In March 1781, General Nathanael Greene decided to finally confront Lord Charles Cornwallis’s British army in a pitched battle and selected Guilford Courthouse in western North Carolina as the spot. Greene positioned his troops as Daniel Morgan had at Cowpens, with two ranks of militia in front and a final line of seasoned Continentals led by Colonels Otho Williams and John Howard. With hand-to-hand fighting raging just in front of him and the contest hanging in the balance, Cornwallis ordered his artillery to fire grapeshot point blank into the mass.

After the Battle of Cowpens, General Daniel Morgan began a rapid retreat north to put some distance between him and Lord Charles Cornwallis’s 2,500-battle hardened veterans who were coming their way. To gain time, General Nathanael Greene, the commander of the southern Continental Army, split his force, sending Colonel Otho Williams and a light corps on a different route, hoping to pull Cornwallis away from the slow-moving main army.

On the morning of January 17, 1781, General Daniel Morgan arrayed his Continentals and militiamen for battle in a South Carolina field known as Hannah’s Cowpens. Morgan placed his 1,400 men in three lines 150 yards apart. He instructed the front-rank militiamen to fire two volleys at the British and then retire to the rear and told the second line to do the same. The last line of defense was comprised of 450 battle-hardened Continental Army veterans from Delaware and Maryland, men that Morgan knew would stand their ground.

Daniel Morgan received a captain’s commission from the Continental Congress in June 1775, and soon raised a force of 96 skilled riflemen much like himself, hardy and fearless, and toughened by years of fighting with Native Americans. The merit of Morgan’s riflemen was quickly recognized, and they were selected to accompany Colonel Benedict Arnold on a mission to capture Quebec in British Canada.

Daniel Morgan, who rose to national prominence during the American Revolution, was born in New Jersey in 1736. At 17, after a fight with his father, young Daniel left home, settling in western Virginia. Daniel became a wagoner and, by age 20, was 6 feet 2 inches and a tower of strength. He had a cheerful nature and a natural intelligence. Following the French and Indian War, Morgan continued his work as a wagoner, became known as the toughest man in the county, and settled down to a peaceful married life in the beautiful foothills of western Virginia.