Profiles of 1776 | John Witherspoon

t was a distinguished feature of the American Revolution that religious feeling was closely connected with political action. This manifested in the galvanizing effects of the Great Awakening and the marshaling of entire congregations as in the famed “black-robed regiment.” So crucial was the role of the clergy in the colonies that King George III dubbed the American Revolution “a Presbyterian Parson’s Revolt.”

In the case of John Witherspoon, the only minister to put his name to the Declaration of Independence, his influence in the cause of establishing the American Republic under God was second to none. In his singular position as President of the College of New Jersey (Princeton) in the decade prior to the war, Witherspoon turned the erstwhile seminary for prospective clergymen into “a seedbed of the Revolution.”

John Witherspoon (1723-1794)

It was in his practical application of Biblical ethics into tangible action, and his “belief that the function of such a college was not merely to educate candidates for the ministry, but also to send out into the widening spheres of colonial life Christian gentlemen and scholarly men of affairs,” that Witherspoon produced a generation of men whose scope and influence was unparalleled among their peers.

The fruit of his rich tutelage produced one President of the United States, one vice president, three Supreme Court justices, ten cabinet officers, twenty-eight U.S. Senators, forty congressmen, thirty-seven State Judges, twelve State Governors, thirteen College presidents and five delegates to the Constitutional Convention.

When Witherspoon took his seat as a delegate for New Jersey at the Continental Congress in 1776, twelve of his fellow members had previously been his pupils.

He owed his presence in America to another delegate and fellow signer, Benjamin Rush, who had recruited Witherspoon from his native Scotland to come to America and lend his hand to the efforts of shaping American minds. Of Witherspoon, Rush wrote:

“It reflects no small honour upon Dr. Witherspoon, that he should consent to cross the ocean, and take charge of a college in a new country, leaving behind him a sphere of great respectability, comfort, and use-fulness. . . . It deserves also to be mentioned, that a little previous to his embarking for America, and while still in a state of suspense, respecting his duty, a gentleman of considerable fortune, and a relation of the family, offered to make him his heir, provided he would remain in Scotland.”

Benjamin Rush (1746-1813)

Witherspoon’s contemporary in Scotland had been the Enlightenment’s darling, David Hume, and there had been none who stood up against Hume’s godless rationale with greater scholarship and ruthless precision than John Witherspoon. His great grasp on the tenets of doctrinal orthodoxy in law and application became the keystones of the American vision, one that coalesced in a cause that, in the words of Paul Johnson, utilized “Enlightenment ideals filtered through a Protestant, covenantal, English-speaking culture that already had a century and a half of self-government, written compacts, and revivalist religion to restrain it.”

It was said that Witherspoon “became an American from the moment he landed on the shores of America” in 1768, and he bore great criticism from the broader intelligentsia for his association with and mentorship of patriot leaders. Undeterred by their censure, at the College of New Jersey’s 1769 commencement—Witherspoon’s first full year as president—he awarded honorary degrees to two prominent critics of British policy: John Dickinson and John Hancock. Hancock’s honor came shortly after British customs officials seized his sloop Liberty.

Maclean House—known as The President’s House—at Princeton University, built in 1756

Having already become a noted voice amongst the patriot cause, and having served upon the Committee of Correspondence and in the Provincial Congress, John Witherspoon was elected by the provincial authorities of New Jersey to serve in the Second Continental Congress. His written instructions explicitly authorized him and his fellow delegates to join the other colonies “in declaring the United Colonies independent of Great Britain” if they judged it necessary.

Less than a month after taking his seat, Witherspoon would cast his vote to adopt the Declaration. Before he left Princeton for this great task, he delivered a stirring sermon, titled “The Dominion of Providence over the Passions of Men.” In it he exhorted his students, many of whom would serve or die in the upcoming conflict:

“Upon the whole, I beseech you to make a wise improvement of the present threatening aspect of public affairs, and to remember that your duty to God, to your country, to your families, and to yourselves, is the same. True religion is nothing else but an inward temper and outward conduct suited to your state and circumstances in providence at any time. Exert yourselves, every one in his proper sphere, be of good courage, and let us behave ourselves valiantly for our people and for the cities of our God, and let the Lord do that which is good in his sight.”

