battle of Mingo Creek.

The British despised Marion and repeatedly tried to neutralize his force, but Marion's intelligence-gathering was given advantage by overwhelming Patriot loyalty in the Williamsburg populace.

Lt. Col. Banastre Tarleton, sent to capture Marion, despaired of finding the "old swamp fox", who eluded him by travelling along swamp paths. Tarleton and Marion were sharply contrasted in the popular mind. Tarleton was hated because he burned and destroyed homes and supplies, whereas Marion's Men, when they requisitioned supplies, or destroyed them to keep them out of British hands, gave the owners receipts for them. After the war, most of the receipts were redeemed by the new state government.

Once Francis Marion had shown his ability at guerrilla warfare, making himself a serious nuisance to the British, Gov. John Rutledge (in exile in North Carolina) commissioned him a brigadier-general of the South Carolina state troops.

When Gen. Nathanael Greene took command in the south, Marion and Lieutenant Colonel Henry "Light Horse Harry" Lee were ordered in January 1781 to attack Georgetown, but were unsuccessful. In April, however, they took Fort Watson and in May, Fort Motte, and succeeded in breaking communications between the British posts in the Carolinas. On August 31, Marion rescued a small American force trapped by Major C. Fraser with 500 British. For this, he received the thanks of the Continental Congress. Marion commanded the right wing under General Greene at the Battle of Eutaw Springs.

In 1782, during his absence as State Senator at Jacksonborough, his brigade grew disheartened and there was reportedly a conspiracy to turn him over to the British. But in June of that year, he put down a Loyalist uprising on the banks of the Pee Dee River. In August, Francis Marion left his brigade and returned to his plantation.

(Source: Wikipedia)

Martha McDowell, Colonel Buford, and the Butcher

My cousin Martha McDowell, daughter of Col. Samuel McDowell and Mary McClung, was born 26 June 1766 in Rockbridge County, Virginia. I don't know much about Martha, except that she married Col. Abraham Buford, a military man caught in a terrible, terrible situation still argued about in history circles.
Abraham Buford was a Continental Army officer during the Revolutionary War, most known as commanding officer during the "Waxhaw Massacre". Born in Culpeper County, Virginia, Buford quickly organized a company of minutemen upon the outbreak of war in 1775, eventually rising to the rank of colonel by May 1778. Assuming command of the 11th Virginia Regiment in September, he would be assigned to the 3rd Virginia Regiment in April 1780 and sent south to relieve the British siege of Charleston, South Carolina.
Banastre Tarleton [pictured, portrait by Sir Joshua Reynolds] was a British officer and politician. His reputation for ruthlessness earned him the nickname "Bloody Ban" and "Butcher" amongst American revolutionists. On May 29, 1780, Lt. Col. Tarleton, with a force of 150 mounted soldiers, overtook the detachment of 350 to 380 Virginia Continentals led by Col. Buford near Lancaster, South Carolina. Buford refused to surrender or even to stop his march. Only after sustaining heavy casualties did Buford order surrender. The battle has always been controversial, since after breaking Buford's line Tarleton's men slaughtered many of the Virginians who surrendered, hacking them down with their sabres. Some sources, such as Buford's Adjutant Henry Bowyer and Surgeon's Mate Robert Brownfield, claim that Buford belatedly raised a white flag but was ignored by Tarleton. In Tarleton's own account, he virtually admits the massacre, stating that his horse had been shot from under him during the initial charge and his men, thinking him dead, engaged in "a vindictive asperity not easily restrained." In the end, 113 Americans were killed and another 203 captured, 150 of whom were so badly wounded that they had to be left behind. Tarleton's casualties were 5 killed and 12 wounded. The British called the affair the Battle of Waxhaw Creek, while the Americans knew it as the Buford Massacre or the Waxhaw Massacre.
Col. Buford escaped on horseback with his remaining men and would hold no further commands for the remainder of the war. He and Martha eventually settled in Scott County, Kentucky.

(sources: Wikipedia - Waxhaw Massacre, Banastre Tarleton, Abraham Buford)