- When you zoom in on the American Revolution and get up close to it, you get a sense of what the cost of independence really meant, the violence, the suffering.

It wasn't just in New England or the Mid-Atlantic.

There was plenty of that here in Georgia too.

The stories on this episode of "Marked" are actually a lesson in opposites.

On one end, there's Savannah in October of 1779 and all of that violence and suffering in a battle that went terribly wrong for the Patriots.

And on the other end, there's a Georgia Colonel without naval experience defending the Georgia coast in a triumphant story that channels David and Goliath.

It was one of the seminal moments in the American Revolution Southern Theater, a fight that meant forming an international coalition, and the attempt to reclaim the soul of a city that's controlled by the crown.

This is "Marked," a series that zooms in on Georgia and its backstory, one historical marker at a time.

I'm Maiya May, and I'm here in Savannah at historical marker 025-10 to tell you the story of a group of Patriots, their global allies, and a push to take back their city.

(triumphant music) (graphics whooshing) When you explore what happened during the American Revolution, stories pop up everywhere.

Patriots refusing to give up, colonists and militia groups that even in the face of long shot odds just wouldn't back down.

And that relentlessness, that resilience to fight was on full display here during the siege of Savannah, October 9th, 1779 to be exact, and the attack at the Spring Hill Redoubt.

Tell me a little bit about where we are.

- So we're standing in what's called Battlefield Memorial Park here in Savannah.

This was kind of ground zero for probably the most important thing that happened in Georgia during the American Revolution.

We're at the site of what was called then the Spring Hill Redoubt, which is this urban mound.

As you can see, it's manmade.

- Mm-hmm.

- [Stan] This was the far western end of the British line, the British recaptured Savannah in December 1778.

The British shifted all of their maneuvers to the south.

They wanted to tap in what they thought was a hotbed of loyalism down here.

Savannah was very lightly defended in December of 78'.

- At this point in the war, as far as the English are concerned, the war in the north is just getting a little difficult.

The Patriots in the north are becoming a problem, so then they try a new tactic and one that's known as their southern strategy, a strategy that was the brainchild of Royal Governor James Wright.

- After being exiled from Georgia, following his arrest and escape in February of 1776, Governor James Wright goes back to England where he harangues minister after minister, member of parliament after member of parliament, and even the king to initiate a southern strategy because there are strong numbers of loyalists in Georgia and in South Carolina.

There was a belief among the British high command that Georgia was home to many loyalists that it might be more easily captured.

And from that capture, the British could kind of roll up the rest of the colonies, going from Georgia to south and North Carolina and then to Virginia, and then meeting their northern army there.

A large component of their colonial wealth is in the south, tobacco cash crops, rice cash crops, to a lesser extent, indigo cash crops are driving the American economy.

The British begin their operations in Georgia in the spring of 1778.

They invade Savannah in December of 1778, and by February of 1779, they have full control of Georgia.

- During the British occupation, everyday life here for the Patriots is awful.

- With the British back in control in Savannah, they are in a sense, strangers in their own land, enemies to the governmental apparatus that is now controlling Georgia as Georgia kind of flip flops during the revolution from rebel control to loyalist or British control, and for citizens of all stripes, those kinds of fluctuations and power and those power vacuums created are gonna make life complex and difficult.

- And so, for nearly nine months, all of that control is unchallenged, but the Patriot forces that are still in the south have a renewed sense of resolve.

They're determined to fight back against this southern strategy.

- [Dr.

Greg] General Robert Howe, who was the continental leader in Georgia is dismissed and replaced by General Benjamin Lincoln.

Lincoln, well, perhaps be most well known for accepting the British surrender following the battle of Yorktown.

Joining Benjamin Lincoln in Savannah was a Polish volunteer named Casimir Pulaski, who was recruited to the cause by Benjamin Franklin.

- So the Patriots have a bit of a leadership refresh, but if they're going to win back Savannah, they're also gonna need some help on the water.

And so, they outsource some of that and they recruit some French naval forces who are willing to help and looking for a fight.

- So joining Lincoln and Pulaski is a French Admiral Charles the Count d'Estaing, who has just experienced great success in the Caribbean, and believes that capturing Savannah will be no difficult task whatsoever.

d'Estaing brings with him a fleet of ships, 4,000 soldiers, and 500 Haitian volunteers, making this an incredibly strong international coalition to recapture Georgia from the British.

