Cowpens

The Cattle Pens That Changed a War: Cowpens, South Carolina, and the Turning of the American Revolution

On the morning of January 17, 1781, in a rolling pastureland where backcountry farmers had long gathered their cattle, a battle lasting barely one hour altered the trajectory of the American Revolution. The Battle of Cowpens was not the largest engagement of the war, nor did it end the conflict. But it shattered the offensive capability of the British army in the South, set in motion a chain of events that led directly to Yorktown, and demonstrated — in the most dramatic fashion imaginable — that American militia, long derided as unreliable in pitched battle, could be wielded with devastating precision by the right commander. That commander was Brigadier General Daniel Morgan, a Virginian of extraordinary tactical instinct, and the place he chose to make his stand was a modest stretch of South Carolina grassland known simply as the Cowpens — a pasturing area where Morgan and his army turned the flanks of Banastre Tarleton's British army.

The battle at the "Cow Pens" is recognized by historians as one of only a few successful double envelopments in history and one of the most important of the American Revolution.

To understand why this remote pasture became one of the most consequential battlefields in American history, one must look to the broader strategic situation in the Southern theater during the winter of 1780–1781. The British Southern Campaign, launched with the fall of Charleston in May 1780, had achieved a string of successes that left the American cause in the region near collapse. Major General Nathanael Greene, appointed by Washington to command the Southern Department in October 1780, inherited an army that was ragged, underfed, poorly supplied, and demoralized after the catastrophic defeat of Horatio Gates at Camden. Greene, who possessed one of the sharpest strategic minds of the war — a self-educated ex-Quaker who was intelligent, strategically gifted, and a capable military administrator — had served Washington well, initially as a divisional commander and subsequently as Quartermaster General of the Army. He made an audacious decision almost immediately upon taking command: he would divide his already inferior force. Conventional military wisdom held that an outnumbered army should concentrate, not disperse. But Greene understood that a divided force could threaten the British from multiple directions, complicating Lord Cornwallis's plans and forcing him to divide his own army in response. Greene's southern fighting force consisted of a mere 949 Continental Army soldiers and 533 militiamen when he took command. In late December 1780, Greene sent Daniel Morgan with a flying column of roughly 600 Continental regulars and militia westward across the Broad River, while Greene himself moved the main body of the Southern Army toward Cheraw. Morgan headed west on December 21, charged with taking position between the Broad and Pacolet rivers and protecting the civilians in that area. He had 600 men, some 400 of whom were Continentals, mostly from Delaware and Maryland. The rest were Virginia militia who had experience as Continentals. By Christmas Day, Morgan had reached the Pacolet, where he was joined by 60 more South Carolina militiamen led by the experienced guerrilla partisan Andrew Pickens. The gamble was extraordinary. If Cornwallis concentrated against either wing, he could destroy it before the other could intervene.

Cornwallis responded exactly as Greene hoped — and feared. Recognizing the threat Morgan's detachment posed to the British post at Ninety Six and to his western lines of communication, Cornwallis dispatched Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton with a force of roughly 1,100 men — including the feared British Legion, elements of the 7th Regiment of Foot (the Royal Fusiliers), the 71st Regiment of Foot (Fraser's Highlanders), and two grasshopper cannons — to find Morgan and destroy him. Tarleton was twenty-six years old, aggressive to the point of recklessness, and held a fearsome reputation. Eighteen years younger than Morgan, he had grown up in Liverpool, England, where his father was mayor. The affluent and brash young man attended Oxford University and studied law before purchasing a commission in the British Army and sailing for America.

At the Battle of Waxhaws in 1780, Tarleton was alleged to have attacked Continental Army troops who were trying to surrender. His refusal of offering "no quarter" is said to be the derivation of the derisive term "Tarleton's Quarter," meaning "taking no prisoners."

Morgan, for his part, was Tarleton's opposite in nearly every way. Part rebel and part brilliant battle tactician, Morgan was an experienced and respected officer who could think outside the box when it came to warfare. He moved to the Virginia frontier as a young man and served in the British Army as a wagon driver in the French and Indian War, for which he earned the nickname "Old Wagoner."

At the beginning of the Revolution, Morgan was chosen by a unanimous vote by the Committee of Frederick County, Virginia, to form a company of riflemen. He recruited 96 men in 10 days and marched them 600 miles to Boston in 21 days.

He participated in several major campaigns of the Revolution, including the invasion of Canada and the Saratoga Campaign, before chronic sciatica forced him to retire in 1779.

Morgan returned to the army after the disaster at Camden, and led the Continental Army to its most brilliantly conceived victory of the war.

Morgan withdrew and assembled his force on January 16, 1781, at Hannah's Cowpens, a well-known local site situated near the North Carolina border in present-day Cherokee County. The choice of ground was deliberate and calculated. To eliminate the possibility of his militia fleeing, Morgan defied convention by placing his army between the Broad and Pacolet rivers, making escape impossible if the army was routed.

Morgan spent the night before the battle talking to as many Continentals and militiamen as he could, delivering powerful speeches and rallying his men for the battle to come.

Morgan's tactical deployment was a masterpiece of improvisation grounded in hard experience. His soldiers were arranged in three lines: the frontline consisted of 150 sharpshooters under the command of Majors Charles McDowell and John Cunningham; the second of 300 militiamen led by Colonel Andrew Pickens; and the final line of about 550 Continental regulars directed by Lieutenant Colonel John Eager Howard.

Behind these three lines Morgan stationed Lieutenant Colonel William Washington's cavalry — William Washington was a second cousin to General George Washington. Each line was spaced roughly 150 yards apart. Morgan told the front-line militia to fire two volleys, aiming mostly at "the men with the epaulets" — the officers — and then they could retire to the rear.

By providing a planned withdrawal, Morgan ensured that the militia would not break and flee as they had so catastrophically at Camden.

Andrew Pickens, who commanded the critical second militia line, was born in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, in 1739 and had traveled the Great Wagon Road south with his Scots-Irish family. In the Long Canes settlement of present-day Abbeville County, South Carolina, Pickens married and raised a family, emerging as a military leader first in expeditions against the Cherokee. In 1779, Pickens and his three-hundred man militia overtook and defeated a much larger force of 700–800 Loyalists at the Battle of Kettle