Battle of Beaufort

Near Beaufort, South Carolina, on February 3, 1779, opposing forces clashed in what became known as either the Battle of Beaufort or the Battle of Port Royal Island, an episode within the wider Revolutionary War. This engagement occurred shortly after British troops had tightened their grip on Savannah, Georgia, a city they had taken in December 1778.

In late January 1779, Brigadier General Augustine Prevost dispatched a contingent of 200 British regulars with orders to capture Port Royal Island, situated where the Broad River meets the sea in South Carolina. In response, Major General Benjamin Lincoln, who held command of American forces in the southern theater, ordered South Carolina's Brigadier General William Moultrie to march from Purrysburg and confront the approaching British troops. Moultrie's command consisted largely of militia, supplemented by a small number of Continental Army soldiers. Neither side achieved a decisive victory in the fighting that followed, though the British ultimately pulled back first and endured greater losses than their American opponents.

Battle

On February 2, Gardner's troops came ashore on Port Royal Island at the plantation belonging to Andrew Deveaux, a Loyalist who possibly showed them the way and whose land is now known as Laurel Bay. Gardner dispatched a small group to hold the island end of the ferry crossing, but this detachment pulled back after running into Patriot forces. Following this, Gardner set his main body in motion toward Beaufort, intending to confront the American defenders.

Word of the British landing reached General Moultrie early the next morning, February 3, prompting him to lead his troops away from town. The opposing sides converged near Gray's Hill, the tallest point on Port Royal Island, situated roughly three miles (4.8 km) south of the ferry crossing and near the island's center.

Positioning his men along the tree line close to the hill's summit, Gardner ordered an advance with bayonets drawn. Moultrie's forces, meanwhile, took up a position in an open field, staying beyond the reach of enemy muskets. Moultrie arranged a pair of six-pound cannons at the heart of his formation, adding a lighter two-pounder to bolster his right flank. It was the Americans who then pushed forward against the British line, a reversal that Moultrie himself noted, remarking that the roles were switched from typical engagements between the two sides, since the British sought cover in the brush while his own men stood exposed in the clearing.

Artillery fire from the Americans came first, followed by successive rounds of musket volleys. The exchange lasted around forty-five minutes before American ammunition supplies grew thin. Just as Moultrie ordered his men to fall back, the British were seen doing the same, abandoning the contested ground to the Americans. A mounted militia unit pursued the retreating British, coming close to severing their path to the waiting boats. In the end, twenty-six British soldiers were taken prisoner, though the militia's limited numbers made it impossible to detain every captive.

Aftermath

Beyond the captives seized in the fighting (accounts differ on whether seven or twelve were held), the British are said to have lost 40 men killed or wounded, though men who deserted claimed that nearly half of Gardner's force had been struck by American gunfire. On the American side, losses were far lighter: 8 dead and 22 wounded.

Prevost placed blame on Gardner for the beating his detachment took, faulting him for wandering too far from his boats. Yet the absence of Loyalist backing was hardly something Gardner could have controlled. For the Americans, seeing a force made up largely of militia overcome British regulars gave a real lift to spirits. That momentum stalled, however, when crushing defeats at Brier Creek in early March pushed back American designs on confronting Prevost's army in Georgia. By April, as Lincoln pushed his troops toward Augusta, Prevost responded by marching in strength on Charleston, yet his campaign amounted to little beyond a short blockade of the city before he pulled his men back to Savannah. During this same campaign, British forces reoccupied Port Royal Island.

Today a marker along U.S. Route 21 near the site keeps the memory of the battle alive, and what remains of Fort Lyttelton holds a place on the National Register of Historic Places. By mid-2023, more than 12 acres of the battlefield had been safeguarded through the efforts of the American Battlefield Trust and its partner organizations.