Orangeburg County, South Carolina - The whole text, 1898 (part 9 of 9)

District. A comparison of those uaiues with those to be found on various Revolutionary documents will show that prominent representatives of almost every one of those families were ardent Whigs, and as the same men had been leaders among their fellow-countrymen before the Revolution Ijegan, it is reasonable to suppose that their leadership was still followed during the Revolution, especially when we consider that as a race the Germans are particularly given to sticking together and following their leaders when in a foreign country. We see illustrations of that before our very eyes almost daily.

Again we have seen that at least two strong military organizations existed among the German Whigs in the immediate vicinity of Orangeburgh village, and the only roll extant (so far as we know) of one of those companies contains about sixty German names out of a total membership of sixty-five. That there were other German soldiers fighting in other branches of the service it is reasonable to suppose; else why should Governor Rutledge have selected Orangeburgh, as his headquarters in 1779, and as the place of rendezvous of the militia, if it w^as not a Whig stronghold? And from the letter of Col. Charles Pinckney to Gen. Moultrie, of March 2nd, 1779, (p, 491,) we infer that Governor Rutledge expected to raise 2,700 men in the vicinity of Orangeburgh, and with four Ninety- Six militia regiments added, he expected to have a force of 5,000. We have shown that from his camp at Orangeburgh he detached, on the 13th of April, 1779, Col, Simons with a thousand njen to Gen. Moultrie at Black Swamp, and yet retained a force of six or seven hundred men. We have also seen that after sending out several detachments, amounting to one or two hundred men in all, he joined Gen, Moultrie in Charlestown with about 600 militia.

From the proofs already furniHhecl, it is quite certain that Orangebnrgh District furnished a large militia force during the Revolution, and as a large percentage of the inhabitants of the District were Germans, then a large percentage of the militia of the District must necessarily have been Germans. And of the large militia force assembled in 1779, by Governor Rutledge, right in the heart of this, the principal German settlement in South Carolina, surely a good proportion of it niust have been from the country around, and as a very large majority of the people around there were German people, then a fair proportion of the Orangeburgh militia with Governor Rutledge must have been Germans. We have likewise seen that many of the regulars in Thomson's regiment were from Orangeburgh, and many of these were necessarily Germans also. The same thing may be said of the company of fifty men recruited by Capt. Thomas Pinckney in Orangeburgh in Jul3% 1775. And here it may be proper to ask why Capt. Pinckney went among the Germans to recruit if they were opposed to the Revolution, and how it happened that he secured three fourths of his men from among them? And in Col. Row^e's regiment; and in Col. Beard's militia regiment; and in those three militia companies mentioned by Col. Thomson as existing in his immediate neighborhood; and in that militia company commanded by Capt. John Salley, there must have been some Germans. And of the four Continental veterans of Orange Parish who drew pensions from the United States government in 1S40, two were Germans, while the only one of St. Matthew's Parish was a German.

General Knox, who was Secretary of War under President Washington, reported that during the Revolution South Carolina had furnished 35,507 enlistments to the Continental service. When we consider that the maximum white population of South Carolina for that period was only about 90,000* this seems incredible. But as the war lasted seven years, and as the longest term of enlistment was for three yearsf and after that had expired, for six months or longer, or for the war, many had a chance to serve out a first enlistment and then re-enlist; a thing which they must undoubtedly have done. Again it must be taken into consideration that a small boy at the beginning of the war was old enough to enlist long before the end of the war. South Carolina furnished fifteen regiments to

*When the six regiments of Soutli Carolina regulars were first raised in 1775-76, the men enlisted therein were enlisted for three years, so that when, in 1776, these six regiments Avere taken into the Continental service they were already engaged for three years, although the Continental E'stablishment only required enlistments for six months at a time. This is one reason why Massachusetts could furnish 67,907 to South Carolina's 35,507. The New England States enlisted their regular troops for six months. The following note from page xviii of Drayton's Memoirs (vol. i.) will he of interest in this connection:

"When the Congress began to consider of a Continental army, they were for leaving the army in Massachusetts, as belonging to the Colony, which they were willing to pay - and besides, to raise a Continental one. But the N Delegates said, this army has stood the brunt - you are willing to pay them - why deprive them of rank? Well, they were made continentals. The regulations came on next; the British, were proposed. No, said they, they have signed other articles; and will you impose others upon them? And, this was yielded. The term, was next; the six months the NeAV-Englanders has enlisted for, was thought too short: no, said they, the war will be over in that time - besides, will you make these men serve longer, than they have agreed for? Well, then, they were answered, rescind the resolve for making them continentals. No. And thus it was, that the ruinous policy of' short enlistments obtained. - This from J. Rutledffe. ' ' tin 1774, the population of South Caroli^ia was estimated bj' the Continental Congress at 225,000; but that included the negroes, and negroes did not, strictly speaking, count in^jjopufation (but as property) in that day - a Republican "Committee on Elections" was, a thing, at that time, yet to be created.

the Continental service, and besides, she was never with less than three militia brigades of her own - sometimes five. So that with her Continentals, militia, State troops, (which sometimes acted as Continentals,) old men, women and children very few of her population of 90.000 were left for Tories or neutrals. Consequently, very few of the large number of Germans in Orangeburgh could possibly have been elsewhere than with the Whigs.

