The Highland Scots of North Carolina

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION

To those Highlanders who had hoped that by coming to America they might escape the tears and travail of repeated civil wars, the outbreak of the American Revolution must have come as a grim disappointment. Now, for the third time in the eighteenth century, the Highlanders had to go through the agony of choosing sides, to accept the strain and the waste of battle, and to face a bitter defeat. Considering both their military experience and their military reputation, it is understandable that they were drawn into the revolutionary conflict in North Carolina. In view of their previous history, the remarkable development is that in this war they are found defending a king of the hated House of Hanover. What can account for this switch in allegiance? How was it possible to transform chronic rebels into dogged Loyalists? It is the purpose of this chapter to describe the events leading to the crucial Battle of Moore’s Creek Bridge and, using sources of information from Revolutionary days, to explain as fully as possible the reasons for the Loyalist stand of the North Carolina Highlanders.

The outbreak of the American Revolution cannot be explained by a single cause or single act. In the American Revolution, as in the bloody French Revolution which occurred a few years later, there were many factors which precipitated the conflict. Probably more than anything else, it was the accumulation of numerous grievances during the period from 1763 to 1775 which finally led the colonists to arms. Few, if any, of the Americans plotted rebellion from Britain during this time. But as Englishmen they did protest what they considered to be denials of their rights. In colony after colony, in the decade before the war, angry citizens were arguing heatedly, signing lengthy petitions, attending angry protest meetings, and threatening economic reprisals against the mother country. The colonists were reacting to Crown policies such as the Proclamation Line of 1763, the Sugar Act of 1764, writs of assistance, the Stamp Act, the Townshend Acts, the cost of quartering troops, the Tea Act, and the Coercive Acts.

The North Carolina Highlanders, living as a relatively isolated inland community, were not involved and probably not much concerned with many of these issues. Colonial documents fail to shed much light on the attitudes of the Highlanders toward Crown policies before 1771. There are, however, some indications of the feelings and actions of the people of Cumberland County in regard to two prewar issues—the Stamp Act and the uprising of the Regulators.

William Tryon, one of North Carolina’s most capable and effective colonial governors, had just taken office in 1765 when the stamp conflict arose. A steadfast defender of the Crown’s rights, Tryon was able to suppress the Regulators, but he failed to enforce the sale of the hated stamps in the colony. Even before the passage of the Stamp Act, when the news reached North Carolina in October, 1764, that such a bill was being considered, the Assembly expressed its conviction that no other body had the right to impose taxes upon the citizens of the colony. After the Stamp Act became law, the residents of the lower Cape Fear area centering around Wilmington protested vigorously. The courts of the colony ceased to function because people either refused to, or could not, purchase the necessary stamps for legal papers. Finally, to the relief of everyone, Parliament repealed the Stamp Act.

The people of Cumberland County were concerned about the proposed stamp tax, and some of them openly opposed it. Unfortunately, we do not know to what degree the Highlanders were involved. In the fall of 1765, a group of the Cross Creek inhabitants gathered to burn in effigy Dr. Houston, the stamp officer. Several months later, a letter in the North Carolina Gazette called upon the citizens of North Carolina to open by force the mouth of the Cape Fear and to drive out the British warships. For printing the letter, Andrew Stewart, a Highlander with the title of “His majesty’s printer for this province,” lost his commission.

