George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 10

[341] off his communications. Soldiers of the militia.

Chap. XVI.} 1780. Oct.

hung on his rear. Twenty wagons were captured, laden with stores and the knapsacks of the light infantry legion. Single men would ride within gunshot of the retreating army, discharge their rifles, and escape.

The Catawba ford was crossed with difficulty on account of a great fall of rain. For two days the royal forces remained in the Catawba settlement, Cornwallis suffering from fever, the army from want of forage and provisions. The command on the retreat fell to Rawdon. The soldiers had no tents. For several days it rained incessantly. Waters and deep mud choked the roads. At night the army bivouacked in the woods in unwholesome air. Sometimes it was without meat; at others without bread. For five days it lived upon Indian-corn gathered from the fields, five ears being the day's allowance for two soldiers. But for the personal exertions of the militia, most of whom were mounted, the army would not have been supported in the field; and yet, in return for their exertions, they were treated with derision and even beaten by insolent British officers. After a march of fifteen days, the army encamped at Winnsborough, an intermediate station between Camden and Ninety-Six.

All the while Marion had been on the alert. hundred tories had been sent in September to sur-

Sept.

prise him; and with but fifty-three men he first surprised a part of his pursuers, and then drove the main body to flight.

At Black Mingo, on the twenty-eighth, he made a

28.

successful attack on a guard of sixty militia, and took