Little River Regiment Research Project Timeline1759–1787
A working chronology of every dated event this project has gathered — from the Snow Campaign through the Bloody Scout — built from pension applications, militia pay records, battlefield archaeology, and county histories. Where sources disagree on a date, both are kept, not silently resolved.
1 · Settlement & the Snow Campaign
1759–1776Frontier forts, first settlement, and the militia district that everyone in this project eventually serves in — the Little River Regiment — takes shape.
Fairforest Baptist Church founded
RegionalThe “first Baptist church in the up country,” on the Broad River, moves to Fairforest in 1762. Its Revolutionary-era congregation later fills the ranks of Col. Thomas Brandon’s Fairforest Regiment, which reinforces Washington’s march to Hammond’s Store in December 1780.
Research Library — Hammond’s Store march-route research
Cherokee War — frontier forts built
RegionalBlockhouse construction across the upper Piedmont, including the old blockhouse that becomes Hayes Station/Edgehill — the same structure Col. Joseph Hayes’s men are surrounded in twenty years later.
Hayes Station Massacre — Military Histories of the 14, Overview
William “Bloody Bill” Cunningham settles in Laurens County
LaurensBorn Augusta County, VA, 1757; settles in Laurens County as a young man, more than a decade before his name becomes attached to the district’s most notorious wartime violence.
Research Library — Wood 2026 biography entry
Col. James Williams settles on Little River
LaurensWilliams settles on Little River, Laurens District, at a plantation he names “Mount Pleasant” — the property that later becomes the fortified British/Loyalist post known as Williams’s Fort.
Service Records – James Williams, §1
James Williams elected to the First Provincial Congress
RegionalElected in Charleston, representing the district between the Broad and Saluda rivers.
Service Records – James Williams, §2
Militia reorganized into twelve regiments
RegionalThe Second Provincial Congress reorganizes the militia; three of the twelve new regiments cover “the Fork,” the district between the Broad and Saluda rivers.
The Snow Campaign
Laurens RegionalCol. Richard Richardson’s Patriot force secures the Fork with little bloodshed: crosses the Saluda from Granby, marches up the Charleston Road to Levi Casey’s plantation on Duncan Creek, fords “the Great Survey” below Casey’s tract on Dec. 12, then pushes on to Liberty Hill and Hollingsworth’s Mill, camping there Christmas Day during the two-foot snowfall that names the campaign. Company commanders named: Capt. James Williams of Little River and Capt. Robert McCreary of Duncan Creek.
Duncan 1999, p. 15
The Little River District is created
LaurensCongress re-districts the Fork into three militia districts. The middle one, the Little River District, covers most of present-day Laurens County and northwest Newberry County, including all of Duncan Creek — the birth of the regiment this whole project’s cast of characters serves in.
Duncan 1999, p. 14
Cherokee War campaign
RegionalSeneca Town, Cherokee Towns, and Tamassee (August), then the Coweecho River (September) — early documented service for a young Joseph Hayes.
Hayes Station Massacre doc, entry #1
2 · Backcountry militia service
1777–1780A decade before it becomes famous for the worst of the war, the Little River Regiment fights unglamorous, faraway campaigns — Florida, Savannah, Stono — while Charleston’s fall in May 1780 turns the home district itself into a battlefield.
James Dillard appointed Sergeant Major
Regional DisputedUnder Capt. Josiah Greer/Col. James Williams, on a four-month Florida expedition under Gen. Andrew Williamson. Robert Long’s own pension file dates the same expedition to 1778 — a one-year discrepancy between the two men’s sworn accounts, unresolved.
James & Mary Dillard, §1
East Florida expedition
RegionalUnder Gen. Andrew Williamson — Robert Long’s first tour, under Capt. Josiah Greer, then Lieut. Col. Robert McCrery. Named subordinates: Lieut. John D. Cue (Kilgore’s company), Lieuts. Matthew McCrery & James McNees(e) (Greer’s), Adjutant Lockley Leonard, Quartermaster Charles Smith.
Little River Regiment – Officer Roster; Logan Manuscript
Pursuit of “Col. Boyd’s” Tories
RegionalUnder Robert McCrery, with Thomas Brandon.
Kettle Creek campaign, Georgia
RegionalWilliam Cunningham’s first documented killing — of Patriot William Ritchie.