In the Regulation controversy, the Highlanders played a more active role. The dispute, which began with peaceful petitions by the Piedmont planters in 1765, ended in the Battle of Alamance in 1771. The planters, underrepresented in the Assembly, lived in a region where money was scarce. The petitioners protested the illegal fees demanded by clerks and county registers of deeds, and the illegal levying and collecting of taxes. The Regulators stopped paying taxes, invaded the courts to halt the proceedings, and whipped court officials whom they captured. After several attempts to appease them, Governor Tryon in 1771 determined to restore law and order in the Piedmont area. Calling up the militia, he organized two military groups to march into the Regulator territory. In Cumberland County the Governor ordered Farquard Campbell and James Rutherford to raise 100 men. Campbell, a long-time political leader of the Highlanders, indicated there would be no difficulty in raising the men. This would seem to show that the Cumberland people were not in sympathy with the Regulators. However, three years earlier, Judge Edmund Fanning had charged that the “principal men of Cumberland” were encouraging the Regulators. If the Highlanders were involved with the Regulators during the early years of the movement, and they may well have been, they made no attempt to stand with the Regulators in the crucial year of 1771. One of the Governor’s armed columns which marched from Wilmington to Salisbury passed through both Cumberland and Anson counties without any difficulty from Regulators there. In fact, General Waddell increased his troops in Cumberland and Anson counties. Finally, on May 16, 1771, the Regulators and Governor Tryon’s army met in Guilford County, and in the ensuing Battle of Alamance, Tryon’s militiamen defeated the inadequately armed and disorganized Regulators. Having successfully suppressed the rebels, Tryon immediately departed for New York to take his post as governor of that colony.

Josiah Martin, the last royal governor of North Carolina, was the unfortunate man chosen to succeed Tryon. During Martin’s five years in the colony, relations between the Governor and the Assembly grew steadily worse. During Tryon’s term, the Assembly had occasionally co-operated with the Governor; during Martin’s term co-operation appeared to be a sign of weakness, and neither side would make concessions. For that reason, little legislation was passed after 1771. Martin’s term began with hostility in the colony and ended with war.

In the years 1771 to 1775, several intra-colony disputes created ill will between Governor and Assembly. During this time, the Governor’s conciliatory treatment of the Regulators, while it endeared him to some of the Regulators, further alienated the Assembly.

Beginning in 1773, events outside the colony served to widen the gap between Governor and Assembly. Leaders of the lower house by the latter part of 1773 despaired of working with the Governor and were willing to make bolder moves. As a protest against the tax on tea, the Assembly organized a Committee of Correspondence designed to share grievances with other colonies and to co-ordinate actions. When the British government responded to the Boston Tea Party with the Intolerable Acts, many North Carolinians were aroused. The leading men of Wilmington met in July of 1774 to protest the cruelties at Boston and the closing of the port. Among those signing the protest were Archibald Maclaine, a prominent merchant whose people had come from the island of Mull, and Robert Hogg, brother of James Hogg. William Hooper, the signatory to the Declaration of Independence, reported in August, 1774, that the people of Wilmington had “very proper resentment for the injustice done.” Much to Governor Martin’s dismay, the leaders of the Assembly called a revolutionary congress to meet late in August, 1774. This First Provincial Congress was widely attended. Among the delegates were Farquard Campbell and Thomas Rutherford from Cumberland County. The delegates resolved to halt all trade with Britain. They also named three representatives to the Continental Convention. Revolutionary government in North Carolina was established by the fall of 1774. The Governor was powerless to stop it.

During the following months, groups of Patriots formed Committees of Safety to administer the non-importation agreement and to organize the opposition to the Governor. The Wilmington Committee published the names of individuals who refused to sign the non-importation agreement and forced them to appear before the Committee. By such actions, and by threatening boycotts of merchants, they secured co-operation.

Events moved swiftly in North Carolina in April and May of 1775. Governor Martin called a meeting of the Colonial Assembly at New Bern for April 4. The leaders of the Assembly summoned the Second Provincial Congress to meet at the same place on April 3, since many delegates to the Assembly were also delegates to the Congress. When the leaders of the Assembly recessed that body to discuss the business of the Congress, Martin angrily ended the Assembly. It was the last royal Assembly held in colonial North Carolina. Government was clearly in the hands of the revolutionary groups now, and the Governor was helpless.

When news of the Battle of Lexington reached North Carolina early in May, the Committees of Safety began to make military preparations. A meeting of concerned colonists gathered in Charlotte on May 31. They called for the election of colonial military officers who would act “independent of Great Britain.” The Governor realized he was not safe in New Bern and fled to the safety of a warship anchored in the mouth of the Cape Fear River, where he remained for several years, subsisting, as one report has it, on biscuit and wild cabbage.

