book knowledge, but he was not much worse off in this
respect than the famous Confederate General Forrest, who is thought by
some high military critics to have been the most remarkable commander
on the Southern side in the civil war. Elijah Clarke, as well as General
Forrest, had something that served them a better turn than a mere
knowledge of books. They had a thorough knowledge of men, and a quick
eye for the situations that follow each other so rapidly in a skirmish
or battle.

[Illustration: Elijah Clarke 097]

Elijah Clarke was born in North Carolina, but moved to Georgia in 1774.
He was among the first of the inhabitants of Upper Georgia to take
up the cause of American independence; and his example, for he was a
notable man even in private life, did much to solidify and strengthen
those who leaned to that cause. When the British troops marched from the
coast into Upper Georgia, Elijah thought the time had come to take
his gun from the rack over the door, and make at least some show of
resistance. His courage, and the firmness and decision of his character,
made him the natural leader of those of his neighbors whose sympathies
were with the Liberty Boys in other parts of the State, and he soon
found himself a commander without commission or title. He cared less
for these things than for the principles of liberty for which he was
fighting.

For a while Elijah Clarke and his followers fought as partisan rangers,
but he soon drew around him a compact and disciplined body of men who
were ready to go wherever he might lead them. He did not confine his
efforts to his new neighborhood We hear of him with Howe's ill-fated
expedition against East Florida, where, at Alligator Creek, he was asked
to perform the impossible feat of storming with a troop of horse a camp
intrenched behind logs and brushwood. He was no doubt amazed at the
stupidity of General Howe in issuing such an order, but he attempted to
carry it out with his usual courage. He did succeed in floundering over
the logs with his troops, but he came to a ditch that was too wide for
his horses to leap, and too deep to be ridden through. At this moment he
and his men were saluted with a heavy fire from the enemy, and they were
compelled to retire in confusion. In this attempt Elijah Clarke was shot
through the thigh. Later he was in South Carolina, at Blackstocks, and
at The Cowpens.

In some quarters an effort has been made to blacken the reputation of
Gen