Research Library — Wood 2026 entry
Battle of Briar Creek, GA, and Cunningham’s Charleston imprisonment
RegionalJoseph Hayes present at Briar Creek (March 1779). Separately this year, Cunningham gathers roughly 600 Loyalists from the Ninety Six district to reinforce Col. Archibald Campbell’s army in Georgia — only 330 actually arrive at Briar Creek. Cunningham is “twice attacked” en route, later captured during Prevost’s campaign, and held four months in the Charleston jail before escaping.
Dunlap-Cunningham Parallels, §7
Battle of Stono Ferry
RegionalCol. James Williams commands a militia detachment; Joseph Hayes and James Dillard both present.
Service Records – James Williams §3; Hayes Station Massacre doc §1
The James Williams Petition
Regional“Lieutenant Levi Casey,” Capt. Thomas Dugan, and Lieut. Robert Dugan sign in defense of Col. James Williams against backcountry accusations of misconduct.
Levi Casey doc, §1
Siege of Savannah
RegionalJoseph Hayes present. Levi Casey furnishes provisions for his own company “on their March from Savannah,” Oct. 26, 1779.
Levi Casey doc, §1
Creek Indian expedition
RegionalRobert Long’s tour under Capt. Joseph Greer and Maj. Robert Gillam. The expedition’s target, Alexander Cameron, escapes after being forewarned — “supposed by Gen. Williamson, then a traitor,” per Robert Long’s own later account, a full year before Williamson’s actual 1780 defection.
Little River Regiment – Officer Roster
Fall of Charleston
RegionalRoughly 5,000 Continentals captured — the war’s greatest single Patriot loss. James Williams flees to North Carolina; most Little River militia “take protection,” including companies under now-Col. Robert McCreary. Joseph Hayes is commissioned Captain in this same window.
Duncan 1999, p. 15; Hayes Station Massacre doc §1
Retreat toward Camden — McCrery’s company surrenders
RegionalRobert Long’s tour under Capt. Joseph Greer/Maj. Gillam. Lieut. Col. Robert McCrery surrenders to the Tories with Capt. Greer’s company of 30 men — a dramatic, otherwise-undocumented episode for an officer who commands Robert Long’s company on three separate tours.
Little River Regiment – Officer Roster, via the Logan Manuscript
Ferguson marches through Williams’s Fort
LaurensFerguson’s force marches from Ninety Six via Williams’s Fort, across the Enoree, in pursuit of retreating Patriots — the first documented use of the Williams plantation as a British/Loyalist post.
Duncan 1999, p. 16
James Williams writes home from Sumter’s camp
RegionalWriting from “Catawba Old Nation,” Williams gives his wife a (as it turned out, over-optimistic) troop estimate for the approaching Camden campaign.
Service Records – James Williams, §4
Battle of Camden
RegionalRawdon and Cornwallis rout Gates — background context for the collapse of organized Patriot resistance that turns the backcountry into the partisan war this project tracks.
Battle of Musgrove Mill
Laurens DisputedOn the Enoree, at the northeast corner of Laurens District. Cols. Isaac Shelby, James Williams, and Elijah Clarke (500–700 men) defeat a Tory force of roughly 500 under Col. Innis; Williams himself wounds Innis. Capt. Shadrick Inman leads a flanking/decoy party. Patriot losses run about 13 dead against 220+ Tory casualties (Duncan 1999); Samuel Hammond’s own account gives narrower figures. One period source (Moultrie’s own Memoirs) misdates the fight to “Feb. 18, 1780” — an acknowledged period error, not a real second date. The next day, Aug. 20, a Samuel Ewing horse-loss claim places him at Duncan Creek.
Duncan 1999 pp. 15–16; Service Records – James & Mary Dillard; Little River Regiment – Officer Roster
Joseph Hayes becomes Colonel
LaurensHayes succeeds Col. James Williams as commander of the Little River Regiment, whose formal command had dissolved after the fall of Charleston.
Hayes Station Massacre doc §1; Duncan 1999 p. 16
Williams authorized to raise 100 horsemen
RegionalGen. Nash’s order, issued from Hillsborough, NC.
Balfour assesses Maj. James Dunlap, in writing
RegionalWriting to Cornwallis: “active, knowing in the country… rather too far forward in his patrols, by which he got into scrapes.” The line that later reads very differently once Dunlap is dead and Cunningham has inherited his command.
Dunlap-Cunningham Parallels, §8 — Cornwallis Papers II:92
3 · Kings Mountain to Hammond’s Store
Oct.–Dec. 1780The Little River Regiment’s founding colonel is killed at Kings Mountain; six weeks later, in one brutal week, his home plantation is fought over twice more — while Tarleton passes through the same country chasing Sumter to Blackstocks.
