It was while Marion was engaged on this service, that the battle of Camden was fought; but luckily, he had no share in the misadventure. He was employed, in fact, in quite an independent career of his own, organizing his own forces and acting at his own discretion. He was at the head of that system of partisan warfare, which, in its developments, was to rid the State of the foreign foe. His present command, "Marion's Brigade," was formed from the hardy spirited population of Irish descent, settled between the Santee and the Pedee, in the territory of Williamsburg. They were convinced of the intentions of the British rulers at Charleston to reduce them to political servitude; they knew their rights, and knowing, dared to maintain them. Their movement was voluntary, as they gathered their small but resolute force of picked men, and called Marion to its command. He had already assumed it, and caused the Tories to feel his new authority when the defeat of Gates took place. It roused him at once to a new effort to redeem the fortunes of war. He was already in the neighborhood of the field, and hearing that a British guard was on its way with a considerable body of prisoners, he determined to arrest the party on its march. Two days after the battle, he concerted an attack, and with the loss of but one man, killed and took 22 regulars and 2 Tories prisoners, and retook 150 continentals of the Maryland line. He was now a recognized leader in the field, and the British commander-in-chief directed his efforts to his overthrow. "I most sincerely hope," wrote Cornwallis to Tarleton, "that you will get at Mr. Marion." But Mr. Marion was not so easily to be caught. On the appearance of a superior force, under the command of Tarleton, which it would have been vain to resist, the skilful partisan turned his forces in another direction, to the borders of North Carolina, where he overawed the Scotch Tories in that disaffected region. The ruthless conduct of the British whom he had left behind, now raised the South Carolinians to fresh resistance, when Marion, ever mindful of his opportunity, returned to the State with speed, accomplishing sixty miles in one day, and in a bold night attack, defeated a large body of Tories on the Black Mingo. Following this up with some smaller successes of the kind, he again attracted the attention of Tarleton, who issued out of Charleston in force for his capture, and when he was fairly on his heels, wearied out and perplexed by the windings of his foe, gave up the chase, it is said, with the exclamation, "Come, my boys! let us go back. We will soon find the Game Cock [Marion's brother partisan, Sumter], but as for this damned Swamp-fox, the devil himself could not catch him."