Detour Through History: British Army

Showing posts with label British Army. Show all posts

24 November 2022

09 November 2022

10 July 2022

05 July 2022

March Of The Army In Spain

Title:War of 1812: Miscellaneous Records (Microform:h-1664):

March of the Army

Also see an anecdote of Charles The Fifth here.

08 November 2021

Alexander Cameron And The Greenville Tracts

Ca 1773 "Parker" Map - South Carolina And Cherokee Lands (LOC)

"...a series of individuals attempted to secure tracts of Greenville land while it was still beyond the [Native American] boundary. The first of these individuals was none other than Alexander Cameron, the deputy Indian superintendent...".

Fort Prince George On A 1794 South Carolina Map (LOC)

"A Scot...[with] a commission as an ensign with the British Army, stationed at Fort Prince George (1762-1763). He settled on a land grant at Long Canes Creek in 1763...".

"He fathered a child by a Cherokee woman...chiefs offered him a tract of Greenville land in February 1768...". In 1770 the Cameron land was identified by surveyor Patrick Calhoun as 'Land reserved for an Indian Boy begotten by a White Man Alexander Cameron.'"[Source of all of the above text]

Cross-posted at Cameron Collections

26 September 2021

Held The Whole British Army At Bay

Early on the 26th [September] his [William Richardson Davie's] patrols were driven in by the enemy's light troops, and in a few moments the legion and light infantry were seen advancing, followed by the whole army. Davie was reinforced in the night by a few volunteers under Major Joseph Graham. Charlotte was then a village of about twenty houses, built on two streets, which crossed each other at right angles. At their intersection stood the court-house.

Colonel Davie dismounted one company and stationed it under the courthouse, where they were protected by a stone wall. The other two companies were advanced about eighty yards and posted behind some houses and gardens. The legion formed at a distance of three hundred yards with a front to fill the street. On sounding the charge the enemy's cavalry advanced at full gallop, but at sixty yards from the courthouse the Americans opened fire and drove them back with great precipitation. A second and third charge had the same result. Yet, being outflanked by the legion infantry, Davie withdrew his companies in good order, successively covering each other, and retreated on the Salisbury road.

1770 Map Of North Carolina (LOC)
See Salisbury Road

The enemy followed with great caution and respect for some distance, when they at length ventured to charge the small rear guard. In this charge Lieutenant Locke and four privates were killed and Major Graham and five privates wounded. The coolness and skill of Davie in this ever memorable combat, in which, with a mere handful of men, he held the whole British army for hours at bay, and drove back repeatedly its best troops, and finally brought off his command unbroken and in good order, stamp him as a soldier of no ordinary capacity. [Source]

25 September 2021

25th Of September In Charlotte

See earlier post from A biography of General Davie (1756 - 1820) which was found in the Magazine Of America here.

On the evening and night of the 25th he [General William Davie] took a number of prisoners, and at midnight took up his position at Charlotte, seven miles from the spot where Earl Cornwallis had encamped.

Source

24 September 2021

24th Of September

M. Fiffers (Top Center) and Rocky River (Lower Right) (Source of 1770 Map - LOC)

See earlier post from A biography of General Davie (1756 - 1820) which was found in the Magazine Of America here.

On the 24th of September the American patrols gave notice that the force of the enemy was in motion on the Steele creek road, leading to Charlotte. Generals Sumner and Davidson retreated by *Phifers on the nearest road to Salisbury. Colonel [William] Davie, with one hundred and fifty mounted men and some volunteers under Major Joseph Graham, was left alone in front of the British army, and he was ordered to observe the enemy and skirmish with his advance.

*Phifer's beyond Rocky River and now in Cabarrus County [Source]

20 September 2021

20th Of September

"...Colonel [William] Davie, with unprecedented boldness, with a command not exceeding one hundred and fifty men all told, on the 20th of September, turning the right flank of the British army by a circuitous march, fell upon three hundred or four hundred of the enemy at Wahab's plantation. The attack was made at daylight. The surprise was complete.

Wikimedia Map (Location Of Wahab Plantation)

The enemy left fifteen or twenty dead on the field and had some forty wounded. Davie got off safely with the captured horses and had only one man wounded. The enemy at once caused the farm buildings which belonged to Captain Wahab, then a volunteer with Davie, to be laid in ashes. Davie brought off ninety-six horses and their furnishings, and one hundred and twenty stand of arms, and arrived in camp the same afternoon, having marched sixty miles in less than twenty-four hours, including the time employed in seeking and beating the enemy. That evening Generals Sumner and Davidson arrived at his camp with their force of one thousand badly equipped militia.

See earlier post from A biography of General Davie (1756 - 1820) which was found in the Magazine Of America here.

