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William Ball
Battle of Cowpens
Saved Lt. Col. William Washington's Life
Scott Catalog # UX87 - Postal Card
Issued on January 17, 1981 at Cowpens, SC
Designed by David Blossom
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There is very little information available concerning William
Ball other than he was a servant of Colonel William Washington.
John Marshall in his account of the Battle of Cowpens wrote
that, "a waiter, too small to wield a sword saved the life of a
relative of George Washington during the battle. Just as Lieutenant Colonel
William Washington, leader of the patriot cavalry, was about to be cut down by
a sword, the black man "saved him by wounding the officer with a ball
from a pistol."
In 1845, painter William Ranney recreated the scene in
oils, from John Marshall's account of the battle. The
painting by Ranney depicted on the stamp shows the famous sword fight
between Lieutenant Colonel William Washington and the British Colonel Banastre
Tarleton, (known as "The Butcher"
because of habitually killing his prisoners) in which William
Ball rode up and saved Washington's life by firing a pistol at the
British officer. Apparently William Ball did not file a pension, and William Washington did not
leave behind any written papers so nothing further is known of William Ball.
There were fifteen additional African Americans that fought in
the Battle of Cowpens as follows: Asher Crockett, Julius Cesar,
Lemerick Farr, Andrew Ferguson, Fortune Freeman, Gideon Griffen, Morgan
Griffen, Drury Harris, Edward Harris, Allen Jeffers, Berry Jeffers, Osborne
Jeffers, Andrew Peeleg, Dick Pickens, and Record Primes.
Further information on the Battle of Cowpens and the African
Americans who fought in that battle can be found in the following:
Downright Fighting, The Story of Cowpens by Thomas J.
Fleming
Black Courage 1775 - 1783 by Robert Green.
The Black Presence in the Era of the
American Revolution by Sidney and Emma Kaplan
The Negro in the American Revolution by Benjamin Quarles
(Available at the National
Park Service On-line Bookstore)
South Carolina Department of Archives and History
http://www.scdah.sc.edu/homepage.htm
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