Thursday

                       Musings and History

Quote of the day:

In the movie "Band of Brothers" the most ruthless US warrior was a Captain Spiers.  He encountered a corporal cowering in a foxhole rather than fighting and asked him what was wrong.  The corporal said "I am just so scared, sir."  Spiers said:

"We are all scared.  When you make up your mind that you are already dead you will be able to kill without mercy, without remorse...and without fear.  All wars depend on it."

Here is a biography of one of the heroes of the American Revolution.

                             Francis Marion

                                    The Swamp Fox

Francis Marion was the last of six children born to Gabriel and Esther Marion in 1757 on the Winyah plantation which is near near present day Georgetown, South Carolina. He was a puny and sickly child and his parents worried greatly for his health. His cousin Peter Horry (pronounced Ow-ree) once wrote the “He was so small as an infant that he could have been mistaken for a New England lobster and would have fit into a pot used for cooking one.” The irony of this statement is the Peter Horry ended up as a member of Marion’s staff while engaged in combat against the British. While living in Georgetown, Francis Marion became enamored with ships and decided that a sailor’s life is where it was at. He approached his parents with this idea and they readily agreed assuming that life at sea would enhance his health. He signed on as the seventh member of a crew headed for the Bahamas aboard a trading sloop. He made several trips but on one return trip an angry sperm whale rammed the boat knocking loose a board. The boat flooded and sank so fast that the crew was not able to get any food or water to take aboard the life boat. Three days hence two of the crew died of thirst and starvation but two days later the little life boat beached itself and the remainder of the crew was saved. Francis made his way back to the house and strangely enough he was in much better health with “his pale face was being a hale and hearty olive” as stated by the ever-present Peter Horry. By this time Marion’s family had moved to another plantation near Eutaw Springs (present day Eutawville, South Carolina). Most of this plantation was covered by Lake Marion on the famous Santee-Cooper lake complex. Marion joined Colonel William Moultrie in the French and Indian War and they ended up slaughtering the Creeks and Cherokees in western South Carolina. This part of the war wore heavily on Francis. He grieved over burning entire villages of the most shabby of huts and cutting large fields of near ripe corn knowing what the resulting misery it would cause the old and very young. Peter Horry wrote again of the misgivings of Francis about this venture. In June of 1775 he was a member of the South Carolina Provincial Congress and was named Captain in the 2^nd South Carolina Regiment, General Thomas Moultrie commanding, to try to kick the redcoats out of South Carolina. Marion was present at the Battle of Sullivan’s Island and the Battle of Fort Moultrie but they were unsuccessful in preventing the British from capturing the port of Charleston, South Carolina. Marion joined with Continental General Horatio Gates at Camden, South Carolina. Gates had no faith in Marion and assigned him the task of heading south toward Charleston and cutting off the retreat of the British after Gates had kicked the crap out of the British at the Battle of Camden. The only problem here was that the British kicked the crap out Gates and his army and they retreated north which left Marion hanging in the wind by himself out in the Great Pee Dee swamp. Marion was not to be outdone. He gathered together about 70 men that supplied their own clothing, horses and most of their food while waging a guerrilla war against British General Charles Cornwallis. Cornwallis had never even heard of such ungentlemanly warfare as attack, do as much damage as you can and then retreat into a nearly impenetrable swamp. So Cornwallis sent the most vicious of his commanders in Lt. Colonel Banastre Tarleton to bring this man and his men to bay. Tarleton had the same results in getting attacked from ambush and his attackers running back into the swamp. Tarleton despaired and called Marion “the old swamp fox”. Marion honed his techniques and he and his men are considered America’s first “Ranger” unit. Marion was so successful against the British because of his intelligence gathering was far and above that of the hated Redcoats. After the arrival of Continental Army, General Nathaneal Greene had been tasked by General George Washington with kicking the Redcoats out of the Carolinas, Georgia and the South in general, Marion was teamed up with the famous if not infamous Henry “Light Horse Harry” Lee (father of Robert E. Lee) into a single unit of cavalry. Marion and Lee were successful in cutting the communications between nearly all of the British encampments. After this, the Continental army and the British knew it was just a matter of time before the Continentals would destroy each encampment one at a time. The end was in sight. Marion was in command of the Continental right wing under the command of General Nathaneal Greene at the Battle of Eutaw Springs, an important victory for the Continentals. In June of 1782 he returned to be a member of the South Carolina Provincial Congress and his men became discouraged, that is until he returned to annihilate a Loyalist uprising on the banks of the Pee Dee River. Marion knew the war was over after Cornwallis left the South and surrendered 8,000 Redcoats to George Washington after being trapped at Yorktown. He returned home and married his cousin Mary Esther Videau. Mary used to listen entranced by the adventures of her cousin “The Swamp Fox”. Marion was like most of the political and military leaders in the Continental Army, George Washington included, he was a slave owner. When he was in the field he was accompanied by a slave named Oscar Marion. The greatest majority of slaves always took the name of their owners. The following is on his Marion’s gravestone:

Sacred to the Memory

Of
BRIG. GEN. FRANCIS MARION
Who departed his life, on the 27th of February, 1795,
IN THE SIXTY-THIRD YEAR OF HIS AGE
Deeply regretted by all his fellow citizens
HISTORY
will record his worth, and rising generations embalm
his memory, as one of the most distinguished
Patriots and Heroes of the American Revolution:
which elevated his native Country
TO HONOR AND INDEPENDENCE,
AND
Secured to her the blessings of
LIBERTY AND PEACE
This tribute of veneration and gratitude is erected
in commemoration of
the noble and disinterested virtues of the
CITIZEN;
and the gallant exploits of the
SOLDIER;

Who lived without fear, and died without reproach

He is buried in the Belle Isle plantation cemetery in Berkeley County, South Carolina. The places, towns and monuments named in his honor are too numerous to mention. As I have said in the past. There are those that were present at the right place at the right time to make this great nation come to fruition, he was one of them. It is my belief that he and others were not here by accident and the United States thrived for reasons yet determined.

                Thanks for listening   I can hardly wait until tomorrow