British Forces Occupy Augusta

British forces under Lieutenant Colonel Archibald Campbell, the same officer who had captured Savannah a month earlier, marched inland and seized Augusta in late January 1779. The occupation initially seemed to confirm the British southern strategy: with Savannah and Augusta both in British hands, the entire Georgia colonial government had collapsed and the state appeared pacified.

The occupation did not hold. Patriot resistance in the backcountry proved stronger than anticipated, and Campbell withdrew from Augusta in February 1779 when supply lines became untenable. But the British seizure established a pattern that would repeat through 1780–1781: Augusta was the key to the Georgia interior, and whoever held it had a claim on the loyalties of the backcountry population.