SYCAMORE MEN

The Southern Campaign of the 1780's is the background for Dixon Blakely's activities under orders from Washington to make every effort to unite the scattered commands -- and under his heart's dictates to marry Jewel May Ward. With Francis Marion and the irregulars, he helps to harry the British, to fight at Kings Mountain, to keep relentless, constant pressure on Cornwallis, to disarm Tarleton's dragoons, to sneak inside Charleston and bring out hundreds of pounds of much needed gunpowder, and to marry, after the battle at Eutaw Springs, his love. For Jewel May, at first distrusted by Marion because of her father's Toryism, becomes a trusted ally, and, through her medical training under Dr. Pindell, is able to follow his command to care for the sick and wounded -- even Dixon when he is hurt. This carefully traces the will-o'-the-wisp tactics of the rebel forces, cross sections the incidents, British and American, throughout South Carolina, bloodhounds the battlefields and takes the pulse of the ebb and flow of military victories for a solid piece of history in fiction form.