This is Angela Odell, and you are listening to Real Cool History for Kids, a podcast show featuring history told from a distinctly biblical worldview perspective.

Welcome to an adventure.

Welcome to episode 168 of Real Cool History for Kids. This episode is for Cassandra Hayes, who wanted to hear the story of Francis Marion, the Swamp Fox. You all know how much I love stories of courage and creativity

and, well, just clever people.

Well, today, I get to tell you the story of one of the most clever heroes of the American

Revolution, Francis Marion, who earned the nickname the Swamp Fox. His story is full of courage and creativity and

danger and some of the most daring escapes in our nation's history. Francis Marion was born around

1732 in the hot, marshyhy low country of South Carolina. I say he was born around 1732

because nobody is absolutely sure when his birthday was. His family were French Calvinist Protestants, and he was the descendant of a Huguenot who fled to America from France because of religious persecution.

Faith and courage were so important to Francis Marion's family.

The low country of South Carolina was a wild place filled

with swamps and thick forest and twisting and winding rivers and all kinds of animals.

Francis grew up learning to ride horses and hunt for food and explore those swamps without getting lost,

a skill that would someday confuse the British

Army so much they could hardly stand it. Francis wasn't a very big kid. In fact, he was kind of small

and wiry, but he was tough, and he was determined. When he was about 12 years old, he felt overboard from a ship during a trip with his family.

He bobbed up and down in the rolling waves until the sailors could rescue him.

After this experience, Francis became more cautious and quiet,

but he also became more unusually brave and able to face danger

without panicking. When he grew older, Francis joined the South Carolina militia during the

French and Indian War. During this time, he learned something that would become his trademark, guerrilla warfare.

That means using small groups and surprise attacks and quick escapes and just really unusual

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