It is believed that one of those Haitian volunteers is Henri Kristoff, who would later become the first king of Haiti.

- They land here in September, thinking this is a fairly lightly fortified defended city.

d'Estaing is told, you can do this without any problem really, and he wants to get it done fast.

Everybody who lives down here knows September is hurricane season.

He's just come from the Caribbean.

He wants to get this done and get out of the way.

The problem is all of these maneuvers take time.

He sends in his terms to the British and demands they surrender the city, but gives them two days to respond.

They dig in even more.

They say, nope, we're not gonna surrender the city.

You'll have to come and take it.

He finally loses patience.

And on the night of October 8th, the Friday night, he tells his American allies led by Benjamin Lincoln, we're going in tomorrow morning.

- Talk to me about that dynamic between Estaing and Lincoln.

That must have been interesting.

- Well, it was, and it kind of encapsulated the whole American French alliance.

So d'Estaing was very flamboyant.

Benjamin Lincoln arrived with the American Continentals from South Carolina and he was a little bit more of a slow it down, let's get the lay of the land here first, and eventually, d'Estaing just overruled him and everybody else.

- And it all starts right here on the morning of October 9th, 1779, and the American and French forces are well organized and ready to take back Savannah and the assault becomes one of the bloodiest fights of the revolution.

- They believe that a morning attack will provide great results.

They decide they want to attack directly the Spring Hill Redoubt, believing that it is lightly manned, and that once taken, it'll provide a gateway to the rest of the city.

However, for some reason, they didn't take into account that morning on the coast can often bring fog.

And so, they have a difficult way making their way to the Redoubt.

Once the fog lifts, to their surprise are many more men facing them than they anticipated.

They also become sitting ducks because the fog is lifted and now those people looking at them have free shots at them.

- Paint a picture of what happened that day.

British soldiers would've been in something like this, I'm assuming.

- [Stan] They would've been manning this redoubt throughout what was known as the siege of Savannah.

After d'Estaing and the French got here, they were bombarding the city from the river, from the southern park.

And eyewitness accounts said that it was literally hell to be in the city while that was going on.

As you can imagine, the inhabitants who had not evacuated Savannah were sort of trapped here- - Mm.

- Behind these lines.

So hot shells were being lobbed into the city from as far away as thunderbolt and even ships out on the river starting fires, landing indiscriminately killing people.

From the earliest moment, shots were exchanged and the battle was on at that point.

Now, once it started, you've got chaos in the sense of trying to move troops around to key points.

So you've got generals who are trying to give orders in the chaos of battle.

The British are shifting interior people along their lines here.

But for the most part, this was the hotspot.

This was the place where the battle was going to be won or lost.

- [Maiya] I've heard that fog played a huge role in this battle as well.

Can you talk to me about that?

- Yeah, so that morning under cover of darkness, d'Estaing and the French thought they would get the jump on the British just by the virtue of the fact that they would start this whole operation while it was still dark.

And that didn't happen because they came from the south.

People got confused about where they were, but then that morning it was also foggy.

So the Americans and their allies all said that they were gonna put white pieces of paper either on their uniforms or their hats so that you weren't shooting at each other, so you knew who was who.

Eventually, as it got to be more daylight, the fog dissipated.

So the British who were behind this redoubt, it's like shooting fish in a barrel at that point.

There was a big loss of life on the American side, but not the British.

The Americans lost over a thousand.

Now, some of the people who were here turned out to be quite famous.

d'Estaing himself took two bullets that morning before he was finally carried off the field.

Casimir Pulaski, and in a breach in the lines, he shot through on his horse and took a shot to the groin, the size of an egg.

A grape shot took him right out of the saddle and he died about two or three days later.

So there were horses out here, there was cavalry, there's infantry.

You can imagine the sound of all this.

There would've been men screaming, there would've been blood everywhere.

There would've been people who were decapitated, arms shot off, cut off, horses that were wounded, bodies you have to step over or step on.

All of that's happening at the same time.

So combat is one of the most intense experiences anybody will ever experience.

What it was like that morning, from the vantage point where you and I are standing right now?