In the aftermath of the Declaration, Witherspoon remained in Congress and had already taken part, through New Jersey’s provincial congress, in framing his state’s constitution. The latter half of 1776 would see repeated patriot defeats, with the loss of New York and New Jersey to the British.

In light of this, Witherspoon closed the college on November 29 and sent the students home or to enlist. When the British arrived on December 7 they spent about three weeks in what locals called the “twenty days’ rage.” They stabled horses in the basement of Nassau Hall, used rooms as prison cells, wrecked much of Witherspoon’s library, and plundered the town. Washington then made the last great attempt of the year: crossing the frozen Delaware from the Pennsylvania shore to the New Jersey side, taking Trenton from the Hessian garrison on December 26. He lost it again to Cornwallis on January 2. The fighting was brief both times, but the devastation of repeated occupations was lasting, particularly for the college.

Nassau Hall at Princeton University—built in 1756, it is the oldest building on campus

One witness, Thomas Nelson, Jr., wrote to Thomas Jefferson about the damage wrought by the enemy: “Old Witherspoon has not escap’t their fury. They have burnt his Library. It grieves him much that he has lost his controversial Tracts.” Also bringing grief was the damage done to the college he had worked so hard to build up. His library of two thousand books was scattered and the Rittenhouse planetarium broken.

Witherspoon, the ultimate Scottish Presbyterian, was saddened but unsurprised by these displays of depravity, and was more greatly moved by the atrocities inflicted on the people of his colony, denouncing them thus in his official capacity:

“While the shadow of hope remained that our enemies could be taught by our example, to respect those laws which are held sacred among civilized nations, and to comply with the dictates of a religion which they pre-tend, in common with us, to believe and revere, they have been left to the influence of that religion and that example. But since their incorrigible dispositions cannot be touched by kindness and compassion, it becomes our duty, by other means, to vindicate the rights of humanity—We, therefore, the congress of the United States of America, do solemnly declare and proclaim, that if our enemies presume to execute their threats, or persist in their present career of barbarity, we will take such exemplary vengeance as shall deter others from a like conduct.”

The conduct of the British in the years following 1776 would continue to merit much holy outrage, and the men in Washington’s army, borne up by their minister’s insistence in the rightness of their cause, would stop at nothing to drive out the foe. In these years, and beyond them, Dr. Witherspoon would contribute an unfathomable amount of wisdom and sacrifice to the cause and the formation of our nation, urging always for the pursuit of Christian virtue and vigilance against apathy and corruption. To detail them would (and has) taken volumes.

Witherspoon Hall at Princeton, named for John Witherspoon

Suffice it to say, Witherspoon taught and preached until the end of his life, while playing a major role in two editions of the Bible, including one from 1791, considered to be America’s first family Bible. He died on November 15, 1794, at 73 years of age at his home and was buried in the president’s lot at Princeton. Thus ended his long and useful life, spent teaching what he called “the permanent things,” and which had influenced so greatly the establishment of this new country.

He left the same charge he had lived. In the matter of making one’s life useful, John Witherspoon asked of us:

“How, can any person bend his knees in prayer every day with his family, without its being a powerful restraint upon him from the indulgence of any sin which is visible to them? Will such a one, think you, dare to indulge himself in anger, or choose to be seen by them, when he comes home staggering with drunkenness, unfit to perform any duty, or ready to sin still more by the manner of performance? But besides being a restraint from gross crimes, I cannot help saying, that speaking of the things of God with the concern of a parent, or the humanity of a master, must give a solemnity of spirit, and a sense of their moment, even greater than before. Let me, therefore, earnestly recommend the faithful discharge and careful management of family duties, as you regard the glory of God, the interest of His church, the advantage of your posterity, and your own final acceptance in the day of judgment.”

