Patrick Ferguson

In October 1778 Ferguson was assigned to lead a raid in southern New Jersey to suppress privateers who had been seizing British ships. With his foot still in the stirrup he was dragged to the rebel side. Ferguson's own account (under the pen-name Egg-Shell) expresses his dismay at Pułaski's lack of preparations and failure to post look-outs.

Some dispute this characterization of Ferguson as showing pro-Patriot bias however and other accounts praise him for his humanity and unwillingness to follow orders he considered barbaric. He is best known for his service in the 1780 military campaign of Charles Cornwallis during the American Revolutionary War in the Carolinas in which he aggressively recruited Loyalists and harshly treated Patriot sympathisers.