Lord Walsingham, an under-Secretary of State, was at the house. To him he read the stunning dispatch. The two took a hackney coach and rode in haste to Lord Stormont's.
"Mount the coach and go with us to Lord North's. Cornwallis is taken!"
Lord Stormont mounted the coach, and the three rode to the office of the Secretary of State.
The prime minister received the news, we are told, "as he would have taken a ball into his heart."
"O God, it is all over!" he exclaimed, pacing up and down the room, and again and again, "O God, it is over!"
The news was conveyed to the king that half of his empire was lost—that his hope of the New World was gone. How was the king affected? Says a writer of the times, who gives us a glance at this episode:
"He dined on that day," he tells us, "at Lord George Germain's; and Lord Walsingham, who likewise dined there, was the only guest that had become acquainted with the fact. The party, nine in number, sat down to the table. Lord George appeared serious, though he manifested no discomposure. Before the dinner was finished one of his servants delivered him a letter, brought back by the messenger who had been dispatched to the king. Lord George opened and perused it; then looking at Lord Walsingham, to whom he exclusively directed his observation, 'The king writes,' said he, 'just as he always does, except that I observe he has omitted to note the hour and the minute of his writing with his usual precision.' This remark, though calculated to awaken some interest, excited no comment; and while the ladies, Lord George's three daughters, remained in the room, they repressed their curiosity. But they had no sooner withdrawn than Lord George, having acquainted them that from Paris information had just arrived of the old Count de Maurepas, first minister, lying at the point of death, 'It would grieve me,' said he, 'to finish my career, however far advanced in years, were I first minister of France, before I had witnessed the termination of this great contest between England and America.' 'He has survived to see that event,' replied Lord George, with some agitation. Utterly unsuspicious of the fact which had happened beyond the Atlantic, he conceived him to allude to the indecisive naval action fought at the mouth of the Chesapeake early in the preceding month of September between Admiral Graves and Count de Grasse, an engagement which in its results might prove most injurious to Lord Cornwallis. Under this impression, 'My meaning,' said he, 'is, that if I were the Count de Maurepas I should wish to live long enough to behold the final issue of the war in Virginia.' 'He has survived to witness it completely,' answered Lord George. 'The army has surrendered, and you may peruse the particulars of the capitulation in that paper,' taking at the same time one from his pocket, which he delivered into his hand, not without visible emotion. By his permission he read it aloud, while the company listened in profound silence. They then discussed its contents as affecting the ministry, the country, and the war. It must be confessed that they were calculated to diffuse a gloom over the most convivial society, and that they opened a wide field for political speculation.
"After perusing the account of Lord Cornwallis's surrender at Yorktown, it was impossible for all present not to feel a lively curiosity to know how the king had received the intelligence, as well as how he had expressed himself in his note to Lord George Germain, on the first communication of so painful an event. He gratified their wish by reading it to them, observing at the same time that it did the highest honor to his Majesty's fortitude, firmness, and consistency of character. The words made an impression on his memory, which the lapse of more than thirty years has not erased; and he here commemorates its tenor as serving to show how that prince felt and wrote under one of the most afflicting as well as humiliating occurrences of his reign. The billet ran nearly to this effect:
"'I have received with sentiments of the deepest concern the communication which Lord George Germain has made me of the unfortunate result of the operations in Virginia. I particularly lament it on account of the consequences connected with it, and the difficulties which it may produce in carrying on the public business, or in repairing such a misfortune. But I trust that neither Lord George Germain, nor any member of the cabinet, will suppose that it makes the smallest alteration in those principles of my conduct which have directed me in past time, and which will always continue to animate me under every event in the prosecution of the present contest.' Not a sentiment of despondency or of despair was to be found in the letter, the very handwriting of which indicated composure of mind."
Franklin was still envoy plenipotentiary at beautiful Passy. He received the thrilling news, and wondered what terms the English Government would now seek to make in the interests of peace.