With Savannah saved, Sir Henry Clinton continued his renewed Southern strategy by seeking to take the South’s largest city and port, Charleston. Lord Germain was enthusiastic over the objective, arguing ‘The feeble resistance … Prévost met with in his march and retreat through so great a part of South Carolina is an indubitable proof of the indisposition of the inhabitants to support the rebel government.’1
Clinton faced several delays in gathering the expedition to capture the city. Reinforcements finally arrived from the British Isles, allowing him to feel secure about leaving New York with an adequate garrison. His naval commander, Admiral Arbuthnot, remained more interested in the Chesapeake, where it was rumored a few French ships remained, so he advocated a diversion to the Chesapeake as part of the expedition. He sent Andrew Hamond and General Cornwallis to Clinton to convince him of the importance of the diversion. Clinton, however, was skeptical, opposing anything that blurred the focus from the proposed expedition against Charleston.2
By the day after Christmas 1779, the Charleston-destined fleet amounted to ninety-six ships, consisting of transports, supply ships, five ships of the line, and five frigates, including the Roebuck. It was readied at Sandy Hook, but faced a stormy path to its destination, the Tybee Light House at the mouth of the Savannah River, which had figured in d’Estaing’s failed attack. Violent weather created confusion and ships actually returned to Sandy Hook on January 24, but were back in Port Royal after a few days. The fleet had to regroup at Savannah and replace much of its lost ordnance before it sailed northward toward Charleston. Arbuthnot had shifted his flag to the Roebuck so that he now was in daily conference with Hamond. Clinton attributed the success of the expedition’s northward sail to ‘the judicious arrangements’ of Scottish naval Captain George Keith Elphinstone.3 The troops were landed at Seabrook Island from February 17; they then moved closer to Charleston, positioning themselves on marshy James Island at one side of Charleston’s harbor, where Fort Johnson would be taken.
Clinton and Arbuthnot’s tempestuous relationship would continue, which Hamond, who knew Arbuthnot from Halifax, would attempt to mediate. Arbuthnot has been described ‘as a rough old diamond’ who would not have been appointed to the command in ordinary circumstances. He was in his late sixties, not in good health, and ‘wrote in a style so muddled as to make his dispatches obscure and ambiguous.’4 Arbuthnot felt that the navy’s obligation was limited to transporting Clinton’s army to the Charleston area and did not involve participating in a siege, except for leaving a few frigates and smaller craft that could maneuver in the shallows of Charleston’s harbor. Obviously, Clinton expected the navy to remain and fully cooperate in the siege. Arbuthnot would refuse to follow up on Clinton’s requests for naval support during the siege. Hamond got him to apologize to Clinton for ignoring his orders, ultimately bringing the two men uneasily together. It was a more thankless task than Hamond realized, for Clinton evidently resented his ‘ascendency over’ Arbuthnot.
Charleston was the rebellious colonies’ fourth largest city, approaching 12,000 souls and also its wealthiest, with elegant planter and merchant households that were related through intermarriage.5 Built on peninsula between the Ashley and Cooper Rivers, the port was on the latter side. To reach it, ships had to cross an extensive harbor or bay with occasional fortifications, the harbor being obstructed at its mouth by a bar. The rivers offered access to the immediate interior and along them were low country plantations growing rice and indigo (processed to make a blue dyestuff), the source of the city’s wealth. It was no accident that over half the city’s population was black and that the plantations required that its merchants be involved in the slave trade as much as those of Newport. In contrast to the other American ports, it had a decidedly West Indies flavor for that is where it had imported the bulk of its slaves, although some came directly from Africa.
