the military art. It is said that General Howe
disapproved of this ex-centric movement.

The force destined for the Southern coasts assembled at Cork towards
the end of 1775, and sailed thence in January, 1776. The troops were
commanded by Lord Cornwallis, the squadron by Nelson's early patron,
Commodore Sir Peter Parker, whose broad pennant was hoisted on board
the _Bristol_, 50. After a boisterous passage, the expedition arrived
in May off Cape Fear in North Carolina, where it was joined by two
thousand men under Sir Henry Clinton, Cornwallis's senior, whom Howe
by the government's orders had detached to the southward in January.
Upon Clinton's appearance, the royalists in North Carolina had risen,
headed by the husband of Flora Macdonald, whose name thirty years
before had been associated romantically with the escape of the young
Pretender from Scotland. She had afterwards emigrated to America. The
rising, however, had been put down, and Clinton had not thought
it expedient to try a serious invasion, in face of the large force
assembled to resist him. Upon Parker's coming, it was decided to make
an attempt upon Charleston, South Carolina. The fleet therefore
sailed from Cape Fear on the 1st of June, and on the 4th anchored off
Charleston Bar.

Charleston Harbour opens between two of the sea-islands which fringe
the coasts of South Carolina and Georgia. On the north is Sullivan's
Island, on the south James Island. The bar of the main entrance was
not abreast the mouth of the port, but some distance south of it.
Inside the bar, the channel turned to the northward, and thence led
near Sullivan's Island, the southern end of which was therefore chosen
as the site of the rude fort hastily thrown up to meet this attack,
and afterwards called Fort Moultrie, from the name of the commander.
From these conditions, a southerly wind was needed to bring ships
into action. After sounding and buoying the bar, the transports
and frigates crossed on the 7th and anchored inside; but as it was
necessary to remove some of the _Bristol's_ guns, she could not follow
until the 10th. On the 9th Clinton had landed in person with five
hundred men, and by the 15th all the troops had disembarked upon Long
Island, next north of Sullivan's. It was understood that the inlet
between the two was fordable, allowing the troops to cooeperate with
the naval attack, by diversion or otherwise; but this proved to be a
mistake. The passage was seven feet d