It must have been an awesome sight, and I use that word not carelessly.

- This assault on the Spring Hill Redoubt wasn't going according to plan at all, and the British artillery is just relentless.

And for the Continental Army, it's only getting worse.

- The attack on the Spring Hill Redoubt went sideways immediately.

British forces outnumbered the French and Americans.

The battle for Savannah in the fall of 1779 was expected to be a fait accompli, just show up and you win.

It didn't turn out that way.

- The eyewitnesses who survived, they described it as just a killing feat.

It was just amazing.

In less than an hour, there were over a thousand casualties.

- The British were better prepared, they had more soldiers than anticipated, and the loyalist allies really rose up to the situation.

- And it was a total disaster.

- So even with the help from the French and the coalition united, the Patriots attempt to take back Savannah failed in a really, really big way.

There's been discussion for centuries, two in fact on how everything could have gone so wrong, including one particular reason that's still discussed today.

- There are rumors and myths about this battle that suggest that someone informed General Prevost that an attack was imminent.

We don't know for sure, but certainly the British were ready when the assault happened.

Patriot leaders from George Washington to John Adams and Benjamin Franklin in Europe were astonished.

They thought that the battle would be quick and easy, much less the second bloodiest battle in the entirety of the American Revolution, which resulted in a humiliating defeat of their prized Franco-American alliance.

- So ultimately, we know this battle for the Patriots was a failure.

Talk to me about why this battle is important, not only for just the time, but the American Revolutionary period in general.

- One of the things that came out of this was the tenuous nature of the French-American alliance.

It hadn't worked very well here.

It was still in its infancy, really.

And the question was, are they gonna be able to work together going forward?

So that was a huge question mark.

Then what's the future of the American army in the south?

It did not look good.

From here, Benjamin Lincoln went on and ended up surrendering the city of Charleston in May of 1780 just six months later.

That opened up the whole nature of what's the future of the southernmost states in the future United States or in the British Empire.

What's the future of the city of Savannah?

The British held Savannah for the duration of the war, but ultimately, it didn't really matter because they couldn't control outside of this city.

They couldn't control the rest of Georgia.

And so, there was a lot at stake that morning, and that French and American defeat and the British victory, what would happen in the future to this part of the world and the people who live there?

So there were enormous ramifications, as they say, for generations yet unborn for what happened that morning.

- Whether it was poor planning, over confidence or knowing the other side's plans altogether, the discussion of why and how things went wrong for the Patriots will probably go on forever.

But the siege of Savannah and the attack of Spring Hill is a good reminder two centuries later of what the true cost of independence looks like.

I'm Maiya Ma and we'll see you at our next stop.

(graphics whooshing) It's the story of a Georgia military leader, one-time prisoner of war and future governor, but it's also the story of the group of ships he led and their relentless push on British naval forces and all of it.

Another example of Georgia meeting the moment and the fight for independence.

This is "Marked," a series that zooms on Georgia and it's backstory, one historical marker at a time.

I'm Maiya May, and I'm here at Georgia Historical Marker 63-6 six to tell you the story of a revolutionary battle that would change hearts and minds while rallying a state at war.

(triumphant music) The American Revolution has often been talked about as not only a war between the British and the 13 colonies, but it was also a civil war, loyalists to the crown, pitted against their neighbors who were pushing back against taxation without representation.

And a lot of us, we envision the bloody images from the battlefields with muskets and bayonets, but the American Revolution had a lot more than that.

There was also plenty of fighting on the water, and in Georgia, that meant the Georgian Navy.

- The American Revolution had its fair share of battles on the water that became landmark victories.

You have the battle of Valcour Island, you have Flamborough Head, you have the Raid of Nassau, but in the south, Georgia had its own offering on the water and it came in the form of the Georgia Navy.

When we think of the Navy, especially in this era, we think of the big mast, big guns, big frigate type vessels.

The Georgia Navy was very much not that.

The Vessels Commission for Georgia were a lot smaller, and they were designed for navigating the shoals in the shallow waters of coastal Georgia at that time.

The vessels were known as row galleys.

They were designed to sort of have like a flat bottom and relied heavily on oars, which meant they needed manpower.

- They had three row galleys.

Continental Congress had given Georgia money to make 'em.