Inside Charleston, the Continental army numbered over 5,000, commanded by General Benjamin Lincoln, while the civilian government was headed by Lieutenant Governor Christopher Gadsden, Governor John Rutledge and most of his council having fled. You will remember that Gadsden had been one of original members of Congress’s Naval Committee. In his twenties, his enthusiasm for a navy had been motivated during King George’s War, when he was the purser on the Royal Navy’s 20-gun Aldborough. The city’s fortifications had been improved, but the flat terrain to its north left it vulnerable to attack. Gadsden would insist that Lincoln not abandon the city, by taking his army in a strategic retreat.6
As we have seen with d’Estaing at Savannah, sieges were to be avoided, unless one had concentrated firepower and time to starve the enemy. These were challenges that Clinton’s expedition would meet. From the naval standpoint, the first obstacle was the bar at the entrance to Charleston’s harbor. The Roebuck and other frigates waited two weeks, until the spring tide with an easterly wind allowed an attempt to get over the bar.7 To lighten the ships, crews had to work feverishly to remove the guns and supplies from Roebuck, the 50-gun Renown, and the 44-gun Romulus. Thus prepared, they moved over the bar unopposed on March 20, and for the next two weeks reinstalled their equipment and arms. After this was accomplished, even the largest British ships were able to slide past. From here they moved toward the inner harbor and port, firing on the rebel post at Point Pleasant, which commanded the first portion of the inner harbor.
By late March, Clinton’s army moved from James Island to above the city, crossing the Ashley River unopposed on seventy-five flatboats and began digging siege entrenchments at the rear of the city.8 In an act of cooperation, Captain Elphinstone had been detached with a party of sailors to aid the crossing.
Still, the impressive fortification on Sullivan’s Island, Fort Moultrie, stood as an obstacle to Arbuthnot’s squadron in reaching the inner harbor. The fleet would have to pass within a quarter of a mile of the fort as they came up the only channel.9 Arbuthnot faced a stronger Fort Moultrie than had the previous British invasion fleet of 1776, in which the fort had inflicted heavy losses on them. On April 9, Arbuthnot’s ships approached Fort Moultrie at 3 p.m. Knowing the fort’s log-braced sand walls could not be breached by cannon fire, Arbuthnot decided against anchoring for a cannonade as the earlier British fleet had done; instead he chose to run by the heavily defended fort. As in the navy’s effort to control the Hudson River in the New York campaign, he felt that once past the stationary fort, his fleet would no longer have obstacles.
The Roebuck and the frigate Richmond served as the van, withstanding the heaviest fire from Fort Moultrie’s 24-pounders. They were followed by four more frigates, six transports, and the 50-gun Renown as the rear guard. From the steeple of St Michael’s Church, an observer watched the passage of Arbuthnot’s ships and remarked: ‘They really make a most noble appearance and I could not help admiring the regularity and intrepidity with which they approached, engaged, and passed Fort Moultrie. It will reflect great honor upon the Admiral and all his captains, but ’tis pity they are not friends.’10 After two hours, and extensive damage to the Richmond and twenty-seven casualties on the Renown, Arbuthnot anchored in the Ashley River, providing Clinton’s army with supplies. On account of the shallowness of the inner harbor, the Roebuck continued to act as Arbuthnot’s flagship.
Two days later, Clinton and Arbuthnot sent a formal summons into the city to surrender as further resistance would be ‘indifference to the fate of the inhabitants’.11 The document was drafted by the pens of Major John Andre and Hamond, now showing cooperation between the commanders. Nothing was unusual about the summons, although General Lincoln rejected it.
Having control of the Ashley River, securing the Cooper River and port on the other side of the city became a priority for Clinton. He found that it was blocked by a massive boom. Lieutenant Josias Rogers, commander of the sloop Fury, volunteered to sever the boom.12 It took three night visits with only a boy to guide his canoe, but he was finally able to cut it. Despite Rogers’ success, it turned out that a substantial portion of the Continental and South Carolina navies had been sunk behind the boom, effectively still blocking the main channel of the Cooper River. Clinton continued to urge Arbuthnot to approach the Cooper River by the narrow and exposed Hog Island Channel. Arbuthnot felt he could not attempt this channel unless batteries at Point Pleasant and Lampriere’s Point were silenced. He based his conviction on a report by Hamond, who had difficulty in sounding the channel because he was fired on from these rebel strongpoints. Clinton fumed because he wanted to have the city completely surrounded, as Arbuthnot continued to delay an approach to the Cooper River.
