Taking A Look At The Battle Of Savannah

The capture of Savannah, was an American Revolutionary War battle fought in Dec. of 1778 pitting local American Patriot MIlitia and Continental Army units, holding the city against a British invasion force under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Archibald Campbell. The British capture of the city led to an extended occupation and was the opening move in the British southern strategy to regain control of the rebellious Southern provinces by appealing to the relatively strong Loyalist sentiment there.

General Sir Henry Clinton, the commander of the British forces based in New York City, sent Campbell and a 3,100 strong force from New York to Capture Savannah, and begin the process of returning Georgia to British
French and American forces held Savannah under siege from September 23 to October 18, 1779 and failed to reclaim the city. The French troops included 500 free Haitians of African descent, calling themselves the Chasseurs-Volontaires de Saint-Domingue. Soldiers of African descent fighting for the Patriots was an anomaly during the southern campaign–most American slaves attempted to flee and join British forces, as they had no desire to defend their Patriot masters’ right to enslave them. Many of the Volontaires themselves later went on to rebel against French control of Haiti. In fact, the Volontaires’ twelve year old drummer, Henri Christopher, commanded Haiti’s revolutionary army and later became king of
In November, after dealing with the threat of a French fleet off New York and Newport, Rhode Island, Clinton turned his attention to the south. He organized a force of about 3,000 men in New York and sent orders to Saint Augustine, the capital of East Florida, where Brigadier General Augustine Prevost was to organize all available men and Indian agent John Stuart was to rally the local Creek and Cherokee warriors to assist in operations against Georgia. Clinton's basic plan, first proposed by Thomas Brown in 1776, began with the capture of the capital of Georgia, Savannah.

Clinton gave the command of the detachment from New York to Lieutenant Colonel Archibald Campbell. The force consisted of two battalions, the 1st and 2nd, of the 71st, Regiment of Foot, the Hessian regiments von Wöllwarth and von Wissenbach, and four Loyalist provincial units: one battalion from the New York Volunteers, two from Delancey’s Brigade, and one from Skinner’s Brigade. Campbell sailed from New York on November 26 and arrived off Tybee Island, near the mouth of the Savannah River, on December