Witherspoon’s grave in Presidents Row at Princeton Cemetery

Image Credits: 1 John Witherspoon (wikipedia.org) 2 Benjamin Rush (wikipedia.org) 3 Maclean House (wikipedia.org) 4 Nassau Hall (wikipedia.org) 5 Witherspoon Hall (wikipedia.org) 6 Witherspoon’s Grave (wikipedia.org)

“The people of Israel shall camp each by his own standard, with the banners of their fathers’ houses.”
—Numbers 2:2

Profiles of 1776 | Susannah Elliot

n the twenty-eighth of June, 1776, Susannah Elliot watched from shore with crowds of fellow onlookers as an enormous British fleet tried to force their way into Charleston Harbor, pummeling the patriot’s crudely constructed first line of defense with shot and shell. Made of palmetto logs and sand thrown up hastily on Sullivan’s Island, Fort Sullivan’s ferocious patriot garrison defied all suggestions to leave their post or submit to their terrible odds. Susannah’s new husband of five months was Major Barnard Elliott, commanding a regiment of artillerymen in that garrison. Her suspense and prayers thus were twofold.

Battle of Fort Sullivan (now Fort Moultrie), 1776

For ten hours Susannah watched as the South Carolinians withstood the onslaught of the greatest navy in the world, and when once their flag had been struck down by a barrage, a Sergeant William Jasper hurled himself over the parapet, exposing himself to almost guaranteed death in order to retrieve it and plant it once again atop the defiant little fortress. There would be no mistaking it for a false surrender. By nightfall the British fleet sailed away, heavily battered, and Charleston was saved from British occupation for the time being.

The morning after the battle, Susannah received word from her husband, still living by God’s grace and exulting in the incredible triumph, “Now, my dear wife,” he wrote to her after commending the bravery of his men, “let us not forget to whom we are indebted for this success against our enemy. Let us return [to] God thanks for it. It is He that does all for us—He inspires our officers and men with courage, and shields their heads in the day of battle—He is the wonderful God of victory.”

Three days later the valiant 2nd Carolina Regiment was drawn up to receive honors from Governor Rutledge and a grateful populace. On this occasion, Mrs. Elliott stepped forward with a costly new pair of silk flags, (colors) embroidered by her own hands and presented to Colonel Moultrie and his Lt. Colonel; whereupon she charged them:

“Your gallant behavior in defense of liberty and your country, entitles you to the highest honors; accept these two standards as a reward justly due to your regiment; and I make not the least doubt, under Heaven’s protection, you will stand by them as long as they can wave in the air of liberty.”

Susannah Elliot’s Blue Flag, currently on loan from the Smithsonian and on display at the South Carolina State Museum for their America’s 250th birthday exhibit

Flags have never been just pretty emblems of identification or a device to communicate across a battlefield. From the Roman signifer whose duty it was to bear the Roman Eagle into conquest, to the brave Marines who raised the Stars and Stripes on Iwo Jima, one’s flag was everything. In the smoke and roar of battle such standards were the only sure rallying point. Men dressed on them, advanced by them, and, when all else failed, gathered again to die beneath them. In American history they were almost always meticulously crafted by the mothers, wives and daughters of the men who fought beneath them, and the flag a man carried was therefore not only the emblem of his country or his cause; it was the visible token of the home he had left and the people for whom he fought.

For her colors, Mrs. Elliot chose one to be blue and one to be red. The blue silk that survives is marked “II REGT”, which means second regiment. At the center, within a wreath of acorns and small flowers, a drum rests on a patch of green. On the drum is a crescent that would later be adopted as the state’s emblem. Beside it are a liberty cap on a pole and draped fabrics of pale blue and tan. Across the emblem, now faded, runs the Latin Vita potior libertas—Liberty rather than life.

This motto would be exacted of Susannah herself in a personal cost when two years later, in October of 1778, her beloved husband Lieutenant Colonel Barnard Elliott was struck down, died and was buried at St. Philips in Charleston with full military honors. Men of the Second Regiment walked in the cortege carrying the silk colors his wife made for them.

