Despite being the son of a pacifistic Quaker merchant, Greene gravitated toward a life of military service. His performance as a battlefield commander and later as Quartermaster General earned the trust of General George Washington, who in October 1780 placed him in charge of the southern Continental forces. Greene was shocked at the poor state of his command when he arrived at army headquarters in Charlotte, North Carolina. Nevertheless, he set to work reorganizing his department with the aide of engineer Col. Thaddeus Kosciuszko, Deputy Quartermaster Col. Edward Carrington, and Commissary General Col. William Davie. Low on supplies, Greene decided he could not remain in Charlotte to await a British attack. Instead, he divided his army in half to threaten both Ninety Six and Charleston in South Carolina, collecting supplies along the way and hopefully confusing the British about his strategic intentions.
"I am well satisfied with the movement [division of the army], for it has answered thus far all the purposes from which I intended it. It makes the most of my inferior force, for it compels my adversary to divide his, and holds him in doubt as to his own line of conduct. He cannot leave Morgan behind him to come at me, or his posts of Ninety-Six and Augusta would be exposed. And he cannot chase Morgan far, or prosecute his views upon Virginia, while I am here with the whole country open before me. I am as near to Charleston as he is, and as near to Hillsborough as I was at Charlotte; so that I am in no danger of my being cut off from my reinforcements, while an uncertainty as to my future designs has made it necessary to leave a large detachment of the enemy’s late reinforcements in Charleston and move the rest up on this side of the Wateree. But although there is nothing to obstruct my march to Charleston, I am far from having such a design in contemplation in the present relative positions and strength of the two armies. "
Maj. Gen. Nathanael Greene to WashingtonGreene, Nathanael. “The papers of General Nathanael Greene.” Vol. VII. Chapel Hill: Published for the Rhode Island Historical Society [by] University of North Carolina Press, 1976, p. 547.