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Reasons For Bg Morgan Victory At The Battle Of Cowpens

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With enemy troops in South Carolina and Virginia, the outlook for the Continental Army was bleak until the Battle of Cowpens. This was an important turning point for the Americans in the Revolutionary War. The purpose of this essay is to prove that Brigadier General Daniel Morgan led the American Continental Army to success, by driving the operations process. Without his understanding of mission command, it would have been difficult to secure the victory at Cowpens. Though there are people that would argue BG Morgan’s victory at the Battle of Cowpens was a fluke, I will prove BG Morgan used the commanders activities of “lead, understand, visualize, describe.” BG Morgan understood the operational variables military and physical terrain. He …show more content…

According to Army doctrine, examining the geography and manmade structures, as well as the climate and weather in the area of operations allows commanders to understand their physical environment. After he identified three hillcrests situated in parallel, BG Morgan knew this would be the best location to set up a reverse slope defense. Each hillcrest was slightly higher than the one before, giving BG Morgan the ability to place his troops in the trough between the hills. This created an American advantage for two reasons: the British ground forces did not aim when they shot, having most of their rounds miss high of the target and the Americans would be able to better identify the British silhouettes against the skyline. BG Morgan’s understanding of the terrain also meant that British forces would have to advance moving uphill at multiple points in the battle, tiring their forces over time. On either side of the Cowpens, the landscape was thick with brambles and infested with swampland, due to days of heavy rain. BG Morgan decided to prepare his defense to meet LTC Tarleton on this terrain. The severely restricted terrain would limit British forces’ ability to attempt any kind of flanking maneuvers, placing their entire force directly in front of three distinctly separate lines of defense. BG Morgan would use this to his advantage by making British forces think American lines were retreating, when they were just maneuvering to support the second and third defensive line. BG Morgan’s understanding allowed him to visualize an operational approach that led to mission

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