St. Phillip’s Episcopal Church and Graveyard, Charleston, South Carolina—final resting place of Lieutenant Colonel Barnard Elliott

Despite this terrible loss, the faith and patriotic fervor of this woman were remarked upon by all who came in contact with her, including General Nathanael Greene who offered her an escort through the lines so that she might better fulfill her self-appointed duties to the militiamen. Mrs. Daniel Hall, a close neighbor, said Susannah was “one of the most busy among the Revolutionary women, and always active among the soldiers.”

Meanwhile at home on her plantation called the Hut, Susannah Elliot proved to be the savior of two Continental officers who were staying at her home when the British came by in a raid. She quickly hid two of them in a closet behind the hearth, known only to herself, while the third trusted his horse to make his escape. He was killed within sight of the house.

The British raiding party ransacked her home and demanded her silver, to which she could honestly reply she had none in the home since she had hid it in the Carolina swamp months before. Two large mounds in her back yard were likewise questioned and she informed them they were the graves of two British soldiers who had died in her home. After much digging, it was proven she was being truthful on this score, as well. The raiding party then left, leaving behind much damage, including the defacement of a portrait of Mrs. Elliot herself. Still owned by her descendants, it shows her to be beautiful and mild in expression, but marred by a tear in the canvas from where a sword had been run through one eye.

A commemorative Medallion issued by the Franklin Mint shows Susannah Elliot presenting her finished flags to the regiment

In October, 1779 during the battle to take Savannah, the patriots under Francis Marion carried Mrs. Elliots colors into the thickest of the fray. It is recorded that at the Spring Hill redoubt, Lieutenant Bush planted one standard on the British earthworks and was shot down. Then a Lieutenant Hume, going to plant the other, fell in the same way. Lieutenant Gray, supporting them, received his mortal wound. “Liberty rather than life”, their motto, had once again been exacted from their bearers.

Then it was that Sergeant Jasper—who in 1776 had received acclaim for rescuing the flag during the bombardment of Fort Sullivan—seized the colors and succeeded, for a moment, in planting them at the very top of the British redoubt. Then a retreat was called, and Sergeant Jasper succeeded in regaining the American camp with the colors in hand. It became apparent then that he too had received his death wound in bearing them up. It was recorded later that in his last moments Sergeant Jasper charged his commanding officer, Major Horry: “Tell Mrs. Elliott I lost my life supporting the colors she presented to our regiment.”

Memorial statue to Sergeant William Jasper in Savannah, Georgia

At the fall of Charlestown in 1780, the 2nd Regiment was captured by the British army, and their standards with them. The blue silk was taken off by Colonel Augustine Prévost and carried to England, where his family kept it as a trophy for more than two hundred years.* In 1989 the South Carolina State Museum and the Smithsonian Institution purchased it jointly. It is now displayed in Columbia, South Carolina. The red standard was never recovered. Of their fame in the war, and of the brave men who died under them rather than disprove their implacable motto, Colonel Moultrie would write to Mrs. Elliot, “There were never colors more honorably supported and never were colors better disposed of.”

*Author’s Note: As with many domestic stories of the Revolution, quotations, letters, and even some dates in this account rest on later recollection—some secondhand, and often preserved by descendants rather than by wartime contemporaries. Historians also disagree on when the surviving blue standard was taken. Nineteenth-century narratives regularly place its capture at the fall of Charleston in 1780; modern research and museum curators hold to it being a trophy of Savannah in 1779.

Image Credits: 1 Battle of Fort Sullivan, 1776 (wikipedia.org) 2 2nd South Carolina colors (scmuseum.org) 3 St. Phillip’s Church & Graveyard (wikipedia.org) 4 Medallion (scdar.org) 5 Sergeant William Jasper memorial (wikipedia.org)

“Behold, we consider those blessed who remained steadfast. You have heard of the steadfastness of Job, and you have seen the purpose of the Lord, how the Lord is compassionate and merciful.”—Hebrews 3:6

Profiles of 1776 | Arthur Middleton

outh Carolina produced many glittering names in the founding generation, but few embodied the colony’s contradictions as completely as Arthur Middleton. Heir to one of the richest rice plantations on the Ashley River, educated in the finest English schools, and the son of Henry Middleton—who had served as president of the First Continental Congress—Arthur might have been expected to follow his father’s more cautious path. Instead, he became one of the most ardent, even ruthless, of the Carolina patriots.

