By: History.com Editors

1781

Light Horse and Swamp Fox raid Georgetown, South Carolina

History.com Editors

Published: November 13, 2009

Last Updated: January 31, 2025

On January 24, 1781, Patriot commanders Lieutenant Colonel Light Horse Henry Lee and Brigadier General Francis Swamp Fox Marion of the South Carolina militia combine forces and conduct a raid on Georgetown, South Carolina, which is defended by 200 British soldiers.

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Marion won fame and the Swamp Fox moniker for his ability to strike and then quickly retreat into the South Carolina swamps without a trace. His military strategy is considered an 18th-century example of guerilla warfare and served as partial inspiration for the film The Patriot, starring Mel Gibson.

Marion took over the South Carolina militia force first assembled by Thomas Sumter in 1780. Sumter, the other inspiration for Mel Gibson’s character in the film, returned Carolina Loyalists’ terror tactics in kind after Loyalists burned his plantation. When Sumter withdrew from active fighting to care for a wound, Marion replaced him and strategized with Major General Nathaniel Greene, who had recently arrived in the Carolinas to lead the Continental forces. On January 24, the Patriots under Marion and Lee managed to arrive at Georgetown undetected and captured at least three officers, including the British commander.

The following month, Lee’s cavalry was able to defeat a band of Loyalist cavalry at Haw River, North Carolina, by taking advantage of the extreme similarity of Patriot uniforms to those of British Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton’s troops. British Colonel John Pyle’s men at Haw River were surprised to discover that the horsemen approaching them were not friends, as they appeared from a distance, but foes. Losing three fingers and blinding one eye in the course of combat, Colonel Pyle, a doctor by profession, survived by hiding in what is now known as Pyle’s Pond.

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Also on This Day in History

Discover more of the major events, famous births, notable deaths and everything else history-making that happened on January 24th

1848

Gold discovered at Sutter’s Creek

A millwright discovers gold along the banks of Sutter’s Creek in California, forever changing the course of history in the American West. A tributary to the South Fork of the American River east of the Sacramento Valley and San Francisco, Sutter’s Creek was named for a Swiss immigrant who came to Mexican California in 1839. John […]

Illustration depicting Sutter's Mill, where New Jersey prospector James Marshall discovered gold in 1848, sparking the California Gold Rush. (Credit: Bettmann Archive/Getty Images)

1862

Author Edith Wharton is born

On January 24, 1862, Edith Wharton is born to an old and wealthy New York family. She grew up in an opulent world where pre-Civil War society tried to keep the nouveau riche at bay. Wharton, expected to become a typical wife, mother, and hostess, instead showed intellectual talent and began to write at an […]

1908

Boy Scouts movement begins

On January 24, 1908, the Boy Scouts movement begins in England with the publication of the first installment of Robert Baden-Powell’s Scouting for Boys. The name Baden-Powell was already well known to many English boys, and thousands of them eagerly bought up the handbook. By the end of April, the serialization of Scouting for Boys […]

1935

First canned beer goes on sale

Canned beer makes its debut on January 24, 1935. In partnership with the American Can Company, the Gottfried Krueger Brewing Company delivered 2,000 cans of Krueger’s Finest Beer and Krueger’s Cream Ale to faithful Krueger drinkers in Richmond, Virginia. Ninety-one percent of the drinkers approved of the canned beer, driving Krueger to give the green […]

1943

General Paulus to Hitler: Let us surrender!

German Gen. Friedrich Paulus, commander in chief of the German 6th Army at Stalingrad, urgently requests permission from Adolf Hitler to surrender his position there, but Hitler refuses. The Battle of Stalingrad began in the summer of 1942, as German forces assaulted the city, a major industrial center and a prized strategic coup. But despite […]

1956

Emmett Till murderers make magazine confession

On January 24, 1956, Look magazine publishes the confessions of J.W. Milam and Roy Bryant, two white men from Mississippi who were acquitted in the 1955 kidnapping and murder of Emmett Louis Till, an African American teenager from Chicago. In the Look article, titled “The Shocking Story of Approved Killing in Mississippi,” the men detailed […]

1965

Winston Churchill dies

Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill, the British leader who guided Great Britain and the Allies through the crisis of World War II, dies in London at the age of 90. Born at Blenheim Palace in 1874, Churchill joined the British Fourth Hussars upon his father’s death in 1895. During the next five years, he enjoyed […]

1972

Japanese soldier found hiding on Guam

On January 24, 1972, local farmers on Guam discover Shoichi Yokoi, a Japanese sergeant who fought in World War II, still hiding in the jungle—26 years after the official end of the war. Japanese soldiers had been trained that death was preferred to the disgrace of being captured alive. Guam, a 200-square-mile island in the western […]

2006

Walt Disney announces $7.4 billion purchase of Pixar

On January 24, 2006, Disney announces that it will purchase animation studio Pixar for $7.4 billion dollars. By the end of 2005, Pixar had become a giant in the world of movie animation, on the strength of its blockbuster hits Toy Story (1995), A Bug’s Life (1998), Monsters, Inc. (2001), Finding Nemo (2003) and The […]

2011

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2018

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Larry Nassar, a former doctor at Michigan State and for USA Gymnastics, is sentenced to 40 to 175 years in prison for sexual assault on January 24, 2018. Nassar was found guilty of using his position in sports medicine to abuse hundreds of women and girls in one of the most high-profile cases to arise […]

Larry Nassar

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Citation Information

Article title
Light Horse and Swamp Fox raid Georgetown, South Carolina
Website Name
History
Date Accessed
March 24, 2025
Publisher
A&E Television Networks
Last Updated
January 31, 2025
Original Published Date
November 13, 2009

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