These successes in Georgia so greatly encouraged the British that in the spring of 1780 Clinton led an expedition against South Carolina, and (May 12) easily captured Charleston, with Lincoln and his army.  By dint of great exertions another army was quickly raised in North Carolina, and the command given to Gates by Congress.  He was utterly unfit for it, and (August 16, 1780) was defeated and his army almost destroyed at Camden by Lord Cornwallis.  Never in the whole course of the war had the American army suffered such a crushing defeat.  All military resistance in South Carolina was at an end, save such as was offered by gallant bands of patriots led by Marion, Sumter, and Pickens.

%154.  The Treason of Arnold.%—­The outlook was now dark enough; but it was made darker still by the treachery of Benedict Arnold.  No officer in the Revolutionary army was more trusted.  His splendid march through the wilderness to Quebec, his bravery in the attack on that city, the skill and courage he displayed at Saratoga, had marked him out as a man full of promise.  But he lacked that moral courage without which great abilities count for nothing.  In 1778 he was put in command of Philadelphia, and while there so abused his office that he was sentenced to be reprimanded by Washington.  This aroused a thirst for revenge, and led him to form a scheme to give up the Hudson River to the enemy.  With this end in view, he asked Washington in July, 1780, for the command of West Point, the great stronghold on the Hudson, obtained it, and at once made arrangements to surrender it to Clinton.  The British agent in the negotiation was Major John Andre, who one day in September met Arnold near Stony Point.  But most happily, as he was going back to New York, three Americans[1] stopped him near Tarrytown, searched him, and in his stockings found some papers in the handwriting of Arnold.  News of the arrest of Andre reached Arnold in time to enable him to escape to the British; he served with them till the end of the war, and then sought a refuge in England.  Andre was tried as a spy, found guilty, and hanged.

[Footnote 1:  The names of these men were Paulding, Williams, and Van Wart.]

%155.  Victory at Kings Mountain.%—­After the defeat of Gates at Camden, the British overran South Carolina, and in the course of their marauding a band of 1100 Tories marched to Kings Mountain, on the border line between the two Carolinas.  There the hardy mountaineers attacked them (Oct. 7, 1780) and killed, wounded, or captured the entire band.

[Map:  %CAMPAIGNS IN THE SOUTH 1778-1781%]

%156.  Victory at the Cowpens%.—­Meantime a third army was raised for use in the South and placed under the command of Nathanael Greene, than whom there was no abler general in the American army.  With Greene was Daniel Morgan, who had distinguished himself at Saratoga, and by him a British force under Tarleton was attacked January 17, 1781, at a place called the Cowpens, and not only defeated, but almost destroyed.