Black Mingo Creek:
Fighting Among Neighbors
In September 1780, Francis Marion returned to South Carolina after a short tactical retreat into the swamps of eastern North Carolina. Hearing that British and Loyalist forces were burning the homes of Whig militiamen in Williamsburg District, Col. Marion aimed to challenge their control of the area.
Marion marched his men across the Great Pee Dee and Lynches Rivers to strike at a Tory detachment at Sheppard’s Ferry on Black Mingo Creek. Stationed at Patrick Dollard’s tavern less than a mile downstream from the trading village of Willtown, some fifty Tory militiamen under the command of Capt. John Coming Ball guarded the ferry crossing.
Arriving at night, Marion crossed the Black Mingo on a bridge at Willtown. The sound of the horses' hooves on the wooden planks roused the Tories, who formed a line in a clearing opposite Dollard’s tavern (located across the creek from you on the other side of the bridge). Marion divided his force into three detachments, attempting to surround them. The brief but bloody fight sent most of the Tories fleeing into the nearby swamps (behind you on this side of the creek), leaving the Whigs with a considerable store of much-needed weapons, ammunition, and horses. After the destruction of so many homes in Williamsburg, the victory at Black Mingo provided an important boost ~ practical and psychological ~ to the Patriot cause in eastern South Carolina.
Marker can be reached from South Carolina Route 41.
Courtesy hmdb.org