Battle of Kings Mountain
RegionalFerguson’s force is destroyed. Col. James Williams, commander of the Little River Regiment, is the senior Patriot officer killed — shot between the shoulders while urging his men up the mountain; he dies the next morning (per his sons’ own Oct. 13 letter: “wounded on the 7th, died on the 8th, buried… on the 9th”). The regiment isn’t present as a unit but is represented individually — Joseph Hayes, James Dillard, John Boyce among them. The rendezvous beforehand was at Island Ford on the Broad River.
Service Records – James Williams §§6–7; Duncan 1999 p. 16
Robert Long returns to service via Odell’s Ford
LaurensRejoins Levi Casey’s still-active company after Kings Mountain.
Duncan 1999, p. 16
The regiment shifts to watch Williams’s Fort
LaurensUnder new Col. Joseph Hayes, the Little River Regiment moves south of the Enoree to watch the Loyalist garrison now holding Williams’s Fort. Capt. Samuel Ewing’s company is sent to reconnoiter near Ninety Six — and, as a result, misses Blackstocks entirely.
Battle of Fishdam Ford
RegionalMaj. James Wemyss’s night attack on Sumter, repulsed. Checked as a candidate for Mary Dillard’s warning ride — not corroborated (see Blackstocks, below).
Tarleton crosses the Broad River, pursuing Sumter
RegionalCrosses at Shirer’s Ferry; passes “Williams’ house” — probably the same Mount Pleasant/Williams’s Fort property; marches to Indian Creek; camps on the Enoree.
Mary Dillard’s ride
LaurensTarleton crosses a ford on the Enoree and pushes to the Tyger. Per family tradition and two SC state-park sources, Mary (Ramage) Dillard, of the Enoree-River homestead near Jones Ford, overhears a Loyalist supper party’s plans and rides through the night to warn Sumter. Tarleton’s own memoir describes an unnamed “woman on horseback” who reached Sumter first with word the British approached “without infantry or cannon” — the detail that let Sumter’s council choose to stand and fight.
James & Mary Dillard, §2 & §5
Battle of Blackstock’s Plantation
Regional DisputedOn the Tyger River, ~5 miles northeast of Cross Anchor. Sumter (~400 men) forms a defensive line among Blackstock’s buildings; Tarleton’s advance cavalry (170 Legion + 80 of the 63rd) is thrown back with heavy losses to the 63rd; Sumter is badly wounded and evacuated toward Wofford’s Iron Works, then North Carolina; Twiggs assumes command. Casualty counts vary widely by source — 2 Americans killed per O’Kelley vs. Winn’s own contemporary count of 1; British losses anywhere from 50 to 100+.
Battle of Blackstocks — Harris Battlefield Study
Skirmish at Thomas Dugan’s house
LaurensGilder’s Creek, Newberry County, on the Laurens border. Capt. Levi Casey’s company, plus three others (~40 men total, “well under strength”), crosses the Enoree and attacks 60 Tories camped there.
Duncan 1999, p. 16 — previously undocumented in this project
Washington’s waypoint on the road to Hammond’s Store
LaurensLt. Col. William Washington reports to Greene from “the property of Robert McClary/McCrery,” on the main road from Grindal Shoals to Hammond’s Store, probably just south of the Enoree.
Research Library — Hammond’s Store march route
Washington’s detachment departs Grindal Shoals
Regional DisputedMorgan’s own report to Greene gives Dec. 29; Robert Long’s pension application instead gives sunset, Dec. 27. Route, per local tradition: Fairforest Meeting House → Duncan’s Creek Presbyterian Church → Hurricane Meeting House → Hammond’s Store.
Battle of Hammond’s Store
Laurens DisputedOn the Bush River, Little River District, near present-day Clinton. Washington’s dragoons and militia (~280–285 total) rout a Loyalist raiding party (~250–260) with zero Patriot casualties — roughly 100–150 Loyalist killed/wounded, ~40 captured. Loyalist command is disputed four ways: Col. Thomas Waters (the modern-scholarship consensus); “Cunningham” (pension testimony, almost certainly misattributed to the later-notorious William Cunningham, present only as a captain under Waters); “Col. Pearson and Maj. Ben Wofford” (Joseph McJunkin’s own account); “Col. Moore” (three independent pension files, possibly confused with an unrelated Loyalist routed at Ramsour’s Mill). Robert Long’s own 1832 testimony dates the battle itself to Dec. 28; Morgan’s contemporary 1780 report and nearly every other source say Dec. 30. No surviving Loyalist-side account of the action has ever been found.
