Soon after his return home, Colonel Graham again marched with his regiment, General Rutherford commanding, against a large body of Tories assembled at Ramsour’s Mill under Lieut.  Colonel John Moore, (son of Moses Moore) near the present town of Lincolnton.  General Rutherford, with some Mecklenburg troops, crossed the Catawba river at Tuckaseege Ford, on the evening of the 19th of June, 1780, and camped at Colonel Joseph Dickson’s plantation, three miles northwest of the ford.  On the morning of the 20th, Gen. Rutherford marched, at an early hour, with the expectation of co-operating with Colonel Locke, of Rowan county, in making a combined attack against the Tories, but failed to reach the battleground until about two hours after the close of that sanguinary engagement, in which the Tories were signally defeated.

When a call was made upon the commanding officers of the militia of Lincoln county (under its old limits) in September, 1780, for troops to oppose the boasting Ferguson, Colonel Graham marched with his regiment, and joined Colonels Campbell, Sevier, Shelby and others at the “Cowpens,” where, a little more than three months afterward, General Morgan gained a brilliant victory; but, it is known, in consequence of severe sickness in his family, Colonel Graham did not participate in the battle which took place on King’s Mountain on the afternoon of the 7th of October, 1780, and which resulted so gloriously for the American arms.

During the year 1775, the Province of North Carolina, ever in the van of early patriotic movements, formed “Associations” throughout her territory, mainly as tests of patriotism.  The county of Cumberland formed an Association on the 20th of June, 1775.  The county of Tryon (embracing Lincoln and Rutherford) formed a similar “Association” on the 14th of August following, which was signed by the “Committee of Safety,” and ordered to be “signed by every freeholder in the county.”  Among the forty-eight signatures may be conspicuously noticed those of William Graham, Charles McLean, (who at one time commanded the Lincoln regiment), Frederick Hambright, (see sketch of his services in this volume) John Walker, Jacob Forney, (father of Gen. Peter Forney), Thomas Espey, (brother of Capt.  Samuel Espey, severely wounded at the battle of King’s Mountain), Andrew Neal, Joseph Neal, John Dellinger, George Dellinger, Joseph Hardin, Jacob Costner, Valentine Mauney, Peter Sides, Joseph Kuykendall, James Coburn, James Miller and others.  One of the signers, Peter Sides, (properly Seitz) belonged to a family from Switzerland—­all true Whigs, and worthy representatives of the land of William Tell.

Colonel William Graham died in April, 1835, in the eighty-seventh year of his age, and is buried at the old homestead, on First Broad river, in Cleaveland county, N.C.

LIEUTENANT-COLONEL FREDERICK HAMBRIGHT.