33 2 The Winning of the West 



British forces were composed in bulk of the Carolina 

 loyalists troops similar to the Americans who 

 joined the mountaineers at Quaker Meadows and 

 the Cowpens ; 48 the difference being that besides these 

 lowland militia, there were arrayed on one side the 

 men from the Holston, Watauga, and Nolichucky, 

 and on the other the loyalist regulars. Ferguson 

 had, all told, between nine hundred and a thousand 

 troops, a hundred and twenty or thirty of them be- 

 ing the regulars or "American Volunteers/' the re- 

 mainder tory militia. 49 The forces were very nearly 



in every way more worthy of credence ; but the point is set- 

 tled beyond dispute by Hill's narrative. Hill was one of the 

 four hundred men with Williams, and he expressly states 

 that after the junction at the Cowpens the force, from both 

 commands, that started out numbered nine hundred and 

 thirty-three. The question is thus definitely settled. Most 

 of the later accounts simply follow the statements Shelby 

 made in his old age. 



48 There were many instances of brothers and cousins in 

 the opposing ranks at King's Mountain; a proof of the simi- 

 larity in the character of the forces. 



49 The American official account says that they captured 

 the British provision returns, according to which their force 

 amounted to eleven hundred and twenty-five men. It fur- 

 ther reports, of the regulars nineteen killed, thirty-five 

 wounded and left on the ground as unable to march, and 

 seventy-eight captured; of the tories two hundred and six 

 killed, one hundred and twenty-eight wounded and left on 

 the ground unable to march, and six hundred and forty-eight 

 captured. The number of tories killed must be greatly ex- 

 aggerated. Allaire, in his diary, says Ferguson had only 

 eight hundred men, but almost in the same sentence enumer- 

 ates nine hundred and six, giving of the regulars nineteen 

 killed, thirty-three wounded, and sixty-four captured (one 

 hundred and sixteen in all, instead of one hundred and 

 thirty-two, as in the American account), and of the tories 



