life in the village to resume its
normal course.

Events, however, were to prove that the danger of invasion was averted
for a time only. In the fall of 1780, just after the disastrous defeat
of the Americans at Camden, and prior to Cornwallis' march into North
Carolina, General Leslie, of the British army, was sent from New York to
Virginia to keep the Americans in southeastern Virginia and Albemarle
from joining Greene's army in the effort to repel the invasion of
Cornwallis.

Edenton was again in danger. The enemy, two thousand strong, were camped
at Portsmouth, and one thousand were reported to have set out from
Virginia on their way to attack the town. To add to the terror of the
inhabitants, two British galleys, with sixty men each, had slipped
through Roanoke Inlet, and were making for the little port. A letter
from Mrs. Blair to James Iredell, written during those anxious days,
gives a graphic description of conditions in Edenton at this juncture.
"Vessels cannot get in," she writes; "two row galleys are between us and
the bar, and are daily expected in Edenton. If they come, I do not know
what we shall do. We are unable to run away, and I have hardly a negro
well enough to dress us a little of anything to eat. We hear that there
is an English fleet in Virginia, landing men at Kempe's."

Governor Nash, realizing that the town was in imminent danger, now
ordered General Benbury, of Edenton, to join General Isaac Gregory at
Great Swamp, near the Virginia border, and aid him in preventing General
Leslie from entering Albemarle. At this post a battle was fought between
Leslie's men and the militia under Benbury and Gregory, in which the
latter were victorious. A little later Gregory wrote Governor Nash that
Leslie's army had withdrawn from Virginia, but that he had not been able
to ascertain the destination of the enemy. However, it soon became known
that Leslie was hurrying to Camden, South Carolina, to join Cornwallis
in his attempt to sweep through North Carolina and conquer that State,
as he had conquered her sister State on the south.

With Leslie's army removed from the vicinity, Edenton remained for a few
months free from the fear of invasion; but not for long did her citizens
enjoy a respite from anxiety, for in January, 1781, the traitor,
Benedict Arnold, was sent by the British to occupy the posts in Virginia
lately deserted by Leslie. From Portsmouth Arnold wrote to General Sir
Henry Clinton, K.C.B.,