Before Thanksgiving I was contacted through my school email by an associate producer in Hollywood.  I was curious, since I wondered how they had gotten my school email.  They wanted to know if I would be willing to be part of a pilot program that would be filmed somewhere in the South and would deal with the Revolutionary War.   I tend not to jump on every offer from Hollywood, so I wanted to know some details. 

When I got home I received more information from the associate producer.  The show is a pilot, titled “Who Am I?”  The concept of the show is to take celebrities and let them know their genealogy.  It would be a surprise, since, like many Americans, they have no clue.  I was one of these Americans.  I had no idea who came before my great grandmother, until I did my own research.  Since that time I have been able to track back my O’Kelley and McClurg line (my mother’s side) to the early 18^th century. 

They told me that the site would be Briar Creek and the celebrity was Shannon Elizabeth.  I didn’t know who that was and had to do a Google search on her.  She was the star in several movies, such as “American Pie” and “Scary Movie”.  She also was on reality shows such as “Dancing with the Stars”.   Her ancestor was Samuel Patton, who fought at Briar Creek, Monck’s Corner, Ramseur’s Mill and against the Cherokees.   I have never been to Briar Creek, so I decided to take the job.  They did ask me to keep it all secret, and this was so Shannon would not know about it.  Each step of the show would reveal her past, and they wanted to get her reaction on film.   Though I didn’t give out any information on blogs such as this, I did tell my buddy, Bert Puckett.  I sent him the Google pictures of Shannon doing Maxim magazine, and Playboy.  His response was “when do we go?”  So I set it up so that he would be part of my entourage. 

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0002436/

Prior to the shoot I did an intense research session trying to find out everything I could about Shannon Elizabeth’s ancestor, Samuel Patton, and about the battle of Briar Creek.  Briar Creek was one of those battles that is rarely mentioned, mainly because it is an incredibly one sided victory, and the whole thing took five minutes.  Actually that was five minutes for the formal battle, but hours for the slaughter that followed.

The British had captured Georgia in early 1779, but then five armies converged on them from South Carolina.  If those five armies linked up they would outnumber the British two to one.  So the British army, under General Prevost, began to retreat from Augusta to Savannah, their main base of operations.   Prevost knew there were only so many routes to Savannah, so he built redoubts south of Briar Creek, that he would use to ambush and slow the Patriot armies coming towards him.   One of these armies was under the command of Major General John Ashe.  Ashe had 2,300 men, to include 70 Georgia Continentals under Colonel Samuel Elbert and 200 North Carolina Continentals under Lieutenant Colonel Archibald Lytle. 

Ashe pursued Prevost’s army down the Georgia side of the Savannah River, while there was an 800 man army under Rutherford moving towards Ashe on the South Carolina side of the river.  When Ashe arrived at the Briar Creek Bridge he discovered that it had been destroyed by Prevost’s retreating army.   Ashe then set up camp in the “peninsula” that is Briar Creek.   It seemed like a good place to defend, with water and swamps on three sides, and the only bridge to cross to their front.  Ashe set up camp, and had his men begin building a new bridge.   He also began constructing a road to Rutherford’s army.  Ashe put some of his best soldiers on the bridge, to slow down any British attempt to cross.  This group is known as Lytle’s North Carolina Light Infantry. 

These men were two companies of riflemen drafted from the General Richardson’s North Carolina Brigade, three companies of expert riflemen from General Rutherford’s North Carolina Brigade, and some 9-month North Carolina Continentals from western North Carolina.  The “9 months men” were levies (draftees) who were ill armed and poorly equipped and had originally marched to reinforce Savannah before it fell to the British.

