Daniel Morgan

Daniel Morgan was the most effective battlefield tactician of the American Revolutionary War, and the victor of Cowpens. He was born in New Jersey to a Welsh family, left home at seventeen after a quarrel with his father, and settled in the Shenandoah valley as a wagoner. He drove supplies for Braddock's expedition in 1755 and was given four hundred and ninety-nine lashes for striking a British officer, a grievance he recalled with relish for the rest of his life. When the revolution began he raised a company of Virginia riflemen, men who could hit a target at two hundred yards with a weapon the British army did not have. He marched them to Quebec with Benedict Arnold and was captured there. Exchanged, he commanded the rifle corps at Saratoga, where his marksmen picked off officers and gunners and helped break Burgoyne's army. He resigned in 1779, ill and passed over for promotion, and returned after the disaster at Camden. At Cowpens in January 1781 he faced Banastre Tarleton with a mixed force including untrained militia. He placed the militia in front, asked them for two volleys and permission to withdraw, and used their retreat to draw Tarleton's men onto his regulars. It was a double envelopment, and it destroyed Tarleton's command in under an hour. He later led troops against the Whiskey Rebellion and served a term in Congress. Cowpens is still taught as a model of using unreliable troops well rather than wishing they were better. Nathanael Greene used the same principle at Guilford Court House two months later. Morgan suffered from sciatica and malaria for much of his life, which repeatedly forced him out of the field at moments when he was most needed.

• Lived: 1736 CE – 1802 CE
• Nationality: American
• Roles: military, politician