On March 2, 1781, American light troops under Colonel Otho Holland Williams of Maryland and Lieutenant Colonel Henry "Lighthouse Harry" Lee of Virginia engaged British light troops under Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton near Clapp's Mill on Beaver Creek. The Americans tried to lure the British from their camp near the mill into an ambush on Alamance Creek, where cavalry units and reinforcements waited, but the ambush failed after heavy fighting in which at least seventeen British soldiers and eight American militiamen were killed. Major General Nathanael Greene had assembled various elements of his army into a united fighting force and, with approximately 5,000 British and American troops in place or in reserve for the battle, signaled his desire for a general action and entered into an action with a force superior in numbers to the British Army for the first time. Although the planned ambush was unsuccessful, it drew Lieutenant General Charles Lord Cornwallis up a longer road to Weitzel's Mill on March 6 and to Guilford Courthouse on March 15; on March 18 Cornwallis led his wearied and depleted troops toward Wilmington and his sources of supply. After the battle, Greene disbanded the horse rifle units in favor of light infantry and dragoon units, and the events of March 2 and March 6 led to conflict between militia and the command of the American army, friction that was fueled by debate in Congress over the maintenance of a standing Continental Army. At Clapp's Mill, Williams used militia as bait to draw the British into the ambush, but after heavy firing he ordered a retreat; Lee's Legion withdrew slowly to entice pursuit, while the militia panicked and fled. Greene then ordered the militia to send their horses home, some refused and left the army, and although Botetourt County, Virginia, militiamen faced some of the heaviest fighting and suffered most of the casualties, they were court-martialed for their departure. Despite dissatisfaction with the militia, these volunteers provided the numbers needed for Greene and Williams to carry out the attack. Clapp's Mill itself began as an early industrial site powered by Beaver Creek: Henry McCulloh received permission to build a mill there in 1763, the Clapp family possessed it by 1768, and it operated as a grist mill, sawmill, and flaxseed oil press at a crossroads of major colonial roads. In February 1781 the British established a camp near this strategic site, used the millsite as a staging area, and concealed forces in the cedar woods to the north for a counterambush, while American reserves stood on Great Alamance Creek before the opposing forces clashed on the high bluff overlooking the mill. The surrounding German-speaking community, formed by settlers drawn in the 1730s to the Haw River system, had established churches, schools, and a vibrant economy by the opening of the American Revolution; though opinion there was divided during the war, many colonists from the Beaver Creek Settlement served with the American army.