They were going to do four, but the fourth one wasn't made yet.

And those row galleys, they were good on the coastal estuary waters and up rivers, but not out in the ocean.

And some of them even had sails.

The names of the three row galleys that were involved were the Washington, the Lee and the Bullock, and they were named after George Washington, Charles Lee, who had been the first southern continental commander, and Archibald Bullock, Georgia's first president, I.E.

governor.

- These boats were under the command of Major General Robert Howe, a North Carolinian who has a bit of a complicated legacy.

- The continental Congress created the southern department of the Continental Army in 1776.

The first commander of it was Charles Lee, but Charles Lee did not stay commander long, and that's when they went and got Robert Howe.

- [Kelly] And in Georgia, Howe has Colonel Samuel Elbert running the Continental Army?

- [Clay] Samuel Elbert was born in Savannah in 1740.

His parents died, and he was a teenager when his daddy died, and so he was an orphan, but he came to Savannah in 1765.

From that point on, he was a merchant on the make learning how to be a merchant.

He did hold himself up by the bootstraps.

- He would go on to become governor of Georgia, but the main part of his story is his leadership of the Georgia Navy, which he would be in command of in 1778.

- On April 15th, Colonel Elbert catches wind of something.

He learns that off Saint Simons Sound, not far from Savannah, there's a group of British ships that have made their way into colonial waters, and it's certainly not intended to be a friendly visit.

- [Clay] It's actually four ships, one's called the Galatea, but it's hanging out behind and that's where the commander is.

But there are three others in there in the river, and one's called the Hinchinbrook, one's was called the Rebecca, and there was a water in bay.

- [Kelly] Colonel Elbert learns that these ships are getting closer to Georgia's inner coastal waters.

He needs to sound an alarm for this.

He's gotta make some moves.

And what we know about this action actually comes from a letter that Elbert wrote to his commander, General Robert Howe.

- [Elbert] Having received intelligence that the above vessels were at this place, I put about 300 men by detachment from the troops under my command at Fort Howe onboard the three galleys, the Washington, Captain Hardy, the Lee, Captain Braddock, and the Bullock, Captain Hatcher, and a detachment of artillery from two field pieces under Captain Young, I put on board a boat.

- Elbert didn't just put them on a boat, he rounded up 300 men and gave them orders to head to Darien where they would intercept the British ships.

- Elbert's plan is to preempt the British and just be one step ahead and it ends up working out.

- Each of the row galleys had a pivot cannon in the front, and of course, these row galley were no good in the open water ocean.

They couldn't do anything there, but they were good in the rivers and they were good along the coastal areas.

And the Frederica River was a coastal area, so this is where they were good.

And so, the row galleys went down and Elbert had them in march down as quick as they could, and they got 'em across on Saint Simons Island.

On April 18th late in the afternoon, Elbert's fleet come around the bend with those row galleys and those ships were there in the river, and rather than engaging the row galleys, the British dropped back that night and got ready for the next morning.

Early in the morning on April the 19th, the galleys began to open fire on those two big British ships.

The galley guns had further range, and the British guns were not making it to them, so they began to pound those two ships really bad.

And the men that were on the island, they had their weapons and some cannon or two, and they began to fire at the ships from the island.

The ships were getting it from two sides.

The battle lasted two hours and the sails were ripped up.

They were knocking down mast and the British, they had no effect on that little flotilla.

- The British, of course, have planned to engage too, but in a spooky twist of fate, the Patriots get a boost from of all things, the weather.

- The lifted up anchor to go back out with the tide, but the wind wasn't favorable to 'em.

It was favorable to Elbert's little row galley fleet.

- The wind disappeared, it just vanishes.

And the British ships with their big sails are sort of stuck and they can't really move.

- [Clay] As the British were drifting back out, trying to get away from this situation, they got out of the channel and they got into some very shallow water.

And when they did that, the ships just stuck.

And when they did that, the ships kind of went back like that, so that the guns, they could only shoot up, and they were defenseless.

- Colonel Elbert and his troops are just bombarding the British.

Literally, the British are just like sitting ducks in the water.

- The only choice that they had was to go down the river and get out of the situation.

But even then, the winds were not favorable.

