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"The general opinion before the action," Moultrie says, "and especially among sailors, was that two frigates would be sufficient to knock the town about our ears, notwithstanding our batteries." Parker may have shared this impression, and it may account for his leisureliness.
While the conspirators were thus taking effectual steps to bind the future acts of the Executive in respect to the forts in Charleston harbor, and to make sure that the rising insurrection in South Carolina should not be crippled or destroyed by any surprise or sudden movement emanating from Washington, they were not less watchful to counteract and prevent any possible hostile movement against them on the part of Major Anderson and his handful of officers and troops in Fort Moultrie, undertaken on his own discretion.
Says Mr. To their hands we are owing the greatest part of the fortifications raised for the protection of the country. Fort Moultrie gave, at an early period of inexperience and untried valor of our citizens, immortality to the American arms."
Those means were the four hundred and forty-five raw militia under Moultrie, who, behind a pile of palmetto logs, on the 28th of June, 1776, repulsed Sir Peter Parker in his attack on Sullivan's Island in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina, and the two hundred and ten "over-mountain men," under Sevier, Robertson, and Isaac Shelby, who beat back, on the 20th and 21st of July, the Cherokee invasion of the western frontier.
The Government, disregarding these wise suggestions, entered into a treaty with the Florida Indians, September 18, 1823, at Camp Moultrie, stipulating for their continued residence in the territory for twenty years. They were by this treaty established in the heart of the country, and their claims to the lands acknowledged and guaranteed.
The result of the debate set the matter so clearly before the people that a great majority of Federalists were elected to the convention. Among them were Gadsden, the Rutledges and the Pinckneys, Moultrie, and William Washington, who had become a citizen of the state from which he had helped to expel the British invader.
Memorandum of verbal instructions to Major Anderson, 1st Artillery, commanding at Fort Moultrie, South Carolina: You are aware of the great anxiety of the Secretary of War that a collision of the troops with the people of this State shall be avoided, and of his studied determination to pursue a course with reference to the military force and forts in this harbor which shall guard against such a collision.
He had expected simultaneous aid by land from three thousand soldiers put ashore from the fleet on a sandbar, but these troops could give him no help against the fort from which they were cut off by a channel of deep water. A battle soon proved the British ships unable to withstand the American fire from Fort Moultrie.
Before she blew up, the Americans boarded her, securing her colours, bell, and some other trophies. "Had these ships effected their purpose," Moultrie reported, "they would have driven us from our guns." The main division held its ground until long after nightfall, firing much of the time, but stopping at intervals.
The militia could not be prevailed on to defend the passes with any degree of firmness; and Moultrie, instead of drawing aid from the surrounding country, sustained an alarming diminution of numbers by desertion. On the passage of the river by Prevost, an express had been despatched to Lincoln with the intelligence.
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