Arbuthnot’s fleet continued to be exposed to rebel artillery. While the Ashley River was now open, the fleet was under long-range fire from batteries in the city, although most of their shot landed short. Each time Arbuthnot’s ships approached the city they were placed under fire; as a result, they were forced to stand off Fort Johnson for much of the remainder of the siege.13 Shells were thrown into the city, chiefly for the psychological effect as the main portion of the city was almost 2 miles from Arbuthnot’s ships.
Finally, Arbuthnot felt he could move in the direction of the Cooper River. He preferred not to use Clinton’s soldiers, who anyway were heavily involved in the siege. Instead, he sent his sailors to take the Point Pleasant battery and word came that nearby Fort Moultrie was vulnerable. On May 4, Captains John Orde and Charles Hudson led 200 seamen and marines in ships’ boats to Sullivan’s Island. This detachment succeeded in passing the fort before daylight, unobserved by the rebels, and took possession of a redoubt on the east end of the island. After some negotiation, the fort’s commander surrendered his garrison of 117 Continentals and 100 militia without resistance.14 Fort Moultrie contained forty-one guns, four mortars and supplies of powder and ammunition. Charleston’s principal fortification was now in the hands of the Royal Navy.
Clinton continued the siege using several heavy guns loaned from Arbuthnot’s fleet. He gained control of the Cooper River’s upper reaches using his own troops and Charleston was completely cut off. After negotiation, Lincoln capitulated on May 12, 1780, surrendering the garrison and the remaining warships, the largest military concentration in the South. One naval historian has called the Charleston Campaign ‘the biggest and most successful British amphibious operation ever mounted’.15
The surrender brought an end to the careers of many Continental officers and ships. Among the losses was Captain Abraham Whipple of Rhode Island, who had been critical of Hopkins at the Glasgow affair, led the squadron that took prizes from the Jamaican Convoy in Newfoundland, and had brought the Ranger to defend Charleston. In fact, many of its guns had been transferred to the land to defend the city, while the Queen of France, Notre Dame, General Moultrie, Bricole and Truite were sunk at the mouth of the Cooper River in the effort to block it during the siege. Most of these ships were from the South Carolina navy, which disappeared with their loss. Those Continental ships that remained in the Cooper River were trapped when the city fell. Whipple was made a prisoner and paroled to Chester, Pennsylvania, the end of his service in the Continental Navy. The Ranger’s career under the Stars and Stripes had lasted only four years.16 The Royal Navy converted it into HMS Halifax, which sailed to Portsmouth Dockyard, where it was immediately put up for sale. It was purchased by a Plymouth merchant, who paid only a small fraction of its original cost and used it for coastal trade. Its ultimate fortune is not known, but it is clear that the Royal Navy had no use for it.
With the exception of New York, the occupation of Charleston would be one of the longest and most successful, especially in contrast to the difficulties the British would face in the rest of South Carolina. The Clinton–Arbuthnot expedition had viewed Charleston principally as a naval base from which Carolina trade could be controlled. Lord Germain, however, suggested that it should also be considered a base from which to encourage Loyalism and subdue the inland South.17 It became the duty of the army, now commanded by General Charles Cornwallis, to move the war to the Carolina interior and see that it was pacified.
After the surrender, Clinton and Arbuthnot had been designated joint commissioners to administer Charleston, a situation which perpetuated their differences.18 Arbuthnot urged immediate implementation of a city civilian government to enhance Loyalism, while Clinton hesitated, promising only that it would happen at a future date. In practice, for close to three years, the city would remain under Clinton’s interim government.
