The final battle of the Revolutionary War–the surrender at Yorktown, Virginia–marked the end of the lengthy war between the British and the new United States. A peninsula near the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay, Yorktown was the final fortification for Charles Cornwallis’s band of British troops and Hessian mercenaries. The American victory at Saratoga achieved by General Horatio Gates in October 1777 was a pivotal moment in the American Revolution because it further convinced the French to formally ally with the American colonists, providing critical military and financial support. The aid provided by the Marquis de Lafayette and the troops led by the Comte de Rochambeau proved necessary for the victory won by Washington’s Continental Army. The French Navy, led by the Comte de Grasse, overcame the British at the Battle of the Chesapeake mere weeks before the final siege was waged, allowing the French to control the bay, and preventing Cornwallis’s men from escaping by sea. Cornwallis surrendered on October 19, 1781, at 10:30 a.m. The Treaty of Paris was signed on September 3, 1783, after months of negotiations between the American and British delegates following the American victory at the Battle of Yorktown. According to the Treaty, “His Britannic Majesty acknowledge[d] the said United States…to be free sovereign and Independent States.”
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After six long years of war, I had learned what victory cost.
And yet, as we closed the trap at Yorktown, the weight of command had never felt heavier.
For years, my thoughts had fixed upon the Northeast.
It was where I endured defeat and retreat.
Where quarreling soldiers were forced to come together.
It was where starving soldiers doubted my leadership.
Men divided by pride, yet bound by a common cause.
New York was the ground we lost first, and I longed to reclaim it.
Then word came that our French allies would sail not for New York, but for the Chesapeake.
Cornwallis was fortifying at Yorktown.
Lafayette was already in Virginia, holding him fast.
For days, I weighed what to do.
Abandon the plan I had pursued for years, or trust in fortune and in France.
We marched south.
We moved in silence, masking our design.
I was not without apprehensions, lest the British should discover our real intentions
and throw themselves into Virginia.
But I felt we must risk something.
Each mile was a gamble on faith, in our allies, and in Providence.
Cornwallis had paid dearly at Dilford Court House.
It's a ribeye name, but a ruin in fact.
His ranks thin, his men exhausted.
We would meet him at the end of the long, bleeding road.
Sir, you are too much exposed here.
Had you not better step back.
Colonel Cobb, if you are afraid, you have liberty to step back.
When our men took the redoubts, the field itself seemed to tremble.
In their courage, I saw every hardship, every winter endured, answered at last.
British reinforcements were already on the way from New York.
But at the Capes, the French fleet turned them back.
With the bay sealed, Cornwallis stood alone.
And in those final, desperate nights, Cornwallis tried to escape across the York River.
But a sudden storm scattered his boats, and the last path of retreat closed before him.
On the 19th of October, the enemy laid down their arms.
By my order, there were no cheers at the surrender.
Only the sound of a nation exhaling after years of struggle.
Later, as news spread of our victory, bells rang,
fires were lit, and celebrations broke out.
For a hope too long deferred, now finally within reach.
While loved ones finally rejoined together, and the nation breathed again,
I confess I had long wished to terminate the war by the reduction of New York.
But Providence directed otherwise, and better.
Yorktown essentially ended the war, yet there was still work to do.