From the safety of his floating command post aboard the Cruizer or the Scorpion, Governor Martin directed the counterrevolution. Even before his exile, the Governor had made plans for a military campaign in the colony. In a letter to General Gage dated March 16, 1775, Martin asked for “two or three stands of arms and some good ammunition” in order to halt the “insulting Gasconading” of the rebellious elements. He told Gage of offers of support from the Regulators and “a considerable body of Highlanders.” Some action had to be taken, as Martin well knew, to rescue the fast-sinking authority of the Crown.

The Governor’s plan for recovering the colony was revealed in greater detail in a series of letters to the Earl of Dartmouth, Secretary of State for the Colonies. Martin had formerly held the commission of lieutenant colonel, but had sold it in 1769. He requested that he be allowed to recruit a battalion of a thousand Highlanders in North Carolina and that his old rank be restored. Martin’s estimate of the Loyalist sentiments of the Regulators and Highlanders was accepted in Whitehall, but Dartmouth turned down the Governor’s request for a commission. In spite of this disappointment, Martin continued planning a military campaign.

During the last half of 1775, both the Governor and the Patriots worked to secure the greater number of supporters and particularly to influence the Highlanders and Regulators. On August 8, Governor Martin issued a lengthy proclamation denouncing the leaders and delegates of the forthcoming Hillsboro Provincial Congress. The manifesto was designed to intimidate those inclined to support the Congress. In New Bern, where the Governor formerly resided, the Committee of Safety issued a counterstatement ridiculing the Governor’s enormous proclamation which was six feet long and three feet wide. The Committee also ruled that all communications with Governor Martin henceforth were to cease.

Late in 1775, General Gage dispatched two officers to North Carolina to organize the Highlanders into military units, Brigadier General Donald McDonald and Colonel Donald McLeod. Since the Highlanders were largely unarmed, they could not be expected to carry on a military campaign without support. It was therefore decided to march them to the mouth of the Cape Fear, where they could receive weapons and join forces with other units. Although the ministry was more interested in retaking Charleston than of beginning a campaign in North Carolina, Alexander Schaw, a friend of Governor Martin, argued persuasively that victory could be more easily achieved in North Carolina. Then, with North Carolina retaken, the Loyalist elements in the South Carolina back country could be supplied with arms and Charleston would fall.

In December the plan of action was revealed. General Howe, who had replaced Gage, would dispatch Sir Henry Clinton and 2,000 troops to the mouth of the Cape Fear from Boston. Meanwhile, the fleet would convey Lord Cornwallis and seven regiments from Ireland to join Clinton. The Highlanders and Regulators would march to the sea to be armed by this force.

Governor Martin’s own plans now became concrete. On January 3, 1776, he was informed of the arrangements and ordered to have the Highlanders at Brunswick not later than February 15. Acting swiftly, he issued a proclamation on January 10, 1776, calling upon the Regulator and Highlander leaders to raise the royal standard, organize the friends of the King, and march the army to Brunswick. The die was cast.

The six-month period from July, 1775, to January, 1776, was a time of tension for the Highlanders of North Carolina. We know now that at the end of that half-year period of consideration a large number of the Highland Gaels did “repair to the royal banner.” That lengthy period of indecision has a point of its own, however, and it is quite necessary to note that the Highlanders gave encouragement to the rebels at this time in many ways. The loyalty of the Highlanders to the King was by no means an immediate, automatic, or unanimous response.

Since the Highlanders were so important to Governor Martin’s plans, he was frequently in touch with them during this critical time. We know that in June, 1775, Captain Alexander McLeod of the Highlander settlement traveled down to Wilmington to communicate with the Governor. There were several messengers who transmitted information between Martin and Allan McDonald. The Wilmington Committee of Safety became suspicious about this exchange after capturing some of the Governor’s couriers and reading his mail. As early as July, 1775, the Committee voiced its fear that Allan McDonald and James Hepburn, a Cross Creek lawyer, were raising troops for a Loyalist army. In October, the Governor informed the Earl of Dartmouth that he had communicated with Farquard Campbell in order to “sound his disposition in case of matters coming to extremity here.” It is little wonder that several Committees of Safety adopted resolutions in the fall of 1775 branding those people receiving letters from the Governor or visiting him as “enemies of the liberties of the people.” They were to be “dealt with accordingly.”

