The American Revolution in South Carolina

Road to Burr's Mill

January 15, 1781


Patriot Cdr:

Capt. George Gresham
Loyalist Cdr:

Lt. Col. Banastre Tarleton
Killed:

0
Killed:

Unknown
Wounded:

0
Wounded:

Unknown
Captured:

0
Captured:

2
Old District: 

Ninety-Six District
Present County:

Cherokee County

Capt. George Gresham (unknown), with some militia (unknown), surprised a small advance party of Lt. Col. Banastre Tarleton’s and took two prisoners. In the same or related encounter they captured a black manservant and two horses.

[It is this author's opinion that Capt. George Gresham's company identified above must have been attached to Brigadier General Daniel Morgan, and therefore most likely from either VA or MD. As yet, no Captain with this name has been associated with either SC or NC.]


On January 15, 1781, Brigadier General Daniel Morgan wrote a letter to Major General Nathanael Greene that he had camped at Burr's Mill on Thicketty Creek indicating that he had recent intelligence of the whereabouts of Lt. General Charles, Lord Cornwallis and Lt. Colonel Banastre Tarleton, and that they were pursuing Morgan diligently.

Brigadier General Morgan had no desire to be overtaken by Lt. Col. Tarleton, so he broke camp very early on January 16th and headed towards Hannah's Cowpens, a much better location to meet the notorious British colonel. Brigadier General Morgan had decamped so suddenly that most of his men had left their breakfasts only half-cooked. Very low on rations, Lt. Col. Tarleton's men were delighted to find any kind of a meal waiting for them, so Lt. Col. Tarleton decided to make camp in the same location for the night of January 16th.

Historians have searched for the location of Burr's Mill for decades. With such scant information as contained within Brigadier General Daniel Morgan's January 15th letter to Major General Nathanael Greene there just wasn't much to work with.

Click Here to read a fairly comprehensive report on how the location above was determined - turn to Page 8 of this PDF file for recent attempts at locating Burr's Mill.



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