On Such Things History Can Turn

It was a time when the Revolution was not going well for the colonists. Lord Dunmore was moving British troops into Chesapeake and had recently taken Great Bridge, the major trade route between eastern North Carolina and Virginia and was poised to invade North Carolina. News traveled slowly, but before much time passed even the residents on the isolated regions of the upper Outer Banks had heard that the British were, in fact, coming.

Tales of pillage abounded. Near present day Corolla, Betsy Dowdy, a young teen, heard that Dunmore not only burned farms and looted, but that his men even killed horses. She could not abide the thought that the British might come in and kill the tame Banker horses that her family and friends owned, and perhaps even those in the wild herds.

There were no American troops between Dunmore and tidal North Carolina. There was no reason to believe that the patriot militia garrisoned to the south west even knew of the fall of Great Bridge.

Though it was late in the fall and the militia was many miles away, Betsy Dowdy slipped out of her home on the Outer Banks to catch her favorite mare. They forded the Sound and rode hard to the mainland. In the darkness, the young teenager rode her Corolla mare 51 miles overnight to alert the militia to the need to quickly move north to intercept the British.

The invasion of North Carolina failed because a powerless young girl stood up to the most powerful nation on earth in order to save her Corolla horses.

This is Croatoan, a wild Corolla stallion who now graces my pastures. It is highly likely that his ancestors were among those who inspired Betsy Dowdy to make her all night ride. The spirit of those horses lives on in him and the spirit of Betsy Dowdy lives on in the Corolla Wild Horse Fund.