They were solely of the Pennsylvania line, and might have been successful but for an attempt which they made upon the fidelity of the Marylanders.
Their purpose was to deliver Greene to the enemy, and otherwise facilitate the objects of the latter, who were to make a concerted movement, in force, upon the American army, at a prescribed moment.
The integrity of the Marylanders, whom Gornell approached, was not to be shaken; and to their fidelity and the quick ears of one of the camp-women, the army was indebted for its safety.
The circumstances were all in favor of the success of the conspirators.
There was a general discontent in the army. The troops were badly fed and clothed -- were unpaid, doubtful of pay, and suffering present distresses. They were inactive. Many of them were new recruits.
Greene was no longer surrounded by the tried and true men and officers, who had borne the brunt of the contest. The term of service of the former had in great part expired, some of his best officers were on furlough, and he had offended others. Sumter had left the army in disgust;Pickens was operating against the Indians; Marion was recruiting his brigade on the Santee; Williams had gone home; Howard was in Maryland, scarcely recovered from his wounds; Wayne was in Georgia, doing good service in that quarter; St. Clair was absent on leave; Lee had gone to Virginia to get married, and his legion was almost shorn of officers;Eggleston had gone with him to Virginia, and the brave fellows, Armstrong and Carrington, had fallen into the hands of the enemy.
The time was well chosen for mutiny, and as the hour drew near for the consummation of the purpose of the conspirators, the British army was set in motion from below, -- not so secretly, however, but that their movements were made known to the Americans.
Symptoms of mutiny became apparent in the camp, and it was necessary to proceed with vigor. Doubtful of a large number of those around him, Greene summoned Marion with all his force from the Santee, while his own army was kept in order of battle. The arrest of Gornell, with that of four others, all sergeants of the Pennsylvania line, took place the night before the conspiracy was to take effect. Gornell was tried and executed;the others were sent under guard into the interior. This proceeding was the signal for the flight of at least a dozen more, who, having been committed, broke away on the night of Gornell's seizure, and found protection with the enemy, who advanced in force to receive them. This prompt proceeding suppressed the mutiny.
The development of the conspiracy, the state of preparedness in the camp of Greene, and the movement of Marion, had the effect of discouraging the farther advance of the British army;and Marion, while yet in motion for the camp of Greene, from which he was but eight miles distant, was summoned in haste to the protection of Georgetown, against which the enemy was reported to have sailed from Charleston. A forced march of four days brought him to White's Bridge, when it was discovered that the alarm was unfounded. The enemy had not shown himself, and was not nigh.
In this march of one hundred and sixty miles, Marion's men had but a single ration of rice. Their sole food, with this exception, was lean beef. The march took place in April, when there is no forage for cattle, and when such as survive the winter, are compelled to wander far in the swamps and thickets in search of the scanty herbage which sustains them. The march of our partisan in these two expeditions was conducted solely on foot. The country south of the Santee had been so completely foraged by the British, during his vacation of it, that he was compelled to dismount his infantry in his movements until the spring herbage should enable him to feed his horses.
His force was reduced to two hundred militia and one hundred and twenty horse.
It was the wish of General Greene that he should take post as near the enemy as possible, in order both to shorten his limits beyond Cooper river, and to enable Col. Laurens, who now commanded the legion of Lee, to pass the Ashley, and close upon the British between the latter river and Goose Creek. But with his infantry dismounted, he dared not venture so completely within the reach of an enemy so superior;and with the double purpose of securing a retreat, if necessary, and of forming a junction with any party when desirable, either at Huger's Bridge, over the west branch of Cooper river, or at Strawberry Ferry, he took post at Sinkler's plantation on the Santee.
This left him within twenty-five miles of each of these designated routes.
His cavalry meanwhile patrolled the country as low as Haddrell and Hobcaw, and in sight of the British posts at those places. They thus procured the earliest news of the enemy's movements, and checked his incursions in that quarter. The effect of Marion's presence with his brigade was soon felt, as well by his people as by the British.
By the latter it was deemed important to relieve themselves from a neighbor at once so vigilant and inconvenient. A messenger, feigning to be a deserter, was dispatched by General Leslie, whose plan was to make his way through the scouts of Marion, to the Scotch and loyal settlements on the borders of North Carolina. These were to be stirred up to insurrection, and Marion was to be diverted from a quarter in which his presence was particularly annoying. The messenger succeeded in his object, but was less fortunate in his return. He had done the mischief required at his hands, fomented the insurrection, and set the loyalists in motion.
The proofs were conclusive against him, and he perished by military execution.
The timely notice which Marion obtained of his labors enabled him to prepare against the event.
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* Johnson's Life of Greene, Vol. 2, p. 319.
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