Kings Mountain, Battle of

At the beginning of the 1770s, the Commons House of Assembly was embroiled in the latest in a series of fierce power struggles with royal officials, known as the Wilkes Fund Controversy. Coupled with new imperial initiatives, these clashes convinced the colony’s elite that if it wanted to control the political destiny of South Carolina, then separation was the only answer.

The precise extent of Loyalist strength in South Carolina will never be known because many people switched allegiances as circumstances dictated during the protracted war.