Francis Marion

Marion's father Gabriel was a Huguenot who emigrated to the colonies from France before 1700.[2] Francis Marion was born on his family's plantation in Berkeley County, South Carolina, c. 1732.[1] Around the age of 15, he was hired on a ship bound for the West Indies which sank on his first voyage; the crew escaped on a lifeboat but had to spend one week at sea before reaching land.[1] In the years that followed, Marion managed the family's plantation.[1]

Marion began his military career shortly before his 25th birthday. On January 1, 1757, Francis and his brother, Job, were recruited by Captain John Postell to serve in the French and Indian War.

Marion returned to his plantation to find it had been burnt during the fighting. His slaves had run away to fight for the British and had later been evacuated from Charleston. He borrowed money to purchase slaves for his plantation.[9]

After the war, Marion married his cousin, Mary Esther Videau.[10]

Marion served several terms in the South Carolina State Senate. In 1784, in recognition of his services, he was made commander of Fort Johnson, South Carolina, a virtual sinecure position, with a salary of $500 per annum.[11] He died on his estate in 1795, at the age of 63, and was buried at Belle Isle Plantation Cemetery in Berkeley County, South Carolina.[12]

The public memory of Marion has been shaped in large part by the first biography about him, The Life of General Francis Marion[13] written by M. L. Weems (also known as Parson Weems, 1756–1825) based on the memoirs of South Carolina officer Peter Horry.[1] The New York Times has described Weems as one of the "early hagiographers" of American literature "who elevated the Swamp Fox, Francis Marion, into the American pantheon."[14] Weems is known for having invented the apocryphal "cherry tree" anecdote about George Washington, and "Marion's life received similar embellishment," as Amy Crawford wrote in Smithsonian Magazine in 2007.[1]

In the 1835 novel Horse-Shoe Robinson by John Pendleton Kennedy, a historical romance set against the background of the Southern campaigns in the American Revolution, Marion appears and interacts with the fictional characters. In the book, he is depicted as decisive, enterprising, and valiant.

Hans Conreid portrayed Marion in an episode of the Cavalcade of America television series, "The Swamp Fox," which was broadcast on October 25, 1955.

Walt Disney Productions produced The Swamp Fox, an eight-episode mini-series about Marion that aired 1959–1961. It starred Leslie Nielsen as Marion, and Nielsen was also one of the singers of the theme song. The series depicted Mary Videau (who in the series no familial relationship with Marion) secretly acting as an informant for Marion on British movements and Marion's nephew Gabriel Marion being killed by Loyalists, causing Marion to seek revenge on those responsible.

Marion was one of the influences for the main character of Benjamin Martin in the 2000 movie The Patriot, which, according to Crawford, "exaggerated the Swamp Fox legend for a whole new generation."[1] The contrast between the film's depiction of Martin "as a family man and hero who single-handedly defeats countless hostile Brits" and the real-life Marion was one of the "egregious oversights" that TIME magazine cited when listing "The Patriot" as number one of its "Top 10 historically misleading films" in 2011.[15] In the film, the fictional character Benjamin Martin (Mel Gibson) describes violence that he committed in the French and Indian War. Around the time of the film's release, comments in the British press challenged the American notion of Marion as a hero. In the Evening Standard, the British author Neil Norman called him "a thoroughly unpleasant dude who was, basically, a terrorist."[16]

Concurrently, the British historian Christopher Hibbert described Marion as "very active in the persecution of the Cherokee Indians and not at all the sort of chap who should be celebrated as a hero. The truth is that people like Marion committed atrocities as bad, if not worse, than those perpetrated by the British."[17]

In a commentary published in the National Review, the conservative talk radio host Michael Graham rejected criticisms like Hibbert's as an attempt to rewrite history:

Was Francis Marion a slave owner? Was he a determined and dangerous warrior? Did he commit acts in an 18th-century war that we would consider atrocious in the current world of peace and political correctness? As another great American film hero might say: "You damn right."

That's what made him a hero, 200 years ago and today.[18]

Graham also referred to what he describes as "the unchallenged work of South Carolina's premier historian Dr. Walter Edgar, who pointed out in his 1998 'South Carolina: A History' that Marion's partisans were "a ragged band of both black and white volunteers."

The British historian Hugh Bicheno compared Marion with British Officers Tarleton and Major James Wemyss. Referring to the British officers as well as Marion, Bicheno wrote that "they all tortured prisoners, hanged fence-sitters, abused parole and flags of truce, and shot their own men when they failed to live up to the harsh standards they set."[19]

According to Crawford, the biographies by the historians William Gilmore Simms ("The Life of Francis Marion") and Hugh Rankin can be regarded as accurate.[1] The introduction to the 2007 edition of Simms's book (originally published in 1844) was written by Sean Busick, a professor of American history at Athens State University in Alabama, who says that based on the facts, "Marion deserves to be remembered as one of the heroes of the War for Independence."[1] Crawford commented:

Francis Marion was a man of his times: he owned slaves, and he fought in a brutal campaign against the Cherokee Indians. While not noble by today's standards, Marion's experience in the French and Indian War prepared him for more admirable service.[1]

The Francis Marion Park is located in front of the Harborwalk in Georgetown, South Carolina.

