Colonel Andrew Pickens and the Long Cane Skirmish - Journal of the American Revolution

Pickens joined Gen. Daniel Morgan and helped him secure the decisive victory at Cowpens on January 17,1781. On the day before, Cornwallis had ordered all of Pickens’s remaining property seized or destroyed, and Pickens “if ever taken, instantly hanged.”[46]

Pickens could easily have chosen to accept a commission as a Loyalist general, or he could have retired like Williamson in safety and comfort near Charleston. He understood that breaking parole and taking up arms with the Americans was a hanging offense, and he was deciding not only for himself, but for those who would join him. His choosing to join the Patriot cause is all the more honorable considering how tempted he was to make a different choice.