The sides and top of King's Mountain were wooded and strewn with boulders.

The motley assailants crept up to the crest while pouring a deadly fire on any of the defenders who exposed themselves.

Ferguson was killed and in the end his force surrendered, on October 7, 1780, with four hundred casualties and the loss of more than seven hundred prisoners.

The American casualties were eighty-eight.

In reprisal for earlier acts on the other side, the victors insulted the dead body of Ferguson and hanged nine of their prisoners on the limb of a great tulip tree.