Eighteen men were appointed on the "Committee for carrying into execution the Continental Association" for Orangeburgh District in February, 1775; and of this number Henry Felder, Lewis Golson, Adam Snell. Christopher Zahn and Godfrey Drier were undoubtedly Germans, while several other names on the list have a German sound. Surely if all of the Germans were opposed to the Revolution, five Germans would not have been put on a committee of eighteen from one district alone. And again, in August of that same year, of the six members of the State legislature returned for St. Matthew's Parish, one, Henry Felder, was a German. Of the thirty-six justices of the peace for Orangeburgh District, appointed in 1776, five, perhaps more, were Germans. And on that grand jury, which in May, 1776, made such an able and eloquent presentment to Chief-Justice Drayton, the German names Felder, Leitner, Snell, Rickenbacker, Whetstone, Crum and Drehr appear. Henry Felder was the foreman, and it is probable that he wrote the presentment which speaks nothing but the loftiest words of Whig patriotism. Henry Felder was probably educated in Zurich before he left that place, and was doubtless well able to write such a paper, since we have it as a traditionary joke that "whenever he got up in the legislature to present a bill it became a law before he sat down", from which w^e infer that he must have been a John T. Morgan in his day and time. (And there are those who seem to believe that the ability to say a great deal is really ability.) And if handwriting is any test of education then Henry Rickenbacker, of the same jury, must have been educated, for he wrote a beautiful hand, almost like copy plate. There were doubtless many well educated Germans among the Orangeburgh settlers. Their pastor. Rev. Giessendanner, was characterized as "a man of learning, piety and knowledge in the Holy Scriptures", and his book clearly shows that he was at least a man of learning.

But to return to their immediate share in the Revolution. On the list of tax collectors for 1777, for Orangeburgh District, were the German names Felder, Stroul, Kaigler and Geiger. And on the Orangeburgh grand jury, that in 1778, presented as a grievance, "the want of a publick general test by which the foes may be distinguished from the friends of the American cause", and recommended that "the abjuration oath be made general", we find the German names Lewis Golson (foreman), Felder, Whetstone, Harrisperger, Rickenbacker, Drehr and Snell. Surely a loyalist, or a neutral who "did not understand the dispute", would not, in the first place, have been on the grand jury, or have signed such a presentment.

And so on, throughout the war, we find a large percentage of the civic officers of the district, Germans. Much to the same effect might be said of the Germans elsewhere in South Carolina, but this essay deals only with Orangeburgh District.

Now, while the Cuninghams, Evan McLaurin, Moses Kirkland, John Stuart, Joseph Robinson, and other Scotch settlers of the "back country" were Tories, by no means all of the Scotch settlers of South Carolina were Tories. In fact the Tory eienient in South Caro- iina was confined to no special race or creed; they were representatives of every nationality then settled in America, and they were usually either the latest arrivals, or the scum of the ante-Revolutionary society; while the majority of them were the ^'driftwood" of the Northern colonies.

But in Orangehurgh Township there were several ti'ue and tried Scotchmen whose names were scarcely ever absent from the council rolls of the State during the Revolution. Among these were Col, Christopher Rowe, Henry Rowe, Sanjuel Rowe, and Donald Bruce the latter of whom had. up to 1774, been a mer- <diant in Charlestown; though we are told that it was among the Scotch merchants of Charlestown that the most dangerous Tory sentiments were to be found. xAnd even he has been unintentionally misrepresented by that earnest and painstaking historian, Wm. Gilmore Simms, who speaks, in "The Forayers", of the ''widow Bruce" as a loyalist. The fact is there was no widow Bruce until ten years after the close of the war, and her husband was not only a member of the State legislature for several years during the Revolution, but likewise belonged to the Whig army, as was shown by an old letter, written by him during the war, lately in the possession of one of his descendants.

In the dark days just subsequent to the fall of Charlestown the tories of Ninety-Six District, backed by the British army, committed all manner of crimes; murdering, plundering, burning and riding rough shod over the people, while at the same time the people of Orangeburgh District were enjoying comparative quiet, and all because the Tory sentiment was not so strong in that district, and because the post at Ninety-Six was more strongly garrisoned by British regulars than that at Orangeburgh.

famous raid into the back country in Noveniher, 17S1, while Gen. Pickens was busy with the Ninety-Six militia in the lower country, he found little opposition, save in Orangeburgh District, where the brave Rumph proved his match and perhaps a little more than his match. In fact, Cuningham's luck seemed to forsake him whenever he reached Orangeburgh, and, to crown all, his favorite charger, "Ringtail", a blooded mare presented to him by his kinsman, Capt. Patrick Cuningham, died on a roadside near Orangeburgh while Cuningham was on, probably, his last trip to Charlestown, whence he soon after embarked for Nassau, where he spent the remainder of his days, a pensioner of the British government and a wretched example of the South Carolina Loyalist.

The Cuninghams were the most conspicuous Tories in South Carolina. They were people of affluence, wealth and influence. They were Scotch people. They lived in a community composed largely of Scotch and (ierman people. They used their best endeavors to influence their neighbors against the revolutionists; but they were unsuccessful, and two of them died alone in a foreign land.

The number of South Carolina Tories - whether Scotch, or German, or English, or Irish, or Hebrew - has been greatly exagerated. It is time to call a halt. It is time to seek the truth.