Kings Mountain and Cowpens: Our Victory Was Complete (Military)

From the rocky slopes of Kings Mountain to the plains of Hannah’s Cowpens, the Carolina backcountry hosted two of the Revolutionary War’s most critical battles. On October 7, 1780, the Battle of Kings Mountain utilized guerilla techniques―American Over Mountain Men wearing buckskin and hunting shirts and armed with hunting rifles attacked Loyalist troops from behind trees, resulting in an overwhelming Patriot victory. In January of the next year, the Battle of Cowpens saw a different strategy but a similar outcome: with brilliant military precision, Continental Regulars, dragoons, and Patriot militia executed the war’s only successful double envelopment maneuver to defeat the British. Using firsthand accounts and careful analysis of the best classic and modern scholarship on the subject, historian Robert Brown demonstrates how the combination of both battles facilitated the downfall of General Charles Cornwallis and led to the Patriot victory in America.