Robert’s flight was only stopped when, “I saw my lame schoolmaster, Beatty, loading his gun by a tree."

From The Road to Guilford Courthouse by John Buchanan. Page 346.

Silent the British camp may have been the evening of 31 January, but the Rebel spies should have maintained their watch. Cornwallis and his troops rolled out of their blankets at 1:00 A.M. on 1 February. It was very dark but the rain had stopped. Sending Webster with half the army and most of the artillery to Beattie’s Ford to create a diversion, Cornwallis marched downriver with the Brigade of Guards, the Royal Welsh Fusiliers, the German Von Bose Regiment, and the British Legion Horse, the latter led by Tarleton. Their guide was a local Tory, either Dick Beal or Frederick Hager, depending on whose recollection you accept, Robert Henry’s or Captain Joseph Graham’s. Both were there, but Robert Henry was closer to the action at riverside, and said he saw Dick Beal taking aim at him.

About daybreak, through the thick mist, some 1,200 British and German soldiers approached Cowans’s Ford quietly enough so that the Americans on the other side had not an inkling of their arrival. The soldiers carried heavy knapsacks and unloaded muskets with bayonets fixed. Their cartouche boxes containing ammunition were tied around their necks. Cornwallis could see Rebel campfires flickering on the other side and was surprised that there were so many, for the King’s Friends had led him to believe that Cowan’s would be lightly guarded. But the sight did not stop him. Nor did the swift, treacherous waters of the Catawba that might have given pause to a timid general. And in time of peril for his troops the man always knew where he belonged. Sergeant Roger Lamb of the Royal Welsh Fusiliers watched as “Lord Cornwallis, according to his usual manner, dashed first into the river, mounted on a very fine, spirited horse, the brigade of “guards followed, two three pounders next, the Royal Welch Fuzileers after them.” The water became breast high, reported Sergeant Lamb. The current wrapped around them and tugged. Following their general on his “very fine, spirited horse” the British troops struggled forward to about midstream, past where the horse ford forked off, before Joel Jetton heard the splashing of horses in the river.

Robert Henry stated that the Tory guide “Dick Beal, being deceived by our fires” had not turned downstream onto the horse ford but had continued straight ahead on the wagon ford, or, as young Robert put it, “had led them into swimming water.” That was the noise Joel Jetton heard. “Jetton ran to the ford. The sentry being sound asleep, Jetton kicked him into the river. He endeavored to fire his gun, but it was wet.” He ran back to the campfires. “‘The British! The British!’” Joel Jetton cried.

Robert Henry and his comrades jumped to their feet and ran to their posts. At riverside Robert thought he was seeing red from lack of sleep and threw water in his face and then knew his eyes were not deceiving him: “I then heard the British splashing and making a noise as of drowning.” For the current was sweeping men and horses off their feet. General Leslie’s horse was swept downstream but recovered. General “O’Hara’s horse,” wrote Sergeant Lamb, “rolled with him down the current near forty yards.” A bombadier tumbled away head over heels but was saved by Sergeant Lamb. But what happened to some did not deter the rest. Hundreds of Redcoats and Hessians led by their general successfully fought the current and bore straight ahead. Cornwallis’s horse was hit but did not fall until he carried his rider to the far bank. At his stand Robert Henry “fired and continued firing until I saw that one on horse-back had passed my rock in the river, and saw that it was Dick Beal, moving his gun from his shoulder, I expect, to shoot me. I ran with all speed up the bank, and when at the top of it William Polk’s horse breasted me, and Gen. Davidson’s horse, about twenty or thirty feet before Polk’s horse, and near to the water’s edge.” Robert heard Colonel Polk shout, “Fire away, boys! Help is at hand!” But Robert’s flight was only stopped when, “I saw my lame schoolmaster, Beatty, loading his gun by a tree. I thought I could stand it as long as he could and commenced loading. Beatty fired, and then I fired, the heads and shoulders of the British being just above the bank. They made no return fire. Silence still prevailed. I observed Beatty loading again. I ran down another load. When he fired, he cried, ‘It’s time to run, Bob.’” During this action Robert recalled that Beatty, “an excellent marksman, fired twice at a distance of not more than twenty five yards . . . and I fired twice about the same distance. I . . . think Beatty . . . killed two, and I killed one.