But the Patriots also were making a play for the hand of the Highlanders. In August, 1775, the Provincial Congress sent a twelve-man delegation, including five Highlanders, to confer with “the gentlemen who have lately arrived from the highlands in Scotland.” The purpose of this committee was “to advise and urge them to unite with the other Inhabitants of America in defence of those rights which they derive from God and the Constitution.”

To win more supporters for the revolutionary cause, four Presbyterian clergymen were requested by Joseph Hewes, one of North Carolina’s delegates to the Continental Congress, to write a letter defending the right to revolt. The letter was then printed and circulated in the state. In November of 1775, the Congress also sent two ministers to the Regulators and Highlanders as revolutionary missionaries. A similar attempt to gain the confidence of the Highlanders was made in the circulation of a letter by a writer who, hiding behind the assumed name “Scotus Americanus,” urged the Highlanders to break publicly with the Crown or declare neutrality in the struggle.

Many of the Gaels were active in the new revolutionary organizations which appeared in 1774 and 1775. Outraged over the recent British firing on colonials at Lexington and Concord, a group of settlers from the Cross Creek area formed, in 1775, what was known as the Cumberland County Association. The document these settlers signed warned the British that “whenever our Continental or Provincial Councils shall decree it necessary, we will go forth and be ready to sacrifice our lives and fortunes to secure ... freedom and safety.” Among the fifty-six signers were five men who were probably Highlanders: Thomas Rhea, Walter Murray, James Giles, William Gillespy, and James Gee. Although Cumberland County itself did not have a Committee of Safety, the records of the Wilmington Committee indicate that Farquard Campbell and Robert Cochran of Cumberland County were visiting members of that revolutionary tribunal. Alexander Legate, a prominent Highlander, was a member of the Committee of Safety in Bladen County.

The Provincial Congress of North Carolina was the chief policy-making body for the Patriots of the colony. It formed and directed the plan of opposition to the Crown. Certainly much of the credit for the success of the revolution in North Carolina should be assigned to this organization. It carried on a constant propaganda barrage, directed the Committees of Safety, enforced the boycott on English goods, and raised a revolutionary army. There were three conventions of the Provincial Congress before the Battle of Moore’s Creek Bridge. Cumberland County was represented by Highlanders at each of the meetings. The delegates to the first convention held in August, 1774, and the second convention in April, 1775, were Thomas Rutherford and Farquard Campbell.

The first two meetings were at New Bern. When the Third Provincial Congress met at Hillsboro in August, 1775, a five-man delegation attended—Farquard Campbell, Thomas Rutherford, Alexander McKay, Alexander McAlister, and David Smith. These men were respected leaders in their community.

This same convention made provisions for the defense of the colony by organizing groups of Minute Men in the several counties. The names of the officers of the Cumberland County Minute Men are significant. Those appointed were Thomas Rutherford, Colonel; Alexander McAlister Lieutenant Colonel; Duncan McNeil, First Major; Alexander McDonald, Second Major.

In the fall of 1775, then, there was clearly a split in the leadership of the Highlanders. Allan McDonald and several other newly arrived Highlanders who were retired British officers advocated loyalty to the King. Meanwhile, James Campbell, the long-time minister of the settlement, and the veteran political leaders of the Highlander colony were playing open and active roles in the rebellion. A recognition of the fact that the Highlanders were divided is important for an understanding of what happened at Cross Creek on February 12, 1776, when General Donald McDonald called on the Highlanders to muster into the King’s forces. Although Thomas Rutherford was a colonel in the Minute Men, he showed a remarkably impartial spirit by accepting a similar commission in General McDonald’s forces. With regard to the initial response to General McDonald’s manifesto, Rutherford reported that “great numbers of His Majesty’s liege subjects have failed to attend.” The Highlanders did not rush pellmell to defend the honor of George III. The decision was slow and painful.

