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Local figure

Horatio Gates

Horatio Gates, the general who had stopped the British at Saratoga, commanded the American army defeated at Camden, South Carolina, on August 16, 1780, and in the following weeks regrouped its remnants at Hillsborough before Congress replaced him and Nathanael Greene took command.

Source: U.S. Army: The Battle of Camden, August 16, 1780 (John R. Maass, Center of Military History)

–1806 · Dates from the Library of Congress · Library of Congress authority record ↗

4 works about Horatio Gates are indexed here.

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Horatio Gates, 1793
Horatio Gates, 1793

Life and Orange County connections

Storylines this person is part of, in date order. Each has its own page.

StorylineHillsborough as the southern army’s base after Camden, 17801780 · 15 events · After the American defeat at Camden in August 1780, Hillsborough became the southern army's base, and the town and county strained to feed it. Gates regrouped his army there, the General Assembly created a Board of War that directed the war effort from the town, the courthouse became a storehouse and the church a hospital, and fugitives crowded the town. In late November the board judged that Orange could not feed the army through the winter, and Gates marched it toward Salisbury. The story runs from de Kalb's halt in June to the arrest of four Maryland soldiers in December.

Dated events connected with this person, in date order. See these 7 dated events in the chronology →

  1. Thomas Burke takes up his neighbors' complaints against army plundering Home from Congress in 1780, Burke found troops around Hillsborough grazing horses on growing corn, pulling down haystacks and taking cattle, wagons and smokehouse stores. He warned local officials, wrote to the president of Congress and to General Gates, and Nash credits him with largely stopping the abuse in Orange. People: Thomas Burke, Horatio Gates Place: Orange CountySearch the index · Nash, Hillsboro, Colonial and Revolutionary (1903), p. 76
  2. Thomas Hart leaves Hartford and moves his family to Maryland With Loyalists raiding his property and Cornwallis expected after Camden, Thomas Hart took General Gates's advice and in the fall of 1780 moved his family from Hartford to Hagerstown, Maryland, according to his partner Nathaniel Rochester, who went with him. Before leaving Hart sold part of his land, and Hartford went to Jesse Benton, husband of his niece, for a payment and a note. There is no record that Hart came back. People: Thomas Hart, Nathaniel Rochester, Horatio Gates, Jesse Benton Place: Hartford, near HillsboroughInternet Archive: Durward T. Stokes, "Thomas Hart in North Carolina", North Carolina Historical Review 41 (1964), p. 333
  3. Horatio Gates, on his way to the Southern Army, presses the governor for supplies from Hillsborough Writing from Hillsborough, Gates told Governor Abner Nash that the army's commissary and quartermaster departments were in a deplorable state, asked the state to set up magazines of provisions and forage and to supply 700 tents for its militia, and urged Nash to come to Hillsborough himself. People: Abner Nash Place: HillsboroughSearch the index · Colonial and State Records of North Carolina, vol. 15, pp. 3-4: Letter from Horatio Gates to Abner Nash, July 19, 1780
  4. Barnaby Cabe takes a wagonload of flour to General Gates's army Thomas Burke of Hillsborough wrote to Horatio Gates that his neighbor Cabe was bringing a load of flour to the southern army and would hand it over only on Gates's order, having been put off by the commissaries. The former Tryon wagoner had come over to the patriot side. People: Thomas Burke, Horatio Gates, Barnaby Cabe Place: HillsboroughSearch the index · Colonial and State Records of North Carolina, vol. 15, pp. 775-776: Letter from Thomas Burke to Horatio Gates, August 1, 1780 · Also: NC State Historic Preservation Office: Cabe-Pratt-Harris House, National Register nomination
  5. Gates regroups the defeated southern army at Hillsborough after Camden After the American defeat at Camden, South Carolina, on August 16, 1780, Gates gathered the remnants of his army at Hillsborough. On September 3 he reported from the town that the Maryland division and the artillery were there being refitted and that nearly 500 regulars were marching from Petersburg to join them. Place: HillsboroughSearch the index · Colonial and State Records of North Carolina, vol. 15, pp. 65-66: Letter from Horatio Gates to George Washington [Extract], September 3, 1780
  6. From Hillsborough, Gates thanks the victors of Kings Mountain On receiving the news of Major Ferguson's defeat at Kings Mountain, Gates wrote from Hillsborough thanking the commanding officers and ordering the prisoners sent under guard to Fincastle Court House, Virginia. The same day he told Governor Thomas Jefferson he would move the whole army to the Yadkin once supplies arrived. People: Thomas Jefferson Place: HillsboroughSearch the index · Colonial and State Records of North Carolina, vol. 15, pp. 115-116: Letter from Horatio Gates to the American officers at the Battle of King's Mountain, October 12, 1780
  7. Gates marches the southern army out of Hillsborough toward Salisbury The Board of War concluded that Hillsborough and Orange County could not feed the army through the winter and persuaded Gates to move toward Salisbury, where provisions were thought to be more plentiful. Place: HillsboroughSearch the index · Lefler and Wager, Orange County, 1752-1952 (1953), p. 52