Shannon Elizabeth’s ancestor was Samuel Patton, who was in Rutherford’s army.  Initially the producer wanted me to focus on a very romantic and novelized version of Samuel Patton’s story that was found on the internet:

http://www.angelfire.com/ga/ChuckPage/samuel1.html

The first paragraph at that site states “The elderly country gentleman stepped off the wagon as his son tied the horses to the hitching post in front of the county court house. He was dressed in his Sunday best, clothes which were well worn and sagged on his thin frame. His eyes were remarkable, a clear sky blue that had a youthful gleam making him seem much younger than his years. He walked steadily on a hickory cane he had whittled himself from a branch found by the banks of the Catawba on his farm.” 

Needless to say, I knew this wasn’t the pension application, and it was most likely something a descendant put up to make it sound better.  Many of the myths about the Revolutionary War were created by a descendant who had a flair for creative writing.  I asked some other historians if they had anything on Samuel Patton, and one, Todd Braisted of New Jersey, sent me the transcribed pension application.  I was able to get some supporting documents from the Sons of the Revolution in Indiana.  With these I began to piece together where he might have been on the battlefield. 

The producer kept calling him Captain Samuel Patton, but I learned that Samuel was an 18 year old who had just joined the militia to push the British out of Georgia.  He later, much later, became a lieutenant, but that was when he was in his early 20s.   Samuel wrote in his pension:

“That he entered the service of the United States under the following named officers, and served as herein stated.  He entered the service as a volunteer in the County of Rowan North Carolina in the year 1778 about the fifteenth day of November, in the Company Commanded by Captain Lopp in which Company John McGahay was lieutenant; under the Command of General Griffith Rutherford; that he marched to Orangeburgh in South Carolina; he marched from thence under Captain William Shepperd in the Regiment Commanded by Col. George Little to Augusta in Georgia, where he remained near three months, and from thence marched to brier Creek in the State of Georgia under General Ashe, where they were defeated by the British, and retreated across the river into South Carolina where they were again commanded by General Rutherford, where he remained until the fifteenth of April, when he was discharged having served five months.”

Through other sources I learned that Samuel had been picked to be in Lytle’s Light Infantry, posted on the bridge at Briar creek.   Through most of the week I also created maps and overlays, using original maps and Google earth. 

Prevost was able to fool Ashe.  He sent a diversion near Briar Creek Bridge, and had them occupy the Patriot’s attention.  Meanwhile Prevost and his army marched around the “peninsula”, commandeered a flatboat and crossed his 4,000 man army over the Briar Creek.   At 3:00 in the afternoon the British bumped into the American camp while they were in three columns, 6 men wide.  At first Ashe didn’t think it was the main British army, but he soon reacted by forming 600 men to slow them down.  The big problem was that Ashe had not issued ammunition, since the men didn’t have many cartridge boxes.  Right as they were forming officers sent men back to get ammo for their companies.   Ashe wrote, “We marched out of lines to meet the enemy, some carrying their cartridges under their arms, others in the bosom of their shirts, and some tied up in the corner of their hunting shirts.” 

To give Ashe credit, he had his army formed and ready for battle in six minutes.  The British displayed into a line of battle at 150 yards, shocking the Patriots, who now realized this was a well trained army and not just a bunch of Loyalist militia.  The Patriots were told to hold their fire until the British were 30 yards away.  The Georgia Continentals couldn’t resist, and marched out to do battle.  When they were 30 yards away they fired three volleys, but the Patriots were on a hill.  The British were in low ground, and all the shots went over their heads.  William Cox, who was there, wrote that they were “too eager leveling their guns almost horizontally, not a British fell.”

The Georgians had moved in front of one of the North Carolina militia battalions to achieve flanking fire, but what it did was mask the fire of the militia unit to their left, and it left a hole in the line to their right.  The unit in front of the Georgians, the 71^st Highlanders, fired one volley and then charged into the hole.  The militia units to the left and right of the Georgians broke and ran.  The units in reserve behind the Georgians also broke and ran, taking Ashe along with them.  All that was left on the field was a small amount of North Carolina militia and the Georgia Continentals.  Seventy Georgians took on the close to 4,000 British, outnumbered 50 to 1. 

