Fort Motte

History

The Cherokee Path is nearby, long used by indigenous peoples for trading and travel. The first Anglo-European colonists in the area were Scots and English traders, who established trading posts with various Native American tribes. Some were fortified as early forts in the colonial period. Amelia Town was established in this area about 1735.

Mt. Joseph Plantation was built in 1767 as an up-country estate by Miles Brewton of Charleston, near the confluence of the Congaree and Wateree rivers. A slave trader, he owned several ships and plantations, becoming one of the wealthiest men in the province.

His sister Rebecca Brewton Motte (1737-1815), widowed in 1780, moved with her children from Charleston to the relative safety of Mt. Joseph Plantation after the British occupied the city. They were living there when the British appropriated this property. After the military took over the mansion and fortified it, the Motte family moved to the overseer's house.

A British garrison of regular, Hessian and Provincial forces occupied the plantation, using it as a depot for their convoys running between Camden and Charleston. The Atlantic port city is about 95 miles away by current roadways but during the Revolution, waterways were more important. The site is near a strategic river crossing of the Congaree River, which gave the British access to an important chain of transport from Charleston to points north and west.

By May 1781 the British had constructed wood and earth fortifications at Mt. Joseph: palisades (9' tall) and ramparts (10-11' wide), were faced with a 6' deep ditch in front. 20-30' from the ditch was a row of abatis. Defending the fortified mansion were 184 British regulars, Hessians, and Provincials under the command of Capt. Lt. Donald McPherson. It became known as Fort Motte, because it was occupied by Rebecca Brewton Motte and her family; she later inherited it from her brother Miles Brewton after he died at sea in 1789.

General Francis "Swamp Fox" Marion and Colonel Henry Lee laid siege to the fortified site. Rebecca Motte became known for giving him arrows from East India which would ignite on impact. His forces shot flaming arrows into the roof in order to drive the British from it,and shot artillery to prevent soldiers from putting out the fire. Captain Lt. McPherson surrendered. "The British surrender of the fort alarmed Lord Rawdon and hastened his retreat from Camden to Charleston."

Miles Brewton and his family died at sea in 1789 as he was en route to Philadelphia after being elected to the second Provincial Congress. His sister Rebecca Brewton Motte (1737-1815), widowed in 1780 when her husband Jacob died, later inherited her brother's estate and plantations, becoming more wealthy. She had also inherited Fairfield Plantation (Charleston County, South Carolina), which she and her husband had owned, and its more than 240 slaves, as well as their town house in Charleston.

The South Carolina Department of Archives and History, the South Carolina Library, and the University of South Carolina have the earliest extant maps for this area. When cultivation of short-staple cotton became profitable at the turn of the nineteenth century, after the invention of the cotton gin, this area was developed for cotton as a commodity crop. The battlefield site is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, considered important because of the military and other history from 1750-1799.