A week after this first muster, however, General McDonald was able to mass a much larger body of Highlanders, and by the end of the month those troops had gone into battle for the royal cause. What forces influenced these Gaels to stand with the King? Can their decision be explained? Since so many people were involved, motivation was sure to be complex and varied. Documents of the day do, however, give us clues to at least four major reasons for the decision.

In the first place, the British in the eighteenth century were remarkably successful in pacifying former enemies. The two prime examples of this facility are their relations with the French Canadians and with the Scottish Highlanders. In 1755, at the outset of the French and Indian War, the British were so suspicious of the French settlers of Nova Scotia that thousands of Cajuns were abruptly scattered to other English colonies, thereby bringing great hardship on the people and also creating the historical background for Longfellow’s “Evangeline.” Only twenty years later, the French Canadians were sufficiently loyal to the British government that they refused all invitations to join the American rebellion, even after France entered the conflict on the American side. Neither the proffered hand of friendship, nor the threat of reprisal, nor lengthy arguments about the “rights of Englishmen” moved the French Canadians to aid the American rebels. They were satisfied. British colonial policy toward the French Canadians had been successful in neutralizing a large number of former enemies.

Similarly, the British had effected a conciliation with the Scottish Highlanders during approximately the same period of time. In 1773, Samuel Johnson favored permitting the Highlanders to wear their colorful, distinctive garb again. The Highlands had undergone many changes since the Forty-five. Woolen and linen mills now operated at several locations. New schools, employing only the English language, were to be found all over the Highlands. The 800 miles of road which had been built destroyed much of the provincialism and isolation of the Highlanders. The migration of many people to other parts of the British Isles or to America gave those who remained in the Highlands family ties outside their local area. It was William Pitt who recognized that the Highlanders and the Highlands had so changed that there was no longer danger of revolution. Knowing their reputation as soldiers and needing troops during the Seven Years’ War, Pitt decided to raise Highland regiments. They served Britain with distinction. A little over a decade later, when the American Revolution developed, London again called on the Highlanders for help. Samuel Johnson reported that the Highlanders responded immediately when their local leaders requested men for military duty. When the war was over, the Lord Advocate, Henry Dumas, informed the House of Commons that no group of subjects in the empire had better demonstrated their loyalty than the Highlanders.

Historians in our own time who have been puzzled over the Loyalism of the Highlanders have failed to observe this shift of allegiance in the years following the Forty-five. The Americans, however, were fully aware of it at the time of the Revolution. In Virginia, Loyalists were referred to as “the Scotch party.” General Schuyler of New York despaired of securing the co-operation or aid of the Loyalist Highlanders in his colony. John Witherspoon of Princeton, who gave dedicated support to the revolutionary cause, included in a sermon of May, 1776, an appeal to Scottish-born Americans to support the rebellion. He observed that so many Scottish people were faithful to the King that the word Scotch was becoming a term of reproach in America.

As we have already noted, many of the North Carolina Highlanders came from Argyllshire. This was Campbell territory. For these Highlanders, it was part of their tradition to defend the House of Hanover.

During the Revolution, then, the Americans became painfully aware of the success of the British in turning their old French and Scottish enemies into neutrals or allies. In taking a Loyalist position in 1776, the Highlanders of North Carolina were not departing from the stand of Highlanders in other parts of the empire. They were only following the tide.

The fear of reprisal was probably a second factor motivating the Highlanders. Certainly Governor Martin, General McDonald, and Colonel Rutherford, all of whom made threatening statements, believed that fear of reprisal would work to the advantage of the Crown. No group of people in the empire was any better acquainted with the painful aftermath of an unsuccessful revolution than the Highlanders. Even those Highlanders who were too young to remember the Forty-five had heard many stories of the brutalities, atrocities, and destruction inflicted by the British Army under the Duke of Cumberland. The North Carolina Highlanders were in a precarious position. If they sided with the King, there was the danger of reprisal from the Patriots. If they took up the rebel cause, they might be forced to re-experience the post-Culloden sufferings. As they made their decision, they probably remembered how difficult it was to overthrow Hanoverian rule and how painful it was to fail.