Born in 1742 at Middleton Place, Arthur was sent to England at the age of twelve, where he excelled in his studies at Westminster and Cambridge. Not relying upon his wealth for occupation, he was called to the bar and practiced law at the Middle Temple in London. He then married Miss Mary Izard in a love match, one that produced eight children.

Middle Temple Hall, London, England

The couple honeymooned in Europe, enjoying a shared love of history and classics, and took the occasion to be painted together by the great Sir Benjamin West. By that point the marriage had produced a child, and baby Middleton was included in the lavish portrait. This inclusion is touching, considering that West’s painting became the only contemporary portrait of Middleton remaining to us, and is symbolic of his remarked-upon devotion to family—a noble characteristic that was used quite cruelly against him in the future War for Independence.

Arthur Middleton, his wife Mary, and their infant son Henry, 1771

The young Middletons returned from their foreign sojourns in 1771, taking up residence at their vast rural plantation, Middleton Place, and seemingly destined for the placid life of the gentry. Yet soon, a sharper edge than his European upbringing had promised became apparent in young Arthur. He began to write periodicals under the pseudonym of Andrew Marvell—borrowed from the famous 17th-century English poet, satirist and assistant to Oliver Cromwell. These writings were ferociously antagonistic to British overreach and were set forth with the meticulousness of a scholar, thus bringing Arthur into the ranks of those defenders of English law who found commonality in past struggles against tyranny.

When the crisis with Britain deepened, Arthur emerged as a leader of the most extreme Whig faction in South Carolina. He supported the intimidation of crown officials with tar-and-featherings, and argued for the confiscation of Loyalist estates. He most wisely organized raids on royal armories, getting hold of the public store of arms before any of the royal appointees, including the governor, could do the same. All of this before 1776, and at the beginning of that year he sat on the Council of Safety that effectively governed the colony without royal approval. In this capacity he helped draft South Carolina’s first constitution and, when his father, Henry Middleton, declined to continue his appointment in the Continental Congress, Arthur took his place.

Henry Middleton (1717-1784), Arthur’s father

The Carolina delegates made an impact in Congress, marked for their flamboyance and vicious tempers more than anything else. What little record we have consists of John Adams marking Middleton to be more ferocious than his fellows, while John Hancock remarked admiringly upon his fine clothes.

Initially South Carolina refused to vote for separation, providing no end of grief for those delegates seeking unanimity. It seemed there was no lack of hatred for Britain in them, but they did not feel compelled to cast their lot in with the other twelve colonies. Indeed, while deliberations for declaring independence were underway in June of 1776, South Carolina’s militia had rebuffed a significant British invasion at Sullivan’s Island in the harbor of Charleston. This seemed to suggest her ability to handle her own affairs should it come to outright war.

Edward Rutledge, brother to the governor and leader of the South Carolina delegation in Congress, pressed further for a solidified confederation and an assurance of foreign alliances before committing to wholesale treason. But, after nine colonies voted for independence in the first vote held on July 1, Rutledge asked for another to be held the next day. Thus on July 2nd, South Carolina and Rhode Island tipped the scales, with New York’s abstention, and the die was cast.

Middleton’s signature

Three fellow South Carolinians affixed their names alongside Arthur’s, providing with their vote the crucial sway of America’s most prestigious colony. Of the four, three of these men would suffer imprisonment before the war was won. At age thirty-four, Arthur was the senior delegate.

He wrote exultingly (but in a poetic code) to his colleague William Henry Drayton from Philadelphia, “the plant which you have been nursing has thriven amazingly, its roots have reach’d this place & sprung up in full vigour…”

Middleton continued on as a member of Congress until the close of 1777, uprooting his young family so they might be with him in Philadelphia. He then returned to South Carolina to help manage his parents’ estates and defend his colony, as in the final years of the war the southern colonies took center stage.