Lytle had been ordered to come to the relief of the Georgians, and the North Carolinians advanced at a rapid rate, with a brass 4-pound cannon.  This was the unit where I put Samuel Patton.  He would have quick marched the mile to the fight, and then when they were within rifle range they saw the Georgians being decimated.  Every single one was killed, wounded or captured.  Lytle’s North Carolinians fired at them from long range with rifle and cannon fire, but soon the attention was turned onto them.  They had to file into the swamp to get away from the approaching British. 

The whole battle took five minutes, but the slaughter lasted the rest of the night.  The Highlanders, angry at the death of one of their own in Augusta, took no prisoners and began to slaughter all who they could find.  Draper wrote that the Highlander’s officer, Captain Baird, had “put to death nearly a dozen of these supplicants with his own hands, and eventually showed their blood oozing out of the touchhole of his fuzee.”  One of the Loyalists wrote that the bodies were “disfigured with reiterated gashes and stabs,” he was “sickened at the sight of so many spectacles of cruelty” and he “turned with disgust from the scene.”

When they could no longer find any Patriots trying to surrender, they shot those swimming to the far shore of South Carolina.  The British set fire to the grass around the river to drive out any hiding in there.  The fire killed many of the wounded and their “parched and blackening bodies joined the next morning in offering a sight such perhaps as the sun seldom rises upon among civilized nations.” 

Throughout the night the Patriots conducted a rescue operation to get as many across the river as they could.  Samuel would have been part of this also, ferrying the wounded across the cold river. 

The first date for the filming was before Thanksgiving.  To do that filming I had to get a substitute for a Christmas Parade that I was scheduled to do with Junior ROTC.  The Hollywood folks were coming from Brunswick, Georgia and worked for Tick Tock productions.  Originally we would stay overnight at the Doubletree hotel in Augusta and then drive out to Briar Creek to film.  Unfortunately the day before the shoot one of the crew’s father died, and they weren’t able to film. 

I thought it might not happen, so I continued on with life.  Though I was a little disappointed, the amount of research I uncovered rekindled my work on Volume One (2.0).  Soon though, Hollywood emailed me back about the new date.  This date would be December 2^nd, a weekday.  No problem for me, since I could get a substitute.  I wasn’t sure about Bert, but he was able to convince his Battalion commander to let him go along. 

We left early in the morning, before the sun came up, and headed towards Georgia.  Most of the trip was down the interstate, but soon we left and headed into rural South Carolina, going down Highway 301.  When we crossed over the Savannah River into Georgia, we took a left down a wide dirt road.  Along the road were signs announcing that there was deer processing centers, or hunt clubs, every half mile or so.

This dirt road was on the same route as the one in the 18^th century, and the terrain was similar to what existed then.  It was pines on the high ground, and oaks in the low swampy areas.  Most people think of battlefields as clear, golf course-like fields, but most of the battles in the South were fought in forested areas.  Almost all the battles centered around a road, since it was the only way to maneuver the wagons and artillery quickly.  Due to the vast, dark forest, armies would camp on the roads, which was the only clear spot on the map. 

We drove down the road for ten miles until we came to the area that was the Briar creek battlefield.  This battlefield is not marked, but I knew were it was.  We found the hill where the Georgians made their stand, and it did rise above the surrounding area quite a bit. 

We continued driving towards the bridge and found the film crew.  They weren’t too hard to spot since they were driving four large, shiny SUVs (in a place where a muddy old pickup truck is the norm), full of the crew who looked the part of a Hollywood crew, with Obama bumper stickers on the back windows.  They told us that they had a local sheriff’s deputy pull them over earlier and give them a ticket.  I chuckled at that one, because the entourage pretty much screamed “we ain’t from around here!”