Governor Martin’s land-grant policies must have been a third factor influencing some of the Highlanders when they were forced to make their choice. As has been noted earlier, the pressure of population and the changes in the agricultural system in the Highlands forced many people from the land. Thus the Highlanders’ land hunger is understandable. As we have seen, a large body of emigrants from Scotland came to North Carolina in 1775. The exiled Governor Martin, who was at that time aboard his floating executive mansion at the mouth of the Cape Fear, greeted a number of Highlander ships when they arrived. Knowing that he had no power to prevent the Highlanders from seizing Crown land for their settlement, he decided to grant them land freely in return for an oath declaring their “firm and unalterable loyalty and attachment to the King, and ... their readiness to lay down their lives in the support and defence of his Majesty’s Government.” The Board of Trade adopted a similar policy in 1775 to encourage enlistments in the Royal Regiment of Highland Emigrants. Most members of this Regiment were either from New York or Nova Scotia. It is possible, however, that some North Carolinians made similar agreements with Brigadier General McDonald. We do know that Governor Martin was directed in April, 1775, to set aside a special area in North Carolina for such Highlander recruits. We know also that the British government planned to organize the North Carolina Highlanders into the Second Battalion of the Royal Highland Emigrants when they reached the mouth of the Cape Fear.

It has been observed that some Highlanders who received land took loyalty oaths. How binding were such oaths? Just as in our own day, not all who took oaths kept them. Probably the best example is Brigadier General McDonald. On the way to Cross Creek in 1775, he was detained in New Bern by the Patriots. They let him go when he took “a solemn oath” that he had neither military nor subversive intentions but was going to Cumberland County for social reasons. That both sides continued to use oaths demonstrates the belief many people had in their effectiveness.

Regardless of the moot question of the effectiveness of oaths, the Highlanders did fear the loss of their land—some of it very recently acquired. They knew the Crown had seized the land of the rebel clans after the Forty-five and, as of 1775, that the land still had not been returned to the original owners. Particularly did the possibility of the seizure of their land press upon those few Highlanders who still retained property in Scotland. In a letter to Cornelius Harnett, Dugall Campbell explained his unwillingness to join the Patriots. If he “took up arms for this country,” said Campbell, “then my property will be immediately confiscated to the King.”

Some North Carolina Highlanders were retired officers on half pay, and their status as such was a fourth factor. Whether because of their past associations or their financial commitment, these men provided leadership for the royal cause and were among the first to offer themselves in the King’s service. The leadership of Flora McDonald’s husband, Allan, appears to have been of particular importance. From Governor Martin’s records, it seems, that McDonald was to be second-in-command, with the rank of major, and McDonald’s son-in-law, Alexander McLeod, was to be first-captain. Since Flora McDonald had been so greatly admired in the Highlands, it was not unusual that many of the Gaels looked to her husband for leadership in this crisis. The older leaders of the colony, as noted above, actively co-operated with the revolutionary groups for a time, but Allan McDonald never wavered in 1775 in his determination to stand with the King. Governor Martin’s letter to the Earl of Dartmouth on November 12, 1775, describes the jealousy the older leaders such as Farquard Campbell felt of Allan McDonald and Alexander McLeod. The older leaders were unhappy to observe the great influence of the newcomers over the Highlander settlers. The best proof of the part Flora’s husband and son-in-law played as leaders is to be seen in the fact that when General Gage’s two officers, Donald McDonald and Donald McLeod, arrived in the Highland settlement, they found two companies of soldiers already organized by Allan McDonald and Alexander McLeod.

It is clear, then, that the decision of the Highlanders to support one side or the other was not an automatic one. Members of the group were active on both sides of the conflict. But a large body of Highlanders did come to the support of the King because of the considerations discussed above—the fear of reprisal, the liberal land grants offered them, and the leadership of a number of retired British officers residing in the colony.

To the sound of the pibroch, the Highlanders mustered in Cross Creek in February, 1776. Only thirty-one years after their last great rebellion in the British Isles, they were the best friends George III had in the colony of North Carolina.

