“These are four British soldiers who have decided to give themselves to the cause of liberty.”
The General directed that the recruits be fed and clothed and enlisted in the regiment to which Morgan was attached. After that he made Morgan sit down and tell the story of his stay in the camp of Cornwallis. This he was able to do with intelligence and in great detail. Lafayette thus obtained the information which he desired. He praised his messenger highly and told him that he would commend him to the good offices of General Washington. In the meantime he proposed to promote him to the rank of corporal, with the promise of still further promotion in the near future. But the volunteer spy shook his head.
“I thank you for your goodness. I appreciate it greatly, but I do not desire to go above the rank of an ordinary private. I have ability for a common soldier, but should I be promoted, my ability may not be equal to the occasion, and I would thus lose my character.”
General Lafayette laughed heartily at this unusual display of modesty, but assured Morgan that his services would not be forgotten and that at the proper time he would be rewarded for his sacrifice and his heroism.
Lafayette was now in a position to act with intelligence. The information that had been brought to him by his spy fortunately did not make it necessary for him to change his plan of campaign. He was in communication with other Continental officers and kept constantly informed of the progress of the campaign. He discovered many other things; that Clinton, at the head of the British forces in New York, was under the impression that Washington was getting ready to attack him. Washington encouraged him to think so. In order that the British general should not be disillusioned, the American continued to make every possible preparation for moving against New York. So cleverly was this ruse carried on that the members of Washington’s own army supposed that he was really getting ready to attack Clinton. When at length everything was just as he wished it, Washington suddenly broke camp and conducted his entire force with all possible speed across the country to the head of Chesapeake Bay and thus by vessels to Yorktown. It was truly a critical time in the Revolutionary War. While Washington was continuing his southern movement Lafayette and his army closed in on the other side. The British realized that they were gradually becoming the victims of a vast enveloping movement. Cornwallis put his spy glass to his eye and peered over the walls of his fortified town. On one side he beheld the French fleet, on the other side Washington’s troops, and on still another, Lafayette’s army. The Americans, 16,000 strong, were gradually but surely coming closer and closer. Cornwallis held out with great bravery for three weeks, but the constant rain of shells and hot shot made his position almost impossible. Finally, seeing that it was useless to struggle against fate, he surrendered. His army marched out on the 19th of October, 1781, to the tune of “The World’s Upside Down,” and it was—at least to the British. They were dazed and could not understand how such a powerful army and such a great empire should fall victims to what seemed to be a handful of untrained farmers. But in spite of their feeling it was over, and they were the vanquished.
The fall of Yorktown practically ended the war of the Revolution. Washington had conquered. Lafayette’s confidence in the struggling colonists was fully vindicated and his great respect for George Washington increased. As has been said, it was the victory of a great and good man in a great and good cause.
The news of the surrender was sent post-haste to London. The excited messenger who announced the sad tidings to Lord North, the Prime Minister of the British Government, afterwards said that that functionary threw up his arms as though he had received a shot and cried dramatically:
“It is all over!”
And so it was; and in the victory at Yorktown none of the Continental troops fought more bravely or showed to greater advantage than those who served under the leadership of Lafayette. Among the privates in the New Jersey Brigade none fought with greater courage than Charles Morgan, who had served as the personal spy of the great Frenchman in the camp of Cornwallis. But in his case virtue and courage had to be their own reward. Many of the soldiers who deserved great honor were compelled to go unrewarded, and Charles Morgan was apparently one of these, for after his exploit, and the ending of the war, his name does not appear in any of the records of that great event. Like many other deserving men, he was lost in the mists of obscurity.