23 July 2021

Ann Howard Died In Montreal In 1782

British Military and Naval Records (RG 8, C Series) - INDEX ONLY
Microform: c-11823 (1927):

13 June 2021

Jonathan Clark's Affidavit

Jonathan Clark's Affidavit
South Carolina, Ninety-Six District:

"...on or about the thirteenth instant, being in the Cherokee country aforesaid, he saw and conversed with John Garwick, an intimate friend and countryman of Alexander Cameron, Deputy Superintendent...".

Ninety-Six on Map
(LOC - South-Carolina and parts adjacent, shewing the movements of the American and British armies.)

"That on this subject the said John answered that he, Jonathan, need not be under any apprehensions of danger until such time as there should be some disturbances below in the country between the King's army and the Colonists, and that then it would be high time for him, the said Jonathan, to take care of himself and remove from the frontiers." [Source]

Cross-posted at Cameron Collections

26 May 2021

1st Life Guards, 1815

Source

1st Life Guards

27 March 2021

Major Frederick Howard -British Military Archives

WO 42. H. 344-450 (Image 709)

The Honorable Frederick Howard, Major

10th or Prince of Wales Regiment

killed at Waterloo

18 June 1815

Widow Frances Susan (Lambton) Howard

Married 6 August 1811

22 September 2020

Excerpt Of Lt. Colonel Butler's Letter To Captain Mathews

Lieutenant Colonel John Butler To Captain Robert Mathews

Niagara 22 September 1781

I enclose you the muster roll of the 10th Company of Rangers... . I also enclose you a list of articles which will be requisite for the farmers.

The Corps of Rangers being now completed to a battalion of ten companies, I should think the 10th
Company would be proper to the Lieutenant Colonel's, with a Captain-Lieutenant instead of a
Captain. However, I submit the whole to His Excellency, the Commander-in-Chief.

I have applied to Brigadier General Powell for leave for Captain Butler to go to Canada for a few weeks to settle bills for the payment of the clothing, arms, &c, for the Rangers lately arrived from England, as he, having transacted all the business, none will be so able to arrange them so well as him; and finally, settling his former accounts as Paymaster will require his being down a few weeks this fall.

*We learn from Detroit that Captain Joseph Brant, being advanced with a party some way ahead of Captain Thompson and Mckee, fell in with a party from Clarke's army, attacked and defeated them before Thompson and McKee got up to him. He killed 37 and made 64 of the rebels prisoners. This, I hope, will put an end to all Clarke's views in that quarter, and may probably subject him to the fate this party met with.
_________________________
British Library. Sloane and Additional Manuscripts, Add MSS 21765, Correspondence with Officers
at Niagara, 1777-1784; National Archives of Canada, Haldimand Collection, microfilm reel number
A-682.

*Known as Lochry's Defeat

29 August 2020

Settling The Prisoners

1780 Map Held At The LOC

EXTRACT: General Frederick Halimand To Lieutenant Mason Bolton

Quebec 29 August 1780

In regard to settling the prisoners from the Ohio at Detroit, it is so favourable to my determined scheme for agriculture (much approved and strongly recommended from home) that it must be encouraged, but at the same time I should think it unsafe to permit so many of them to remain together, and perhaps impolitic with the Indians who are naturally jealous and suspicious, and should any bad consequences result from settling those people on their lands they will attribute it to design. I therefore wish to have them divided between Detroit, Niagara, and Carleton Island. At Niagara, you will dispose of as many as the situation will admit of, and send the rest to Carleton Island. And as the season will be too far advanced for them to build after their arrival, you would do well, with the assistance of Colonel Butler, to choose proper situations and have log houses erected for them by the Rangers, and whatever men you may occasionally be able to spare from the Garrison...all of them who are artificers should be employed and reasonable pay allowed them.

British Library. Sloane and Additional Manuscripts, Add MSS 21764, Letters to Officers Commanding at Niagara, 1777-1783; National Archives of Canada, Haldimand Collection, microfilm reel number A-682.

In August of 1781 my ancestor, William Roark, was a prisoner "from the Ohio" who was marched to Canada. An excerpt from his Revolutionary War pension application explained his experience as a POW, from his capture at the site of Lochry's Defeat to his discharge on parole in New York:

"...the Ohio river where we were to join Gen. Clark, but he had gone on down the river."

"The general intention was to go to the falls of the Ohio, to get a reinforcement from the Kentucky settlements thence to proceed against the Indian towns. We started under Col. Lochry or Laughery and had nearly overtaken Gen'l Clark, but got defeated by the Indians in June or July [August] about ten miles below the Big Miami as it was said, some said it was further. All were killed but forty-seven who were taken prisoners among which I was also taken. The Indians took us to their town and after some time we were taken to Detroit. From Detroit we were taken to Canada and confined about forty miles from Montreal where we were kept ten months or upward. Then we heard of the surrender of Cornwallis at York. Then under British orders we were taken to Quebec and put on board of a ship and taken to New York where we were discharged on parole (17th March 1783) for there was not prisoners to exchange for us."