on with less than three rounds to a man--half of his men were
sometimes lookers on because of the lack of arms and ammunition--waiting
to see the fall of friends or enemies, in order to obtain the necessary
means of taking part in the affair. Buck-shot easily satisfied soldiers,
who not unfrequently advanced to the combat with nothing but swan-shot
in their fowling-pieces.

While Horry proceeded towards Georgetown, Marion marched to the upper
Santee. On this march he was advised of the defeat of Gates; but,
fearing its effect upon his men, without communicating it, he proceeded
immediately toward Nelson's Ferry. This was a well known pass on the
great route, the "war-path", from Charleston to Camden. Here his scouts
advised him of the approach of a strong British guard, with a large body
of prisoners taken from Gates. The guards had stopped at a house on the
east side of the river. Informed of all necessary particulars, Marion,
a little before daylight, detached Col. Hugh Horry, with sixteen men, to
gain possession of the road, at the pass of Horse Creek, in the swamp,
while the main body under himself was to attack the enemy's rear. The
attempt was made at dawn, and was perfectly successful. A letter from
Marion himself, to Col. P. Horry, thus details the event:--"On the 20th
inst. I attacked a guard of the 63d and Prince of Wales' Regiment, with
a number of Tories, at the Great Savannah, near Nelson's Ferry; killed
and took twenty-two regulars, and two Tories prisoners, and retook one
hundred and fifty Continentals of the Maryland line, one wagon and a
drum; one captain and a subaltern were also captured. Our loss is one
killed, and Captain Benson is slightly wounded on the head."

It will scarcely be believed that, of this hundred and fifty
Continentals, but three men consented to join the ranks of their
liberator. It may be that they were somewhat loth to be led, even though
it were to victory, by the man whose ludicrous equipments and followers,
but a few weeks before, had only provoked their merriment. The reason
given for their refusal, however, was not deficient in force. "They
considered the cause of the country to be hopeless. They were risking
life without an adequate object." The defeat of Gates, and his bad
generalship, which they had so recently witnessed, were, perhaps, quite
sufficient reasons to justify their misgivings.

This disastrous event did not produce like despondency in our partisan
or his fo