Guilford County NcArchives Military Records.....Paisley, Colonel John March 4, 1781
Revwar - Letters 
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Nancy Poquette npoq@hotmail.com May 26, 2006, 3:36 am

From Vol. VII Of Papers Of Nathanael Greene, Page 393:
	“From Colonel Otho Williams, William Shaffer’s on Stony Creek, 3 miles 
NE Colonel Paisley’s [NC], 4th March 1781, 9 o’clock pm.
“Dear General, The interruption Captain Kirkwood gave the enemy’s piquet last 
night appears to be an inducement to Lieutenant Colonel [Banastre] Tarleton to 
leave his camp with seeming haste this morning early. A considerable quantity 
of flour was left in a hogshead and in small parcels, kettles left over the 
fires, plates and other furniture with a few cast horses [from footnote, these 
were most likely horses that had lost shoes] were left in the field. From this 
information arose the misinformation that Lord Cornwallis had marched. The fact 
is that the British Army remains near the junction of roads leading to 
Hillsborough, Salisbury and Cross Creek and is rather more compact than before.”

“Convinced of this, I decamped about 3 o’clock this afternoon, marched to the 
Guilford road, remained until sunset and then came here. General [Andrew] 
Pickens is on my right in the same neighborhood. Three of our parties which 
have come in since noon corroborate the information above, and Mr. [James] 
Merriweather, a cornet, gives us the following as a fact which he received from 
a Loyal lady who mistook him for an officer of the British Legion. Early this 
morning a party of Tories going to the British standard were fired upon by a 
timid piquet. They halted, and while they were hesitating what to do in so 
critical a circumstance a detachment of the Legion commanded by Lieutenant 
Colonel Tarleton charged them, and those who did not disperse expeditiously 
were cut to pieces. Mr. Merriweather was near the lines and having heard the 
fire enquired the cause, and got the above account with this addition, that 
Tarleton, being informed of his mistake detached some dragoons with a view of 
collecting them, but without effect…” ALS (MiU-C).”

	From footnote: “Tarleton ‘said that his decision to withdraw was 
occasioned by ‘the forage being completed.’ (Tarleton, Campaigns, page 236). 
Joseph Graham, in a long account of this incident in his memoirs, contended 
that his command’s harassment of a British picket resulted in Tarleton’s attack 
on the Loyalists. ‘The British had been so teased by Graham’s party, that on 
hailing [the Loyalist detachment] they waited for no reply, but charged them 
immediately.’ Graham said the Loyalists, who had heard of ‘Pyle’s disaster,’ 
hesitated to ‘confess to which party they belonged.’ Four were killed, twenty 
or thirty badly cut, and the rest dispersed before the British dragoons 
became ‘sensible of their mistake.’ Afterward, ‘not more than half’ of the 
Loyalists ‘could be collected.’ Such ‘miscarriages’ concluded Graham, ‘so 
completely broke the spirit of the loyalists in those parts that no party was 
known afterwards to attempt to join the British in these or the adjoining 
counties.’ (Graham, Graham, page 339.)


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