The Governor expected approximately 3,000 Regulators to rise and a like number of Highlanders. Among the Regulators the response was disappointing. Immediately after the Governor’s proclamation had been issued, there was renewed Loyalist zeal in the Regulator counties. But the Regulators did not flock to join the royal troops. One group of 500 gathered but when they began marching to Cross Creek, the sight of a company of Whigs dispersed them. The total number of Regulators who fought at the side of the Highlanders in the royal cause in 1776 was under 200. Why did the Regulators fall so short of the Governor’s expectations? Some expressed dissatisfaction that most of the leaders were Highlanders. Many had no weapons, since their guns had been seized in 1771. Moreover, they had felt the pain of losing in war, and they did not desire to take such a risk again.

While among the Highlanders there was greater response, again the numbers raised did not coincide with the Governor’s estimate. During the first month of 1776, several Highlanders experienced a remarkable change in attitude. It was Thomas Rutherford, delegate to all the Provincial Congresses and head of the Cumberland County Minute Men, who issued the call for all “Lovers of Order and Good Government” to muster under the King’s standard at Cross Creek on February 12, 1776. When only a few reported, Rutherford published another manifesto“to command, enjoin, beseech and require all His Majesty’s faithful subjects ... to repair to the King’s Royal Standard at Cross Creek.” Alexander Legate, a member of the Committee of Safety of Bladen County, appeared at the muster and received a Commission as captain. One of the delegation sent by the Hillsboro Congress to speak to the Highlanders in the fall of 1775 was Alexander McKay; but when the royal standard was raised at Cross Creek, he joined the King’s army. Farquard Campbell, in January and February of 1776, sought to appear as a friend of both sides. The ranks of the Patriot Highlanders thinned. Of the five Cumberland County delegates to the Hillsboro Congress, only two remained faithful to the American cause—David Smith and Alexander McAlister.

Thomas Rutherford’s calls supplemented the earlier proclamation of General Donald McDonald, who on February 4, 1776, had asked all loyal subjects to join his army. At that time, McDonald had assured Loyalist men that their families and property would be protected and that any supplies or equipment seized by the army would be paid for. In spite of these promises, a total of only 1,500 men joined the Loyalist forces. Thirteen hundred of them were Highlanders. Because of faulty intelligence reports, the Governor originally was led to believe that 7,000 men had joined McDonald’s forces. Later he received reports that the group was made up of 3,500 men. Only after the Battle of Moore’s Creek Bridge did he learn of the actual size of the Loyalist army.

The Patriots soon were aware of the impending Loyalist march to the mouth of the Cape Fear. The Committee of Safety in New Bern made plans at its meeting of February 10 to oppose the Highlanders. Colonel Richard Caswell received an order from the Committee to mobilize his Minute Men for action. The people of Wilmington also exhibited concern over the Loyalist march to the sea, since Wilmington was on the route the army would take.

To meet the Highlanders, two units of militia and Minute Men marched north from Wilmington. Colonel James Moore, who commanded the Patriot troops, by forced march up the western side of the Cape Fear reached Rockfish Creek, blocking McDonald’s path downstream.

At this time, the dual role of Farquard Campbell became evident. Campbell visited the military encampments of both the Highlanders and the Patriots, giving each information about the other. Campbell informed General McDonald that Moore expected reinforcements shortly. Since the King’s forces would then be outnumbered, Campbell advised McDonald to avoid a battle. In the light of this information, the British general realized that his primary aim ought to be to lead his soldiers to the mouth of the Cape Fear and there to rendezvous with the forces from Boston under Sir Henry Clinton and seven regiments from the British Isles under the command of Lord Charles Cornwallis. McDonald feared that open battle would bring defeat, since his men were untrained and only half had firearms. He accepted Farquard Campbell’s advice, crossed the Cape Fear at Campbellton to evade Colonel Moore, and descended the east bank of the river.

After evading Moore’s army, the Loyalists marched steadily downstream until they encountered the Patriot forces drawn up at Moore’s Creek Bridge, eighteen miles above Wilmington. Colonels Richard Caswell and Alexander Lillington had fortified an elevation overlooking the bridge that the Loyalists had to cross. To make that crossing more difficult, the floor boards of the bridge had been removed and the sleepers greased.

