South Carolina Loyalists in the American Revolution

An interest in the Georgia loyalists, which I developed during a brief residence in that state, exposed me to the fact that, except for Robert W. Barnwell, “Loyalism in South Carolina, 1765–1785” (Ph.D. dissertation, Duke University, 1941), South Carolina’s loyalists in the Revolution had not been studied in any comprehensive way. Although Barnwell’s study showed a firm grasp of the principal groups and individuals in the province and state who dissented from the decision to seek independence, it had not been expanded to a monograph; meanwhile, much material, particularly from British sources, had become more readily accessible, and it seemed worthwhile to undertake such a study.

--Robert Stansbury Lambert