It was favorable to the Americans, but it was not favorable to the British trying to get out.

That's how they got stuck in the mud.

When they got stuck in the mud, the little tide current make the ships go back a little bit, so the cannon were just totally ineffective.

- With their ships now stuck, no wind and the constant assault from the Lee, the Washington, and the Bullock, the British naval officers are staring down a difficult choice - At this point, the British have two options.

They can either surrender and almost certainly end up as prisoners, or they can abandon ship, and some of them choose that second option.

And so, some of them make a run for it, and they manage to get all the way back to the Galatea, which is one of their ships stationed near Jekyll Island.

And when you read Colonel Elbert's letter to General Howe, the man who put him in charge of all of this, you can almost hear Elbert's excitement as he describes it.

- [Elbert] It being late, the galleys did not engage until this morning.

You must imagine what my feelings were to see our three little men of war going to the attack of these three vessels who have spread terror on our coast and who were drawn up in order of battle.

But the weight of our metal soon damped the courage of these heroes, who soon took to their boats and as many as could abandoned the vessels with everything on board of which we immediately took possession.

What is extraordinary?

We have not one man hurt.

- I think Elbert himself was stunned at what he had pulled off.

He had no naval experience.

I mean, this is not anything him being in the Navy, he was the commander of the Continental Army and even the militia, but he had no naval experience.

- Colonel Elbert has managed to get through this entire ordeal with not a single casualty.

The British, on the other hand, weren't so lucky.

They lost two captains with three more officers captured.

- [Elbert] Captain Ellis of the Hinchinbrook is drowned, and Captain Moubray of the Rebecca made his escape.

As soon as I see Colonel White, who has not yet come to us with his prizes, I shall consult with him, the other three officers and the commanding officers of the galleys on the expediency of attacking the Galatea, now lying off Jekyll, - They took the ships, and not one person was killed on the American side, but some of the British were, they even got some prisoners that were British, all of their weapons, everything that was on the ships, and they got the ships.

This was the first major engagement in southern waters.

- This entire episode is not really a battle in the traditional sense, which is why it's called the F Frederica naval action.

It was quick and pretty decisive.

That doesn't diminish the importance of it.

It also proved that these row galleys, which were built in Savannah were an effective means for defending the Georgia coast where these shallow waters, you had to be able to navigate them.

- It's important to note that these ships were built in Georgia by Georgians to defend the Georgia coast.

As you can imagine, there's a lot of pride that comes with that.

- The British naval efforts were big hulking ships.

They are made for crossing huge oceans, and here you have row galleys designed for fresh water that take all of them out.

- The victory for the Patriots and for Georgia came at a time when morale wasn't high.

So this was a big win for the south.

- One of the other major ripple effects of this entire operation is the legacy of Colonel Samuel Elbert.

- This is the first victory for Georgia in the American Revolution, right there on the Frederica River, and it was all because of Elbert.

I mean, he's the one that made the plan.

Nobody over him was messing him up.

He showed right there.

If he was left to his own resources and abilities, he would've been an excellent commander on the battlefield.

That's Georgia's first big victory.

It created morale.

Boom.

- It was his leadership and foresight at the Frederica naval action that really cemented his legacy.

I mean, this is what gave him status.

- He knew that the galleys he was commanding may not be as powerful as the British vessels that were built up around Saint Simons, but Elbert and his more than 300 men went to defend the coast anyway, because independence was on the line.

- It's his only battle victory.

So in his military life, it's right at the peak of it, 'cause the other things that he was involved in were disasters.

It's his greatest gem that sits in his crown in terms of his military career.

- You've heard us talk a lot about the Georgia forces during the revolution and the incredible courage it took to stand up to the British, and all of that courage was on the water too, because the Georgia Navy and what it accomplished during the naval action on the Frederica River, just down the road from here is extremely important for its own reasons.

It was a profound moment in our state story and only added to the narrative of what Georgians were capable of.

I'm Maiya May, and thanks for watching.

(graphics whooshing) We've logged plenty of miles visiting these historical markers across our state, and our hope is that you found these select stories and these people and places as fascinating as we did, and that your understanding of Georgia's story is a little bit clearer.

I'm Maiya May.

Thanks for watching.

(triumphant music) (triumphant music continues) (audio warbling)