Author: Andrew Waters

Andrew Waters is a writer, editor, and land conservationist residing in Spartanburg, South Carolina. He is the editor of three slave narrative collections published by John F. Blair, Publisher. His fiction and nonfiction have appeared in Wake Forest University Magazine, the Spartanburg Herald Journal, North Carolina Literary Review, and Pembroke Magazine, among others. As a conservationist, he has preserved over 20,000 acres in the Carolinas. Currently he is working with the National Park Service to conserve areas around Revolutionary War battlefields in the South Carolina Upstate. Waters is a frequent speaker on conservation issues and a local expert on battlefield conservation. His latest book is To the End of the World: Nathanael Greene, Charles Cornwallis, and the Race to the Dan.

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Crime and Justice Posted on

William “Bloody Bill” Cunningham and the Bloody Scout

On or about November 19, 1781, a Loyalist officer named William Cunningham and his regiment of approximately three hundred men rode toward Hayes Station, a fortified log home, or “blockhouse,” in the Little River District, surrounding western South Carolina’s Little River primarily in what is now Laurens County, South Carolina.[1] Now commanding the outpost was […]

by Andrew Waters
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Critical Thinking Posted on

The Mysterious March of Horatio Gates

Following the American surrender at Charleston on May 12, 1780, the Continental Army’s “Southern Department” was in disarray. Taken prisoner that day were 245 officers and 2,326 enlisted, including Maj. Gen. Benjamin Lincoln, the Southern Department’s commander-in-chief, along with militia and armed citizens, the most American prisoners surrendered at one time during the American Revolution.[1] […]

by Andrew Waters
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Conflict & War Posted on

Hammond’s Store: The “Dirty War’s” Prelude to Cowpens

Little is known about the colonial-era history of Hammond’s Store, though the site appears to have been a local meeting place prior to the American Revolution. A 1775 proclamation of South Carolina’s Second Provincial Congress listed “Hammond’s old store” as the election polling place for the newly established “Little River” electoral district.[1] A letter from […]

by Andrew Waters
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Conflict & War Posted on

Thomas Sumter’s Dog Days Expedition

As Nathanael Greene retreated from Ninety Six in late June 1781, following his unsuccessful siege there, Thomas Sumter was eager to campaign in lower South Carolina. This was a stratagem the Gamecock had employed before.  Following Greene’s defeat at Hobkirk’s Hill on April 25, 1781, Sumter quickly opened a campaign against the British supply depots […]

by Andrew Waters
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Features Posted on

Sumter’s Rounds: The Ill-Fated Campaign of Thomas Sumter, February–March 1781

In February 1781, Thomas Sumter emerged from his three-month convalescence to begin his next campaign in the South Carolina interior. Having been wounded seriously in the back, chest, and shoulder at the Battle of the Blackstocks, leading his militia army against a combined force of British regulars and volunteers commanded by the notorious Lt. Col. […]

by Andrew Waters