Unfortunately for the Highlanders, General McDonald, a conservative and capable officer, became ill and the command fell to Colonel Donald McLeod. McLeod secured the approval of the other younger officers for an attack the following morning, indicating that he would lead the assault personally. The results of his leadership were disastrous for the Highlanders. From concealed positions, the Patriots fixed their rifle and artillery fire on the bridge as the Highlanders attempted to follow their leaders across the slippery beams. After the Patriots’ first volley had swept the bridge clean, the Highlanders on the bank panicked and fled from the scene. About fifty Highlanders were killed and 880 were captured. In sharp contrast, the Patriots lost only two men. The attempt of the Highlanders to come to the aid of Governor Martin and the royal cause failed.

Defeat is always a bitter experience. The Highlanders learned this after the Battle of Culloden; they rediscovered it after the Battle of Moore’s Creek Bridge. In North Carolina, the aftermath of battle was not so bloody as it had been in Scotland; still, it was a trying time. The Highlanders who were captured were thrown into the common jails of the colony. As a consequence of their imprisonment, the prisoners’ families were left alone and, often, unprotected. In the months after the battle, groups of Whigs raided, pillaged, and burned Tory farms, causing much needless suffering. Though most of the Loyalist soldiers were captured, a few successfully concealed themselves in the woods after the battle. Since the Whigs had captured General McDonald’s muster lists, these Loyalist soldiers could not return home. Instead, they attempted to hike overland to join British units elsewhere. Although the Committees of Safety forced some Highlanders to leave North Carolina in 1776, the Provincial Congress did not officially authorize such policies until the next year. In April, 1777, the Provincial Congress passed a law legalizing the banishment of nonjuring Loyalists and the confiscation of the property of those who refused to take an oath of fealty to the Revolutionary government. This legislation provoked a new migration.

One of the new migrants was Flora McDonald whose brief and unpleasant stay in North Carolina was in sad contrast to the joyous reception given the Highland heroine and her family upon their arrival in the colony. Zealous Patriots forced Flora to leave her new plantation, “Killegray” on Mountain Creek in Anson County, only a few months after settling there. Allan, taken prisoner at Moore’s Creek, was exchanged for a captured American officer after lengthy negotiations. Flora and her children left North Carolina under a flag of truce after spending only four years in the colony.

There are no reliable estimates of the numbers of Loyalist Highlanders who left the state or of the size of the group which remained in North Carolina. We must rely upon the observations of contemporaries who witnessed the exodus. One concerned Whig declared that two-thirds of the people in Cumberland County were preparing to leave in the summer of 1777. This may have been a high estimate, but others at the same time wrote of the “great numbers” departing, and described them as people of considerable wealth. Where did the Loyalists go? A few moved south to Florida and the West Indies. Most went by ship to New York and then on to the British Isles or to Canada, where many settled in Nova Scotia.

In spite of retaliatory laws, confiscations, and pillaging, many Highlanders remained in the upper Cape Fear region, as the census returns of 1790 witness. After the Battle of Moore’s Creek Bridge, however, Governor Martin realized it was impossible for him to exercise authority in North Carolina. His plan had failed. He abandoned his post at the mouth of the Cape Fear River. When the British forces finally did arrive—three months late—there was no chance of a successful campaign in North Carolina, so the troops of George III moved down the coast to Charleston. Later, in 1781, Lord Cornwallis did lead a British army into North Carolina. He expected the Cape Fear Highlanders to flock into his army, but they were cold to his pleas. Many of the remaining Highlanders may have been Loyalists at heart, but they were unwilling to take up arms again.

Although the eighteenth-century Highlanders were not always consistent in their attitude toward the House of Hanover, they were remarkably consistent in choosing the losing side in civil wars. In three separate conflicts they took up arms. In each war they were defeated. After each defeat they suffered from retributive legislation. Those who fled from North Carolina in the 1770’s might well have recited the same verse sung by their ancestors a generation earlier.