I gathered the crew together around the Briar Creek memorial sign and gave them a quick history lesson of what happened there.  The sign, like many historical signs, had the location wrong.  The crew then went about and got busy setting up the shots, and rigging up a vehicle with exterior cameras to film the road passing by, while focusing on the wheels of the SUV.  Bert and I just stood back and watched, and shot the breeze with some of the crew.  The head producer had been to some of the places that we had (Panama, Iraq, Afghanistan) when he had been a reporter and he talked with us about the different things we had done.  I also pulled out all the “eye candy”, such as muskets, clothing, hats and such, so that they could see what might be used. 

Before I left to the shoot my dad suggested that I wear a Revolutionary War uniform in the interview.  I passed on that idea.  There is a time and place for everything.  When I am the historian, or historical consultant, I don’t wear the reenacting clothing.  This is because some in Hollywood instantly think you are some sort of Ren Faire nerd if you wear it, and won’t listen anymore.  You dress the part you want to portray.

The “talent” showed up around 1:00.  The crew kept calling Shannon “the talent” instead of her name.  I figure it is a Hollywood thing.   With her was the host of the show, Marsh Mokhtari.  Marsh was really interested in what had happened there, and Bert took him over to my pickup truck and showed him how to fire a musket. 

While we were waiting for the camera operators to set up the shots I asked him what he had done.  He said he hosted “Most Dangerous Roads” on National Geographic.  Bert told him that he watched the show with his son, Hunter.  Marsh thanked them for watching the show.  Once I got home I discovered other shows he had been on. 

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1851126/

Shannon came down and joined us by Briar Creek.  I asked Marsh if she new anything about what was about to be revealed, and he told me no, it was part of the surprise.  The show would trace her genealogy back through history, revealing each part at the site where it happened.  This is why they wanted me to keep it a secret, so that she wouldn’t find out.  The producer wanted me to shorten my history of what happened, but I’m not too good on “short”.  I like to tell all the details.  When it came time to film I told Shannon about what had happened at the bridge.  Thought the fight at Briar Creek didn’t perk her up much, she was pretty interested when she found out that her ancestor was Irish.  After the initial shoot the crew filmed us at different angles, with me saying the same thing over.  I don’t really have a script, so with each telling I revealed some other part that Marsh wanted me to expand on.   Since he was British he wanted to know what had happened in this incredibly one sided victory.  The crew filmed over my shoulder, looking at Marsh and Shannon, and then filmed over Marsh’s shoulder, looking at me.  At one point Shannon didn’t look like she was enjoying the shoot much, so Marsh told her that he just wanted her to be happy.  I looked her in the eyes and told her, “What’s not to be happy about?  It’s a beautiful day.  The sun is shining.  You are in a beautiful part of the country.  Besides, it could be worse… you could be on fire" (it's an Army thing).

For the next part of the filming we were going to have Shannon fire the musket.  She seemed a bit apprehensive about firing the musket, so I told her that if she did fire the weapon, it might burn her hair and mess it up.  So instead Marsh could fire it.  I then showed Marsh how to load and fire using the musket of my wife, Alice.  This same musket was used to teach Jason Isaacs and Heath Ledger on the set of “The Patriot.” 

Bert teaching Jason Isaacs to use the same musket in "The Patriot"

It is shorter and easier to manage.  As I showed Marsh the musket the camera came in on some close-up angles on my hands and the lock of the weapon. 

When Marsh fired the musket it surprised him, and he was amazed at the amount of smoke coming off of it.  We filmed him firing it a few more times, but now he was getting into it and wanted to do it again.  The camera also did close-up footage of him aiming down the barrel, without the musket being loaded. 

After that scene Marsh and Shannon were going to drive around talking, while cameras attached to the outside of the car recorded them.  However, our part was over.  Marsh thanked Bert and I, and he said that we were true professionals.  Since it was now about 3:00, it was time for us to head back on the long 5 hour drive home. 

I don’t know if the pilot will make it on TV or not, but I had fun researching the actual ground that Briar Creek was fought on.  Though Shannon is the stereotypical “hot chick” from Hollywood, I was more interested in the site, and was glad to finally put an image to what I had been writing about.