The Battle of Cowpens was a military engagement during the American Revolutionary War fought on January 17, 1781, near the town of Cowpens, South Carolina. American Patriot forces, estimated at 2,000 militia and regulars under Brigadier General Daniel Morgan, faced 1,000 British troops under Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton. The American victory was the worst loss suffered by British units since General John Burgoyne surrendered to General Horatio Gates at Saratoga in 1777. A small force of the Continental Army under the command of Brigadier General Daniel Morgan had marched to the west of the Catawba River, in order to forage for supplies and raise the morale of local Colonial sympathizers. The British had received incorrect reports that Morgan’s army was planning to attack the important strategic fort of Ninety Six, held by American Loyalists to the British Crown and located in the west of the Carolinas. The British considered Morgan’s army a threat to their left flank. Lieutenant General Charles Cornwallis dispatched cavalry/ dragoons commander Tarleton to defeat Morgan’s command. Upon learning Morgan’s army was not at Ninety Six, Tarleton, bolstered by British reinforcements, set off in hot pursuit of the American detachment.

A few minutes before sunrise, Tarleton's vanguard emerged from the woods in front of the American position. Tarleton ordered his dragoons to attack the first line of skirmishers, who opened fire and shot 15 dragoons. When the dragoons promptly retreated, he immediately ordered an infantry charge, without pausing to study the American deployment or to allow the rest of his infantry and his cavalry reserve to make it out of the woods. The Virginians fired into the British at a range of no more than 30 yards, with massive effect, causing the confused British to lurch to a halt. The shock of the sudden charge, coupled with the reappearance of the American militiamen on the left flank where Tarleton's exhausted men expected to see their own cavalry, proved too much for the British. Nearly half of the British and Loyalist infantrymen fell to the ground whether they were wounded or not. Tarleton’s apparent recklessness in pushing his command so hard in pursuit of Morgan that they reached the battlefield in desperate need of rest and food may be explained by the fact that, up until Cowpens, every battle that he and his British Legion had fought in the South had been a relatively easy victory.