War in the Carolinas became typified by a special sort of savagery not previously indulged in by either side. There were many factors for that, including the protracted nature of the war and the growing desperation for a decisive action. Added to that was the threat of slave revolts, the hampering of a weak government, and the change of tactics to those of guerrilla warfare and brutal reprisal. The Carolinas had far greater divided loyalties than any other region, creating a civil war inside the war. Those loyalists whom Arthur Middleton had in the early days eyed with suspicion, and whose disenfranchisement he had advocated, proved lethal in their support of the crown. Neighbors betrayed neighbors, entire congregations were decimated, plantations ransacked and the horrors of war brought fully to the doorstep of ordinary citizens.

Charleston was put under siege by the British in 1780 and Arthur Middleton, as a member of the militia, went there to serve in its defense. The forces arrayed against the patriots overwhelmed them, and finally on May 12, 1780, the American defenders of Charleston surrendered.

It was a devastating loss both strategically and for morale; the British took over 5,500 able-bodied American men as prisoners, including the highly targeted signers of the Declaration of Independence: Arthur Middleton, Edward Rutledge, and Thomas Heyward, Jr.

Edward Rutledge (1749-1800)

Thomas Heyward Jr. (1746-1809)

Middleton and the other captives were sent by sea to St. Augustine, Florida, still under British control, where he was kept in the Castillo de San Marcos under cruel and harsh confinement for fourteen long months. While he languished there, the British paid his defenseless family a visit.

Castillo de San Marcos, St. Augustine, Florida

Arthur Middleton’s family barely escaped with their lives by fleeing to the countryside during repeated raids on their plantation. When they returned, it was to find all portable valuables carried off. Those priceless effects too heavy to move were vandalized. Bureaus had axes taken to them, every painting not looted had its canvas slashed through with knives, and in typical fashion, the crops had been burned. Worse than all that, the British carried off over 200 of Middleton’s slaves, which they then sold in the British West Indies.

The surviving south wing of Middleton Place, Dorchester County, South Carolina—the main house once stood in the gap in the treeline

Due to this intentional impoverishment, being left no means to feed her children and remaining slaves, Mary Middleton was forced to ask for help from the British authorities. According to her account, they behaved decently enough when she name-dropped her loyalist relations, but it was a humiliation that Arthur Middleton would never forgive them for.

Upon his release, Arthur returned to Congress, elected in the certainty he would promote a newly independent South Carolina’s interests. There, with characteristic intensity, Arthur argued that Lord Cornwallis should be executed and not paroled, citing the war crimes he had allowed. Cornwallis would eventually be exchanged in a prisoner swap for fellow South Carolinian—Middleton’s friend and mentor, President Henry Laurens.

Middleton would later serve in the state legislature and as a trustee of the College of Charleston, but his priority in the postwar years became his family and the rebuilding of his estates. He became famous for his generous hospitality and, in an act of a much-tempered man, advocated for his loyalist neighbors to be able to retain their property in the new nation.

Arthur Middleton did not live long to enjoy the peace and civil liberty he had sacrificed so much to ensure: weakened by imprisonment, he died of fever on New Year’s Day 1787, only six years after being released from captivity. He was just forty-four years old, and left behind his wife Mary and their eight children; two sons, and six daughters.

Tomb of Arthur Middleton at Middleton Place, Dorchester County, South Carolina

He was buried in the family tomb in the Gardens at Middleton Place. The South-Carolina Gazette remembered him as “A complete philanthropist, but the firmest of patriots; cool, steady, and unmoved, at the general wreck of property and fortune, as far as he was personally concerned, but with a heart melting for the sufferings and woes of others. Accomplished in letters, in the sciences, and fine arts; a model of private worth and public virtue; a good citizen. A good father, and an exemplary husband.”

Arthur Middleton had inherited a great name and a great estate, risked both, endured imprisonment, and left behind a signature that still binds his state to the glorious cause of 1776. His children, being his most lasting legacy, would all hold honored positions in their newly free country and contribute to South Carolina’s luster.

