e, Progress, and Establishment of
the Independence of the United States of America, &c. By
William Gordon, D.D. New York. 1789.

17. Five volumes of MS. Letters from distinguished officers
of the Revolution in the South. From the Collection of Gen.
Peter Horry.

Preface.

The facts, in the life of Francis Marion, are far less generally
extended in our country than his fame. The present is an attempt to
supply this deficiency, and to justify, by the array of authentic
particulars, the high position which has been assigned him among
the master-workers in our revolutionary history. The task has been a
difficult, but I trust not entirely an unsuccessful one. Our southern
chronicles are meagre and unsatisfactory. South Carolina was too long in
the occupation of the British--too long subject to the ravages of civil
and foreign war, to have preserved many of those minor records which
concern only the renown of individuals, and are unnecessary to the
comprehension of great events; and the vague tributes of unquestioning
tradition are not adequate authorities for the biographer, whose laws
are perhaps even more strict than those which govern the historian.
Numerous volumes, some private manuscripts, and much unpublished
correspondence, to which reference has been more particularly made in
the appendix, have been consulted in the preparation of this narrative.
The various histories of Carolina and Georgia have also been made use
of. Minor facts have been gathered from the lips of living witnesses.
Of the two works devoted especially to our subject, that by the Rev.
Mr. Weems is most generally known--a delightful book for the young. The
author seems not to have contemplated any less credulous readers, and
its general character is such as naturally to inspire us with frequent
doubts of its statements. Mr. Weems had rather loose notions of the
privileges of the biographer; though, in reality, he has transgressed
much less in his Life of Marion than is generally supposed. But the
untamed, and sometimes extravagant exuberance of his style might well
subject his narrative to suspicion. Of the "Sketch" by the Hon. Judge
James, we are more secure, though, as a literary performance, it is
quite as devoid of merit as pretension. Besides, the narrative is not
thorough. It dwells somewhat too minutely upon one class of facts, to
the neglect or the exclusion of others. I have made both of these works
tri