“Damn you, don’t you know your own officers!,” was released, and galloped off to safety.”

From The Road to Guilford Courthouse by John Buchanan. Page 178.

Clarke’s foresight in maintaining a reserve now paid off. He ordered the forty men to go to Shelby’s aid. Their response was immediate, their support critical. At just about the same time the British suffered a grievous loss when a Watauga rifleman, William Smith it was said, shot Colonel Alexander Innes off his horse. Badly wounded, Innes was carried to the rear. “I’ve killed their commander!,” Smith shouted.14 The riflemen rallied. There now rose above the din wild sounds that chilled the blood, sounds Captain Abraham DePeyster of De Lancey’s New York Battalion would remember well. The “yelling boys” he called them. Shelby’s Over Mountain men, whose usual foes were Cherokee and Creeks, paid those warriors the ultimate tribute. With shrill Indian war cries, they followed Shelby in a furious charge on the regulars. As slowly as the Rebel line first bent, the British were forced back, and now the twenty horsemen stationed on Shelby’s flank under the command of Josiah Culbertson of South Carolina burst out of their hiding place and charged in support of the riflemen.

The Tory regulars did not yield ground easily. The fighting was desperate and at close quarters. The British took a heavy loss in officers. Besides Innes being out of action, a rifleman named William Beebe shot Major Fraser from his saddle, Captain Peter Campbell of New Jersey was killed, and of the regulars’ seven surviving officers five were wounded. Shelby said a stalwart Tory militia captain, William Hawsey, “was shot down near our lines while making the greatest efforts to annimate his men.” Elijah Clarke, whose wing had remained steady throughout the fighting, then led his men over their breastworks in a wild, screaming charge. Isaac Shelby was in awe watching Elijah Clarke in battle. “It was in the severest part of the action,” a friend of Shelby’s later recalled, “that Colonel Shelby’s attention was arrested by the heroic conduct of Colonel Clarke. He often mentioned the circumstances of ceasing in the midst of battle to look with astonishment and admiration at Clarke fighting.” The charge of Clarke and his men ended in a melee so confused that the Tory militia commander Colonel Daniel Clary, the bridle of his horse grabbed and held by two Rebels on either side, retained his composure, shouted, “Damn you, don’t you know your own officers!,” was released, and galloped off to safety.”