General Gate's Disgrace
When the militia fled before the initial British charge, Gates tried to rally them. However, the throng of panicked militiamen swept him up in their northward flight.
Far removed from the battlefield, Gates assumed that his army had been defeated and he decided to go to Charlotte to regroup. Finding neither troops nor supplies there, Gates rode on to Hillsborough, NC to seek help from North Carolina’s state legislature.
Although the Continental Congress initially backed Gates, his political enemies exploited his three-day journey from the battlefield as an act of cowardice. He was removed from command, and his reputation never recovered.
“Was there ever an instance of a General running away as Gates has done?” Alexander Hamilton
Marker can be reached from Flat Rock Road (South Carolina Route 58).
Courtesy hmdb.org