People named in the same events

People named in the same dated entries as Horatio Gates, those sharing the most entries first. Each line links one of the shared entries in the chronology, where its source is cited. A shared entry shows these people in the same event, not how well they knew each other.

Indexed works

Works about or by Horatio Gates. Each links to the institution that holds or provides it. Background reading appears below.

August-September, 1780: Joint Select Committees (Reports of and messages concerning)

North Carolina. General Assembly · 1780

Reports and messages of joint select committees from August and September 1780, when the General Assembly met at Hillsborough after the defeat at Camden. Committees worked on supplies and provisions for the army and the adjustment of public claims. Horatio Gates, Richard Caswell, Abner Nash, William Hooper, hospitals, surgeons, cavalry and wagons all appear. 88 pages.

Included because: Catalog heading in the NC Digital Collections record: Gates, Horatio, 1728-1806.

NC Digital Collections DPLA

NC Digital Collections record courtesy of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

Governors' Papers: Abner Nash, Correspondence, September 1780

Brice, Francis · 1780

September 1780 letters of Governor Abner Nash, 40 images, from the weeks after the defeat at Camden. Francis Brice is among the writers, and Horatio Gates, William Lee Davidson, Thomas Jefferson and the Continental Congress are named, together with Hillsborough and Orange County.

Included because: Catalog heading in the NC Digital Collections record: Gates, Horatio, 1728-1806.

NC Digital Collections DPLA

NC Digital Collections record courtesy of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

Senate Joint Resolutions: August 30-September 13

North Carolina. General Assembly · 1780

Senate joint resolutions of 30 August to 13 September 1780, in the weeks after the defeat at Camden, 96 images. Among them are a rejected resolution about militia routed in South Carolina, a commission for Captain William Williams in the Invalid Corps, and a rejected request that General Horatio Gates gather the Continental troops. Hillsborough figures in the session.

Included because: Catalog heading in the NC Digital Collections record: Gates, Horatio, 1728-1806.

NC Digital Collections DPLA

NC Digital Collections record courtesy of the North Carolina Department of Natural and Cultural Resources.

Letters from Lord Cornwallis regarding incursions into North Carolina, General Gates' movement to Hillsborough, interruptions during the movement of prisoners of war to Charleston and attacks by rebel forces

1780

Cornwallis reported in 1780 on incursions into North Carolina, on Horatio Gates moving toward Hillsborough, on interruptions to the movement of prisoners of war to Charleston, and on attacks by rebel forces. Militia, scouts, supplies, ordnance stores and garrison duty are among the subjects, with Camden, Augusta, Ninety Six and Waxhaw as places. The listed enclosures are not included. Colonial Office series CO 5/238, military despatches.

Included because: Catalog heading in the Duke record: Gates, Horatio.

Duke NC State

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Picture: Horatio Gates, 1793. Public domain. Photograph by Gilbert Stuart; Downloaded from The Athenaeumoriginal is at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.; via Wikimedia Commons

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