Nathanael Greene
Nathanael Greene was Washington's most capable subordinate and won the southern campaign without winning a battle. Born in Rhode Island in 1742 into a Quaker family with an iron forge, he was largely self-educated, buying books and teaching himself mathematics and military history, and was expelled from his Meeting for attending a military parade. He had a limp and asthma. He was elected to a local militia company as a private because the officers thought his limp unsightly, and eighteen months later the colony made him a general. He commanded at Boston, Trenton, Brandywine and Germantown, and in 1778 accepted the post of quartermaster general — a thankless administrative job he took because the army was starving, and which he performed well enough to keep it in the field. He was given the southern command in late 1780 after Gates was destroyed at Camden, inheriting about 2,000 exhausted men against Cornwallis. He then did something no manual recommended: he divided his smaller force in the face of a larger one, sent Daniel Morgan west, and forced Cornwallis to split too. Morgan destroyed Tarleton at Cowpens. Greene then ran, drawing Cornwallis 320 kilometres north across flooded rivers, wearing his army down, before turning at Guilford Court House in March 1781 and inflicting losses that cost the British a quarter of their strength. He lost at Hobkirk's Hill and Eutaw Springs too, and after each the British withdrew further. He wrote that they fought, got beaten, and fought again. He died in Georgia in 1786 of sunstroke, at forty-three.
- Lived: 1742 CE – 1786 CE
- Nationality: American
- Roles: general, military_leader
