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Archiver > 1776 > 2002-11 > 1036419140


From: John Robertson <>
Subject: [1776] Battle of Camden preservation initiatives
Date: Mon, 04 Nov 2002 09:12:20 -0500


>From: "Charles B. Baxley" <>
>Subject: Newspaper article
>Date: Sun, 3 Nov 2002 20:14:51 -0500
>
>Dear Friends:
> The Palmetto Conservation Foundation, as coordinator of several
> local historical and conservation organizations, has announced that they
> have purchased the fee title to the 290 acres underlying the Bowater
> conservation easement. This land represents the heart of the
> approximately 1,000 acre battlefield of the night and day battles. This
> purchase was made as the property is on the market and we had no idea how
> hostile the new underlying landowner would be towards conserving this
> important battlefield. The State newspaper's lead article on Sunday,
> November 3, 2003:
> <http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/4433865.htm>http://www.thestate.com/mld/thestate/4433865.htm.
> We have not raised the funds to pay for this purchase, but your help
> in research and understanding will be fundamental towards this important
> project. I am sure that once people understand the scope of this battle,
> the brave people involved on both sides and the pivotal roles this action
> played in the struggle for independence, that appropriate funding will
> come. Your help and contributions are greatly appreciated.
>Charles B. Baxley
><mailto:>


For those of you have long been disappointed when visiting the battle site
of the Battle "near" Camden SC, 16 August 1780, this is *big* news.

Bryan Whitfield took these pictures in 1979 in preparation for his thesis
"The Preservation of Camden Battlefield":
http://battleofcamden.org/whitfield7.jpg
http://battleofcamden.org/whitfield9.jpg
http://battleofcamden.org/whitfield10.jpg
http://battleofcamden.org/whitfield11.jpg
It still looks very much the same today.

[I am in the process of OCR transcription of Bryan's full work which will
be available on the site below.]

The serious historical research site of the History Committee (of which
Charles Baxley is chairman) may be seen here:
http://battleofcamden.org.
This site may well already be the most substantially documented site of any
Revolutionary War battle on the Internet (yet remarkably, remains one of
the better kept secrets on the 'net). If not, it eventually will be
because we are accumulating there the verbatim documents needed as sources
for the historical study which is an absolute prerequisite to there being a
national or state park at the site. We are firmly committed to making such
a park become a reality. A perusal of the "Organization" portion of the
website will clarify just how serious that intent is and how much momentum
it has already developed.

This site will certainly be very useful to future historians (academic,
enthusiasts, re-enactors, wargamers, &c.) and candidates for advanced
degrees. One could turn out a pretty good thesis from the materials
today. If used for such, including term papers, we'd like to hear from you.

While this site is not a genealogy site, it will be of interest to
genealogists. We have begun the accumulation of "verified" participants
for BOTH sides. "Verified" as used here means we provide the name of the
source(s) that substantiates a soldier's participation. In general, it
will accomplish little to ask us about an individual, because if we know,
it is already on the list.

Since the accumulation of credible source documents (primary and secondary)
is what this site is all about, we plan to put online on our site all the
relevant revolutionary war verbatim pension statements that we can
locate. In some cases, we can find transcripts online but are unable to
locate the owner to obtain their permission for using them verbatim; we
will make abstracts of the relevant data out of such and put them on our
site. We link to pension statements on other sites, also, but having them
on our site allows them to be pulled up on a text search basis by our
search engine. Pension statements tend to be under-used in historical
studies, because of the considerable effort to obtain mere tidbits of
information. Perhaps the major difference between Dr. Babits "Devil of a
Whipping" for the Battle of Cowpens is that he incorporated the
information from such, based on 30 years of research by Dr. Bobby Moss. As
a result, it reads remarkably different from all earlier studies. We are
trying to profit from that example. Both of these scholars are members of
our History Committee.

If you have a verbatim text pension statement for a soldier who was in the
Battle of Camden, 16 August 1780, or in a closely related action (e.g.,
Fishing Creek), we'd like very much to receive a copy. They can easily be
included in an email. Be sure to show any numbers assigned to it. Those
with R numbers (rejected) are just as useful as any others.

If you have an ancestor who was there or in a closely related action, and
he is not on our list, you may well be able to help verify his
participation and you may associate your name, email address, etc. These
databases (and all associated documents) will be part of the permanent
records that will be made available at a future park on the site.

If anyone with access to lists or groups where those with connections to
the Brits and Loyalists involved in the Battle of Camden 1780 (or closely
related actions) can be found, and would care to forward this post to
those lists, it would be helpful. We already have a *lot* of info relating
to the Brit/Loyalists, but could use help in finding more.

John Robertson



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