Image Credits: 1 Middle Temple (wikipedia.org) 2 Family Portrait (wikipedia.org) 3 Henry Middleton (wikipedia.org) 4 Signature (wikipedia.org) 5 Edward Rutledge (wikipedia.org) 6 Thomas Heyward (wikipedia.org) 7 Castillo de San Marcos (wikipedia.org) 8 Middleton Place (wikipedia.org) 9 Tomb (wikipedia.org)

Profiles of 1776 | William Moultrie

outh Carolina—that most glamorous, contradictory, diverse of American colonies—was considered to be the emotional leader of the southern colonies during the founding years. Not even grand old Virginia could fully persuade the southern bloc to break away from England without South Carolina’s influence, and for years she remained the most fickle of compatriots.

“All our misfortunes arise from a single source, the reluctance of the Southern Colonies to republican government,” John Adams bemoaned in the spring of 1776, as he strove in vain to get a confirmation from their delegates of their commitment to independence. South Carolina was not afraid of a fight—she’d been having heated altercations of her own with the British for the past decade—but her own interests remained paramount and aloof from all the others.

And then, in June of 1776, Providence intervened, sending a much-needed initiative under the cloak of calamity. Less than a whole month before the Declaration of Independence needed a unanimous vote of ratification, British warships sailed into Charleston harbor, bringing the conflict home. Suddenly the war, the military occupation, the brutalities they had been hearing about from afar and protesting valiantly with remonstrances and resolves, were at their front door. The effect on the legislature and delegates to Congress was irreversible and all to the benefit of total separation. This was all very well and good, yet the matter of defending Charleston from the British remained.

William Moultrie (1730-1805)

One South Carolinian came to the forefront then, Colonel William Moultrie. A veteran of the Cherokee Wars, owner of a rice plantation, deputy to both the First and Second South Carolina Provincial Congresses, he was also a member of the First South Carolina General Assembly after the adoption of the state constitution. In each capacity he proved himself an early and ardent supporter of the cause of independence.

Knowing that the British would try to send their fleet to seize Charleston, the largest and most important port in the South, and aware that upon their arrival they would incite the local loyalists and slaves to rise up against the patriots, William Moultrie took it upon himself to oversee the building of a fortification. He chose to build it on Sullivan’s Island, which guarded the main ship channel into Charleston Harbor and afforded an excellent strategic advantage.

A British engineer’s map showing the location of Sullivan’s Island in relationship to the mainland, with a closeup of the fort design, circa 1776

At the same time, the loyalist population of the Carolinas rose up against their patriot neighbors without British backup, but were summarily defeated, the news of which gave great pause to the incoming British fleet. Commodore Peter Parker and General Henry Clinton debated whether they should continue their attempt at all, but having heard reports that the fort on Sullivan’s Island was incomplete, they dared an attack.

General Charles Lee, second-in-command of the Continental Army after Washington, arrived in Charleston to take command of the defense around the same time as the British. After observing the incomplete defenses made on Sullivan’s Island by the local militia, General Lee pronounced it no better than a “slaughter pen,” and ordered it abandoned. This would leave Charleston’s harbor largely defenseless, a choice that Governor Rutledge and Colonel Moultrie profoundly objected to.

Rutledge privately wrote to Moultrie: “General Lee wishes you to evacuate the fort. You will not without an order from me. And I will sooner cut off my hand than write one.” And so, Colonel Moultrie went against his superior officer’s wishes and with his 2nd South Carolina regiment took up position at the mouth of Charleston harbor, in the ramshackle fort that they had built.

The fort was a square structure capable of accommodating about a thousand men. It was made of local palmetto logs, two rows joined sixteen feet apart, with the space between them filled with sand, and it rose ten feet in height. Large bastions protruded from each corner and the walls bristled with thirty-one cannon, ranging from nine to twenty-six pounders.

Charleston and Sullivan’s Island from the perspective of the British flotilla

When Lee suggested to Moultrie that the British fleet would “knock the fort about your ears in half an hour,” Moultrie replied with great coolness, “Then we will fight them behind the ruins, and still prevent their landing.” Moultrie’s men were, of course, not the only defenders. Defending the northern end of Sullivan’s Island against possible British attack were another eight hundred men, including thirty allied Catawba men, dug in with two cannons under Colonel William “Old Danger” Thomson.

