Estaing had gone back to
Grenada and Byron bore away to St. Christopher. Great alarm prevailed
among our remaining West India Islands, for d'Estaing had boasted that
he would capture the whole during the summer; but he soon sailed away to
Hispaniola, and then to the coasts of Georgia and Carolina to aid the
Americans.

OPERATIONS IN GEORGIA.

After Lower Georgia had submitted to Colonel Campbell, he resolved
to prosecute his success by an advance into Upper Georgia. In this
expedition he met with few interruptions. On his approach to Augusta,
the second city of the province, the American troops fled from the town,
and the inhabitants took the oath of allegiance to the British monarch,
and formed themselves into companies for their own defence. Campbell
was now not far from a part of North Carolina where the majority of
the population were known to be royalists, and he detached
Lieutenant-colonel Hammond, with two hundred infantry mounted on
horseback, to encourage them to take up arms. The progress of the royal
arms in the Southern States was alarming, and the provincials resolved
to arrest it. In the month of January, congress despatched General
Lincoln to take the command of some regiments raised in North-Carolina,
and to unite them with the remnant of the army of Georgia. Lincoln took
post on the north bank of the river, about fifteen miles above the town
of Savannah. He was thus posted and preparing for action when Colonel
Campbell made his expedition into Upper Georgia. Soon after this
Campbell returned to England, and Augusta was evacuated, as being too
distant a post to be supported. Lincoln now marched along the northern
bank of the river, with a view of crossing it and reconquering
Georgia. In the meantime General Prevost left Savannah, and marched for
Charlestown, the capital of South Carolina, in the hope of taking it by
surprise. He appeared before that city on the 11th of May, and on the
following day it was summoned to surrender. The summons was unheeded,
and Prevost having viewed the lines, which could not be forced without a
great loss of men, and knowing that the garrison was more numerous
than his troops, and that Lincoln was hastening to its relief, retired
towards Georgia. He took possession of John's Island, which was
separated from the continent by a small inlet of the sea, commonly
called Stone River. His intention was to have remained in that island
until ammunition should arrive from New