Tarleton was not deficient in personal courage, and turned to meet his old enemy in a hand-to-hand encounter.  The officer nearest him struck at Washington as he passed, but missed his blow and received a bullet in his side from the young bugler’s pistol.

“Carter,” cried Tarleton to the other aide, who rode near him, “a captain’s brevet if you take that woman’s petticoat,” pointing with his sword to the saucy little flag, the story of which had reached the British camps.

But it was no woman’s hand which was there to defend it, and as the Englishman wheeled his horse for the attack Peyton’s pistol flashed almost in his face, and he fell forward on his charger’s neck, convulsively clasping it as the animal ran wildly forward unguided toward the American lines.  Meanwhile, the two commanders had crossed swords, and as both were good fencers, a duel a l’outrance seemed imminent.  But Tarleton had no time for chivalrous encounters.  His opponent beat down his guard, and with a sudden thrust wounded the British colonel in the hand.  The latter drew a pistol, and as he wheeled to follow his flying squadrons discharged it at his adversary, the ball taking effect near the knee.  The battle was now really at an end, and the pursuit was abandoned at this point.

As Walter Peyton lay down beside his camp-fire that night it was with a body worn down by excitement and fatigue, but with a heart beating high with pride as he looked at the flag he had so gallantly defended, and remembered his colonel’s words of commendation, which he more than hoped meant promotion to a captain’s commission.

In the city of Charleston all was gloom and sorrow except in the little circle of society which boasted of its loyalty to the Crown.  Scarcely a family but had some representative in the Continental ranks, and as all intelligence reached the city through British channels, the darkest side of every encounter between the armies was the first which the imprisoned patriots saw.  The non-combatant members of all the planters’ families had moved into the city before its capitulation, and while the ladies permitted the visits and acquaintance of the English officers, they never lost an opportunity to show them how hateful they esteemed the royal cause.

It was nearly a month after the victory at the Cowpens that Miss Elliott was sitting with her mother one evening in the parlor of their city residence.  Conspicuous among the furniture was a large and comfortable arm-chair upholstered in heavy crimson silk damask, but while everything else in the room was neat and even elegant, this chair appeared to be more fit for the lumber-closet, the entire square of silk having been cut from the back, leaving the underlining of coarse striped cotton exposed to view.  The tones of the curfew or “first bell,” which may still be heard nightly in the seagirt old city, had just died away when a loud rap came from the heavy brass knocker on the street-door, and in a few moments old Billy appeared to announce “Captain Fraser.”