On June 8, 1776, the British regulars landed on nearby Long Island (today’s Isle of Palms) with a plan to wade across Breach Inlet at low tide and attack the fort from the rear, while the warships bombarded it from the harbor side. Delays caused by weather, the difficulty of getting heavy ships over the Charleston Bar, and faulty intelligence about the depths of the channels postponed the attack.

It was on the morning of June 28, a day that would become famous in Carolina history, that the British finally launched the combined assault of naval forces under Parker and land forces under Clinton that would become the Battle of Fort Sullivan. The massive British fleet, consisting of nine heavily armed ships, bombarded Fort Sullivan for a total of ten hours, disproving General Lee’s contemptuous prediction that the British would pay the defenders no mind and go straight for the city. General Lee had deprived the little fort of much-needed supplies, including ammunition, but this only made Moultrie’s artillery aim more carefully and deliberately. Moultrie cautioned them: “Do not make too free with your cannon. Stay cool and do mischief.”

The attack of June 28, 1776, as seen from inside the fort

The patriots had one great advantage: the palmetto logs with which they had constructed the fort were naturally pliable, and along with their sandy filling, they absorbed the cannon balls like sponges, thwarting much of the intended effects of the bombardment.

As a result, the British fleet endured tremendous losses while the patriots’ greatest liability was their depleted ammunition stores. It was Francis Marion—later known as the famed “Swamp Fox”—who fixed this, managing to slip in with additional supplies borrowed from the city’s defenses. With this the defenders were able to renew their attack on the fleet and the new ground invasion coming their way.

Francis Marion (c. 1732-1795)

The ferocious battle would last until nine o’clock in the evening, and the new supplies of ammunition only added greater fervor to the engagement. A Charleston loyalist who had joined the British and served in the flotilla said that “it was impossible for any set of men to sustain so destructive a fire as the Americans poured in.”

It is recorded that during this battle the blue and silver crescent flag of Carolina—originally designed and flown by Moultrie himself ten years prior during an altercation with the crown—was shot down, and a Sergeant William Jasper immediately leapt upon the beach, and during the hottest fire from the fight, recovered it. He reascended the bulwark and deliberately restored it to its place. Even the British foe let loose an eruption of applause for this display of astounding bravery.

Sergeant William Jasper retrieving the standard, to the applause of all on-lookers

After ten hours of this vicious firefight, the Carolinians defending Fort Sullivan succeeded in thwarting Clinton’s land attack and repelling Parker’s flotilla, causing them to retreat and cut their anchor lines to get away. The British suffered over 200 casualties (killed and wounded) and multiple damaged ships, while American losses were very light at 12 killed and 25 wounded.

This battle was the first outright victory of the war, not the running skirmish as at Concord nor bloodbath of Bunker Hill. Instead, the defense of Fort Sullivan was exactly the sort of unequivocal triumph the hesitant Continental Congress had been yearning for. Six days after this battle the Congress declared the United Colonies to be free and independent states. The signers for South Carolina were Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Thomas Lynch, and Arthur Middleton.

Moultrie’s brave stand kept Charleston out of British hands until it finally fell in late 1780, which would result in the capture and cruel imprisonment of three of the Carolina signers and Colonel Moultrie himself. From the prison ship which held him he would write with typical fortitude, “The hardships I have gone through, I look back upon with the greatest pleasure and honor to myself. I shall continue to go on as I have begun, that my example may encourage the youths of America to stand forth in the defense of their rights and liberties.”

Grave of Moultrie, at the fort on Sullivan’s Island that now bears his name

Fort Moultrie in 1861

Image Credits: 1 William Moultrie (wikipedia.org) 2 Map (wikipedia.org) 3 Flotilla (wikipedia.org) 4 Battle (wikipedia.org) 5 Francis Marion (wikipedia.org) 6 Jasper retrieving the standard (wikipedia.org) 7 Moultrie’s grave (wikipedia.org) 8 Ft. Moultrie in 1861 (wikipedia.org)