Kings Mountain, Battle of

(Oct. 7, 1780) Battle in the American Revolution between American revolutionaries and loyalists.

About 2,000 frontiersmen were assembled to resist the British advance into North Carolina; they surrounded the 1,100 soldiers, mainly loyalists from New York and South Carolina, on Kings Mountain, S.C., near the border with North Carolina. The frontiersmen killed or captured almost all the loyalists, and the battle marked the beginning of the war's turn against the British.

* * *

▪ United States history

      (October 7, 1780), in the American Revolution, American victory over a loyalist detachment in South Carolina during the British campaign in the South. To stem the British advance into North Carolina, a force of about 2,000 colonial frontiersmen had been gathered from neighbouring states to replace the Continental forces that had been lost in South Carolina at the battles of Charleston (May 1780) and Camden (Camden, Battle of) (August 1780). The frontiersmen felt particularly bitter against the 1,100 soldiers, under Major Patrick Ferguson (Ferguson, Patrick), who were mostly New Yorkers and South Carolinians loyal to the British. About a mile and a half south of the North Carolina boundary, the frontiersmen surrounded the loyalists on Kings Mountain and killed or captured almost the entire force. The battle was noted as the first of a series of setbacks that ended in the eventual collapse of the British effort to hold North America.

* * *