Numerous locations in the US are named after Francis Marion, including the Francis Marion National Forest near Charleston, South Carolina. The city of Marion, Iowa holds an annual Swamp Fox Festival.[20] Marion County, South Carolina, and its county seat, the City of Marion, are named for Marion. The city features a statue of General Marion in the town square, and has a museum which includes many artifacts related to Francis Marion; the Marion High School mascot is the Swamp Fox. Francis Marion University is located nearby in Florence County, South Carolina. The Swamp Fox is a wooden roller coaster located in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.

In Washington, D.C., Marion Park is one of the four large parks in the Capitol Hill Parks constellation. The park is bounded by 4th & 6th Streets and at the intersection of E Street and South Carolina Avenue in southeast Washington, D.C.[21] The Francis Marion Hotel is a historic hotel in downtown Charleston, South Carolina.

The municipalities of Marion in Alabama, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Virginia, and Marion Center, Pennsylvania are named for Francis Marion. Marion County, Indiana (of which the city of Indianapolis is a part), is named for the general, as are Marion Counties in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Missouri, Mississippi, Ohio, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and West Virginia, and more than 30 townships in 9 states. The Military Junior College Marion Military Institute in Marion, Alabama has an organization called Swamp Fox which is attributed to Francis Marion. The marionberry is named after the county in Oregon and so derives its name from him. The 169th Fighter Wing of the South Carolina Air National Guard, located about 12 miles east of Columbia in Eastover, South Carolina, boasts the title "Home of the Swamp Fox" and has an image of the face of a fox painted on the body of their F-16 Fighter Jets. The South Carolina State Guard, the successor to the South Carolina Militia, charters the “Swamp Fox” Explorer Post 1670 through the national division of Exploring (Learning for Life) for youth 14 to 20 years of age.

In 1850, the painter William Tylee Ranny (1813–1857) produced Marion Crossing the Pee Dee, based on events following the battle of Camden in the American Revolution. The picture, displayed at the Amon Carter Museum, depicts Marion sitting on a horse and talking with a subordinate on the back row of a small boat, Marion being second from the left.[22]

In 2006, the United States House of Representatives approved a monument to Francis Marion, to be built in Washington, D.C., sometime in 2007–08. The bill died in the Senate and was reintroduced in January 2007. The Brigadier General Francis Marion Memorial Act of 2007 passed the House of Representatives in March 2007, and the Senate in April 2008. The bill was packaged into the omnibus Consolidated Natural Resources Act of 2008, which passed both houses and was enacted in May 2008.[23] Although a site at Marion Park was selected,[24] it was not built before authorization expired in 2018.[25] Some local residents opposed a monument to a slaveowner.[26]

The U.S. Navy was home to the USS Francis Marion, a Paul Revere-class attack transport. The ship served as the flag for COMPHIBGRU 2 (Commander Amphibious Group 2). For many years, Submarine Squadron Four at the Charleston Naval Base called itself the Swamp Fox Squadron.

• 
  Historic Marker at the burial site of General Francis Marion "Swamp Fox"
• 
  Historic Marker at the burial site of General Francis Marion "Swamp Fox"
• 
  Informative Sign at the burial site of General Francis Marion "Swamp Fox"
• 
  Informative Sign at the burial site of General Francis Marion "Swamp Fox"
• 
  Final resting place of General Francis Marion "Swamp Fox"
• 
  Final resting place of General Francis Marion "Swamp Fox"

• Battle of Tearcoat Swamp
• Early history of Williamsburg, South Carolina
• List of places named for Francis Marion
• Oscar Marion, slave of Francis Marion and Revolutionary War soldier
• The Patriot, a 2000 film whose lead character was partly based on Marion
• The Swamp Fox (TV series), a 1950s television series produced by Walt Disney and starring Leslie Nielsen. This TV series inspired the 1960 Parker Brothers board game of the same name.
• Rogers' Rangers
• Knowlton's Rangers

• Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Marion, Francis" . Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
• Bass, Robert D. Swamp Fox. 1959.
• Boddie, William Willis. History of Williamsburg. Columbia, SC: State Co., 1923.
• Boddie, William Willis. Marion's Men: A List of Twenty-Five Hundred. Charleston, SC: Heisser Print Co., 1938.
• Boddie, William Willis. Traditions of the Swamp Fox: William W. Boddie's Francis Marion. Spartanburg, SC: Reprint Co. 2000.
• Busick, Sean R. A Sober Desire for History: William Gilmore Simms as Historian. 2005. ISBN 1-57003-565-2.
• Cate, Alan C. Founding Fighter: The Battlefield Leaders Who Made American Independence. Praeger, 2006.
• Oller, John. The Swamp Fox: How Francis Marion Saved the American Revolution. Boston: Da Capo Press, 2016. ISBN 978-0-306-82457-9.
• Risjord, Norman K. Representative Americans: The Revolutionary Generation. Rowman & Littlefield, 2001.
• Simms, W.G. The Life of Francis Marion. New York, 1833.
• Myers, Jonathan. Swamp Fox: Birth of a Legend. Ambition Studios, 2004.
• Young, Jeffrey Robert. Domesticating Slavery: The Master Class in Georgia and South Carolina, 1670–1837. University of North Carolina Press, 1999.
• Wickwire, Franklin and Mary. Cornwallis and the War of Independence. John Dickens & Co, 1970.

• The Swamp Fox, Smithsonian.com
• The Online Books Page: Texts about Francis Marion