Actually, Charleston had never had an incorporated city government, its civilian defense had been coordinated by the state, so that its previous governing experience was limited. Clinton’s interim government established several boards of prominent citizens to administer the town. A Board of Police was created as an interim civil authority, a system that was an improvement over the colonial government’s relatively negligent rule.19 William Bull II, the former lieutenant governor and a plantation owner, returned and was named Intendant General of the Police Board. Commissioners were appointed to oversee the markets, internments, streets and address numbers, and civil suits. As cattle and rice were found in plantations around the city, Clinton created Commissaries of Captures to take charge of fresh provisions obtained from these sources. For Loyalists, the city was actually running smoother than ever and business opportunities were ample. Those who publicly pledged loyalty to the crown enjoyed greater personal and commercial freedoms, while those who secretly scorned the occupying power were ignored.
Charleston’s port was revived as a center of trade. From July 1780, Cornwallis gave the Intendant General of Police and the superintendent of the port control over the city’s trade.20 Merchants who wished to export commodities had to present a certificate to the superintendent of the port and the captain of the ship exporting the goods had to document his intentions. Goods shipped without the certificate could be confiscated. Ships’ captains pledged and posted bond that they would carry cargo exclusively to the British Isles. Vessels trading only locally were forbidden to land cargo any place but Charleston, and the penalty was seizure and sale of the ship and cargo. Initially, trade revived with the British Isles as well as locally with Savannah, Georgetown, South Carolina and St Augustine. Illicit trade between the city and the countryside also flourished as the rebels sought munitions to carry on the war and the popular British manufactures. In return, food appeared to feed the city’s expanded population which now included the British military and large numbers of white and black Loyalists.
A Royal Navy careening yard was established in Charleston, known for its ample naval stores. Navy convoys carried supplies to Charleston, Savannah and St Augustine, and the navy’s protection of trade continued as rebel privateers increased in Carolina waters. Along with Captain James Gambier’s Raleigh, the Roebuck, under its new commander, Andrew Snape Douglas, left Virginia and returned to occupied Charleston on November 21, 1780 where the two ships spent months protecting the trade entering the city and patrolling its environs. By the end of the year, further assistance was requested as ‘many vessels have been taken of great value within sight of the town’.21 In February, additional protection came from two schooners, paid for by the contributions of Charleston merchants.
To dispose of captured prizes, the vice-admiralty court in Savannah sent a representative to take depositions on captured vessels and send them to the court to be tried. Finally, in October 1781, Charleston’s own vice-admiralty court reopened, acting independently of the military authorities.22 This was just in time, as several privateering raids originated in Charleston in the following year. To the south, Beaufort, half the size of Charleston, but better protected by the Outer Banks, dominated Port Royal Sound. In March 1782, Major Andrew Deveaux, son of a Beaufort Loyalist planter, planned the attack on his home town. Three Loyalist privateers, the Peacock (Captain Duncan McLean), Rose and Retaliation, left Charleston for the Carolina coast to take prizes and capture public stores believed to be in Beaufort. On April 4, the privateer squadron entered Beaufort Harbor without identifying itself and seized the pilots and townspeople who went out to greet them. The next day, Loyalist militia rowed ashore under Major Isaac Stuart and captured Beaufort, driving off local militia gathered by planter Lieutenant Colonel John Easton. The privateers spent the next five days plundering the town and vessels in the harbor, and skirmishing with local militiamen, who increased in numbers from neighboring communities. Having spiked the cannon in the town battery, the Loyalists returned to their ships but remained in the harbor, where they were able to take an incoming sloop. The town sent two fire rafts against them, but they failed to do damage and an exchange of prisoners (whalers, townspeople, slaves) was negotiated. On April 17, the privateers returned to Charleston’s vice-admiralty court with their prizes. Charleston would remain in British hands for the rest of the war.
Excepting only George Elphinstone, Clinton continued to feud with Royal Navy officers. His last bone of contention was over the valuable prizes surrendered in Charleston Harbor. Clinton claimed the navy took more than half of them, while they comprised only a third of the expedition. He complained that the £10,000 that the army had ‘taken and lodged with their agents until His Majesty’s pleasure should be known’, had not been awarded, ‘as the Lords of His Majesty’s Treasury … have neglected it’.23 Clinton had no idea that this was normal for the distribution of prize money, and he would continue to argue over the army’s share of prizes even after he had returned to England and the war was over.