Research Library — Hammond’s Store entry, extensively
Fall of Williams’s Fort
Laurens DisputedCol. Joseph Hayes (infantry) and Cornet James Simmons/Simons (cavalry) advance on the Loyalist-held fort at the Williams plantation, held by Brig. Gen. Robert Cunningham with ~150 men. Robert Long gives Dec. 29; Landrum and most other sources give Dec. 31, the day after Hammond’s Store. At least five different, unreconciled accounts of how the fort actually fell survive: an outright “precipitate retreat… fort destroyed” (Landrum); an overnight-ordered evacuation, “possibly ignited” (Wood 2026); command consistent with either, but no narrative detail (LAMAR Institute 2024); a formal surrender ultimatum Cunningham flees ahead of, with only minor losses (Duncan 1999); or merely stripped of stores and left standing (one Carolana.com compilation).
Research Library — Hammond’s Store entry
4 · Cowpens to the Bloody Scout
Jan.–Nov. 1781The regiment’s finest hour at Cowpens, a Loyalist officer’s murder that hands command to William Cunningham, and a long, grinding year of sieges and small actions across the same few miles of Laurens ground.
Cornwallis orders Tarleton after Morgan
RegionalDirectly prompted by the Hammond’s Store/Williams’s Fort defeats two days earlier.
Dunlap’s raid on Long Cane
RegionalTargets Andrew Pickens’s and James McCall’s families; a noose is placed around the neck of one of Pickens’s sons to extort information; Mary McRea is kidnapped.
Dunlap-Cunningham Parallels, §3
Battle of Cowpens
RegionalThe Little River Regiment fights in strength under Col. Joseph Hayes — eight companies reconstructed from pension applications (Blasingame’s, James Dillard’s, Samuel Ewing’s — including Robert Long — William Harris’s, John Jones’s, John Ridgeway’s, Samuel Saxton’s, Daniel Williams’s). The night before, Capt. Shadrick Inman, James Dillard, and Isaac Greer are sent by Morgan to scout Tarleton’s approach. James Dillard is wounded by gunshot. Levi Casey is promoted to Lieut. Col., second-in-command of the regiment, around this time.
Joseph Hayes doc §5; James & Mary Dillard §1; Duncan 1999 p. 17
Dunlap murdered as a prisoner; Cunningham inherits his command
RegionalMaj. James Dunlap is wounded and captured near Beattie’s Mill, then killed by a group of militiamen while a captive (shot twice in the head, then through the body), likely at Gilbert Town, NC. William Cunningham is promoted to Major and inherits Dunlap’s Provincial Light Horse command — the direct causal link to Cunningham’s later command of Loyalist forces in the Little River District.
Dunlap-Cunningham Parallels, §§1–2, 5
Battle of Mudlick Creek (Fort Williams #2)
LaurensElements of Col. Benjamin Roebuck’s Spartan Regiment again ambush Loyalists occupying Williams’s Fort. Traditionally framed a Patriot victory, but Roebuck himself was wounded and captured — a real complication to the clean-win narrative. Unclear whether the actual fighting was in Laurens or Newberry County.
Duncan 1999, p. 17
Siege of Ninety Six
RegionalDaniel Williams and James Dillard present, under Gen. Greene.
Skirmish on Bush River
LaurensCol. John Thomas Jr. (Spartan Regiment) engages Tories, killing 3 and capturing 12, aided by at least four Little River Regiment members.
Duncan 1999, p. 17
“Battle of Clark’s Ford”
Laurens DisputedA skirmish near a ford on Duncan Creek, “near General [Levi] Casey’s old place” — year known, month and day not.
Duncan 1999, p. 17
Edisto River campaign
RegionalUnder Gen. Andrew Pickens, against “Col. Cunningham’s” Tories — Robert, not William, most likely. James Dillard wounded again, this time by saber.
Ninety Six garrison evacuates to Charleston
RegionalRawdon’s last sally from Ninety Six reaches only as far as Duncan Creek before turning back.
Battle of Eutaw Springs
RegionalThe last major battle of the southern campaign; the British withdraw toward Charleston.
Casey orders a muster at Hammond’s Old Store
Laurens Disputed yearCol. Levi Casey’s letter to Capt. James Dillard orders regimental officers “to Meet at Homonds old store on the first Saturday in October Next” — showing the site still functioning as a Little River Regiment muster point nine months to two years after the battle fought there.
