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Historical Background

Victory at Yorktown

In the autumn of 1780 the British commenced operations in Virginia. In October an army under Gen. Alexander Leslie landed at the mouth of the James River. Although called to South Carolina 2 months later, his force was soon replaced by a command under Benedict Arnold, now a general in the British Army. Washington, still in New Jersey, sent the Marquis de Lafayette with a small force to keep Arnold occupied. Although greatly outnumbered, the young Frenchman maneuvered skillfully to keep Arnold under surveillance without risking his own men. Then, late in April 1781, Lord Cornwallis marched into Virginia. After vainly pursuing Lafayette's small force for a month, he withdrew to the coast. Lafayette, his strength gradually increasing, followed closely. After a brisk encounter on July 6 at Green Spring, near Jamestown Island, Cornwallis crossed the James River and marched to Portsmouth. There he received orders to take up a position at Yorktown, on the Virginia Peninsula, which General Clinton thought would make a good naval station. The British reached Yorktown by water early in August, and Lafayette took station nearby.

Map VI. Disputed Lands After 1781. (click on image for an enlargement in a new window)

Washington had been considering an assault upon Clinton's strongly positioned force in New York City. But word came in August that Admiral de Grasse's French Fleet would put into Chesapeake Bay in the fall, and Washington saw an opportunity to crush Cornwallis while the French warships protected him from the British Navy. Gen. Jean B. de Rochambeau, French commander at Newport, agreed to cooperate. A swift march took the combined French-American Army southward. Virginia militia flocked to the standard. By the end of September, Washington had concentrated almost 16,000 men around Yorktown, bottling up Cornwallis. Admiral de Grasse held off the British Fleet while Washington conducted siege operations. The genius of Washington's Yorktown campaign lay in his swift movement and concentration of forces. The siege was routine and had the result that was inevitable under the circumstances. On October 19, 1781, Cornwallis surrendered his entire army of 7,500 men. (See p. 73.)

Grand French Battery, part of the first Allied siege line, Yorktown Battlefield, Va. (National Park Service)