On June 15 Cornwallis left his camp at Elk Hill, sacking the plantation as he departed. He moved eastward toward the coast where he could better coordinate his movements with those of Clinton in New York. Clinton was under heavy pressure from Washington and French General Rochambeau. Heading for Williamsburg, Cornwallis plundered the countryside as he went. Reaching Williamsburg, he received orders from Clinton to send 3,000 men to New York. Leaving Williamsburg for his ships at Portsmouth, he maneuvered Lafayette and Wayne into a reckless battle near Jamestown on July 6. Beating Wayne badly, Cornwallis had Lafayette at his mercy, but could not follow up for a complete victory.
At this point indecision by Clinton, commander-in-chief of the British army, caused a fatal error. He had ordered Cornwallis to send the men to New York; then he countermanded that order and wanted them shipped to Philadelphia; then to New York again. Finally learning that Admiral de Grasse with a major French fleet had left France for America, he suggested Cornwallis move across the James from Portsmouth and find a suitable site on the peninsula for both an army and the British fleet. He suggested Old Point Comfort. His proposal was examined by Cornwallis and rejected as undefendable. Cornwallis settled on Yorktown with its high bluff and good port.
Yorktown, September-October, 1781
The news that Admiral de Grasse and the French fleet had cleared France presented Washington with an opportunity he had to exploit. Washington and Rochambeau took counsel and concluded an assault on Clinton in New York was not a certain success. Cornwallis was a better bet. They decided to leave Clinton in New York believing he was about to be attacked by a large army and move quickly southward to Virginia. Coordinating their arrival with that of de Grasse in the Chesapeake, they would snare Cornwallis at Yorktown.
For once in the war a grand American plan went off without a hitch. Washington and Rochambeau left New York on August 21, getting away without detection by Clinton. Simultaneously Lafayette moved his troops south of Cornwallis to block an escape into the Carolinas. On August 30 de Grasse with his great fleet of 24 major ships, 1,700 guns, 19,000 seamen, and 3,000 troops reached the Capes. He had disembarked his troops before a smaller British fleet arrived to challenge him. On September 5 the French fleet drove the English back to New York. Cornwallis was trapped.
Carefully Washington, Rochambeau, and de Grasse plotted the siege of Yorktown. When the formal siege began on September 28, Washington had an army of nearly 16,000 men including 7,800 fresh, disciplined, and well-equipped French troops. The 8,800 Americans included 3,000 Virginia militia commanded by Governor Nelson and veteran Generals Weedon, Robert Lawson, and Edward Stevens. The bulk of Washington's Continentals were from Pennsylvania, New York, and New Jersey. Cornwallis had about 7,000 men, many of whom had been in the field since February, 1780.
At the beginning Cornwallis abandoned his weaker outer defenses, which Washington immediately turned into artillery battery positions. Once the siege began in earnest on October 6, the allied artillery pounded the British into submission. Parallel trenches were dug close to the British lines. On the night of October 14 a combined attack by Americans under Colonel Alexander Hamilton and the French took the two redoubts which were the keys to the sagging British defenses. On the 16th Cornwallis attempted to escape across the York River to Gloucester Point and then north to New York and Clinton. A sudden storm scattered his boats and barges. With that Cornwallis recognized the utter hopelessness of his position and on the 17th signalled Washington for terms of surrender. Washington replied that only complete surrender was acceptable. Cornwallis agreed. There was no choice. At 2 p.m. on October 19, 1781, Cornwallis' army of 7,247 stacked arms and surrendered to the Americans while a British regimental band played the now famous military march, "The World Turned Upside Down." Cornwallis, pleading illness was not present. He was later to go on to a distinguished career as governor-general of India.
Fighting went on spasmodically in the Carolinas and in the West for some time. But everyone knew the war was over. The British people no longer wanted to fight what had become a world war involving the Dutch, French, and Spanish, as well as the Americans. When he heard the news from Yorktown, Lord North supposedly cried out, "Oh God! It is all over."