Research Library — Hammond’s Store entry; James & Mary Dillard §1
5 · The Bloody Scout & Hayes Station
Nov.–Dec. 1781The worst month of the war in Laurens County. Major William “Bloody Bill” Cunningham’s six-week retaliatory raid reaches its most infamous single act at the Hayes Station blockhouse — then Levi Casey answers it.
The “Bloody Scout” begins
Laurens RegionalNow-Major William Cunningham leads 100+ Loyalist raiders out of British-held Charleston on a six-week retaliatory raid through the upper-SC backcountry, killing dozens of Patriots.
Cloud’s Creek Massacre
RegionalShortly before Hayes Station — Cunningham kills Patriot prisoners.
Cunningham crosses the Saluda
LaurensMurders Maj. William Caldwell in present-day Newberry County — Caldwell had tried, unsuccessfully, to reach Hayes’s garrison first with a warning.
Hayes Station Massacre
Laurens DisputedAt the old blockhouse on Thomas Edgehill’s confiscated plantation (“Hayes Station” / “Edgehill Station”), near Little River Church, eastern Laurens County. The DAR monument, Landrum/Ramsay, and Hayes’s own audited account (twice) give Nov. 19; Find A Grave and WikiTree independently give Nov. 18. Col. Joseph Hayes’s garrison — reported troop strength ranges from “forty rebels” per a contemporary Loyalist newspaper to 16–23 per other sources — is surrounded by Cunningham’s raiders (reported 150–300). Hayes refuses an initial surrender demand, hoping for reinforcement; the blockhouse roof is set alight; he surrenders on a promise of quarter. Cunningham spares the women, children, and one man “to whom he was indebted for past favors” — then has the rest hanged and hacked to death.
The death toll is itself disputed across six figures: the DAR monument’s traditional 14 (Hayes + 13 named men); a contemporary Dec. 1781 Loyalist newspaper’s 15 (five named officers plus ten privates); William Dunlap’s own sworn 1832 pension count of 17; a compiled WikiTree roster totaling ~17–18; William Millwee’s pension testimony describing “one half the captives” killed, proportionally; and Duncan 1999’s independent count of 14. The fourteen named on the monument: Col. Joseph Hayes, Capt. Daniel Williams, Lieut. Christopher Hardy, Lieut. John Neel, Clement Hancock, Joseph Williams, Joseph Irby Sr., Joseph Irby Jr., John Milven, James Feris, John Cook, Greaf Irby, Benjamin Goodman, Yancy Saxon. Daniel and Joseph Williams were both sons of the late Col. James Williams, killed at Kings Mountain thirteen months earlier.
Hayes Station Massacre — Military Histories of the 14, full document; Duncan 1999 p. 18
Casey’s retaliation; command passes to him
LaurensCunningham’s band attacks Whig veteran John Boyce’s Union County home; Boyce escapes (losing partial use of three fingers to a sword blow) and raises his old commander, Capt. Levi Casey, who pursues with fifteen men and captures several raiders — including the outlaw “McCombs” — near the mouth of Duncan’s Creek on the Enoree River. The captured men are summarily hanged: per Landrum, under a “stooping hickory” where the old Charlestown road crossed the Ninety-Six road; per Duncan 1999, at the intersection of the Ridge Road and the 1770-laid Island Ford Road near present-day Whitmire (possibly the same crossroad — not yet reconciled) — and buried in a common grave at the tree’s foot. This is the point at which Levi Casey succeeds the murdered Hayes as commander of the Little River Regiment.
Hayes Station Massacre doc, Overview; Duncan 1999 p. 18
6 · Aftermath
1782–1787The fighting ends; the paperwork, the postwar civic life, and — eventually — Cunningham’s own quiet death in exile close out the record.
Levi Casey’s continuous command
LaurensCasey’s own sworn account documents Lieut. Col./Col. service running continuously Dec. 1, 1780 – Dec. 1, 1782 (453 days), certified by Brig. Gen. Andrew Pickens.
British evacuate Charleston
RegionalEffectively ends the war in South Carolina.
James Dillard’s Cherokee expedition
RegionalForces the surrender of Loyalist refugees sheltering with the Cherokee — his last documented wartime service.
Casey’s postwar land-grant paperwork
LaurensWriting from “Newberry County 96 District,” Casey personally manages land-grant paperwork for three men — Abraham Gray, John Swinford, and Josias Duckett — the same district’s postwar civic life resuming.
William “Bloody Bill” Cunningham dies in Nassau
RegionalIn postwar exile, of unknown causes — never captured, never brought to account for Hayes Station or the Bloody Scout.