Hanging Rock (Second)

On August 6, 1780, Patriot and Loyalist forces clashed at Hanging Rock in an engagement of the American Revolutionary War. The fight formed one piece of militia General Thomas Sumter's broader effort to strike at or wipe out British and Loyalist outposts scattered across the South Carolina back-country, positions that had gone up in the wake of Charleston's fall in May 1780. Among those who fought that day were a thirteen-year-old Andrew Jackson, who would later become President, along with his brother Robert.

Decades of neglect and unchecked development eventually caught the attention of preservationists: in 2026, the National Trust for Historic Preservation placed the Hanging Rock Revolutionary War Battlefield on its yearly list of "America's 11 Most Endangered Historic Places," citing the site's lack of safeguards amid growing real estate pressure in the surrounding area.

Background

For much of 1779 and into the early months of 1780, Britain's campaign to reclaim its rebellious colonies in the south was proceeding smoothly. British troops had seized Savannah and Charleston, and they crushed what remained of the Continental Army's presence in South Carolina during the Battle of Waxhaws. With both Georgia and South Carolina firmly under their control, the British set up a series of outposts throughout the interior of these states, aiming to draw Loyalist support and stamp out Patriot resistance. Hanging Rock, located in what is now Lancaster County, South Carolina, became the site of one such post. Positioned as the northernmost of these British strongholds, it held a substantial garrison exceeding 1,400 Loyalist soldiers. This force included 500 regulars from the Prince of Wales' American Regiment, alongside local Loyalist militia units and a handful of dragoons belonging to the British Legion. Major John Carden held overall command of these combined forces.

On the American side, Brigadier General Thomas Sumter led an assortment of units: Major Richard Winn's regiment from Fairfield, Colonel Edward Lacey's men from Chester, Colonel William Hill's York regiment, and Major William Richardson Davie's Waxhaws forces from Lancaster county, supported by Colonel Robert Irwin's cavalry from Mecklenburg county, North Carolina. Sumter set his sights on the British post at Rocky Mount, situated along the Catawba River west of Hanging Rock, and launched his assault there on August 1, 1780. To support this effort, he sent Davie on a separate diversionary strike against Hanging Rock itself. Davie's men managed to storm a fortified house, seizing 60 horses along with a quantity of arms, though this action failed to stop the British from dispatching reinforcements from Hanging Rock to bolster the Rocky Mount garrison. When the assault on Rocky Mount ultimately failed, Sumter turned his attention to Hanging Rock, now depleted of some of its defenders, and resolved to strike there instead.

Battle

Sumter settled on striking the camp with three columns of mounted men. As dawn broke, the opening charge fell upon the Loyalist militia, and Winn's and Davie's men shattered them completely. Captain McCulloch's company within the British Legion managed only a single volley before Sumter's riflemen scattered them as well. Heavy fire also tore into the Prince of Wales' American Regiment, inflicting losses of a severe nature. A portion of that regiment recovered, however, slipping into nearby woods where they arranged themselves cleverly enough to halt the American advance with an unexpected crossfire. This bought the Loyalists time to form a hollow square at the center of the open ground, bolstering their position further with a three-pound cannon that some of Rugeley's Camden militia had left behind.

Amid the chaos of combat, Carden's composure failed him, and he handed his command over to a junior officer beneath him, a moment that proved pivotal in the Americans' favor. Captain Rousselet, leading infantry from the British Legion, pressed a charge that drove a good number of Sumter's troops backward. Sumter's shortage of ammunition kept total victory over the Loyalists out of reach. Three unbroken hours of fighting wore on, and the heat and thirst grew so intense that many combatants collapsed.

Aftermath

Casualties told a lopsided story: the Loyalists came away with 192 men either killed or wounded, while the Americans counted only 12 dead and 41 injured. During the fighting, some American soldiers stumbled upon a rum supply within the Loyalist camp, and drinking got the better of them. Too drunk to rejoin the fight, these men wandered off from the engagement and headed back toward the main encampment at Waxhaw. Today, the site where the clash occurred holds a place on the National Register of Historic Places, with oversight falling to the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources. By mid-2023, ongoing preservation efforts by the American Battlefield Trust, working alongside various partners, had secured 172 acres (0.70 km2) of the historic ground.