Cornwallis moved his whole army to Yorktown, on the York River, in August and began leisurely fortifying that position and Gloucester Point opposite. Meanwhile the French West Indies fleet, under Comte de Grasse, evaded its British opponent and moved north to cooperate with the French and American land forces under Washington and Rochambeau. De Grasse sailed for the mouth of Chesapeake Bay to blockade Cornwallis by sea, while the allied armies prepared to leave the Hudson River, where they had been threatening Clinton, and close in by land. Lt. Col. Banastre Tarleton, Cornwallis’s cavalry leader, watched the gathering of hostile forces.
Near the end of August, the Guadaloupe of twenty-eight guns, left York town, to proceed to New York with dispatches from Earl Cornwallis, and from Captain Symonds of the Charon, who commanded his Majesty’s ships in the Chesapeak. At this period, the sea officers imagined that the British fleet from the West Indies would be discovered off the capes by the frigate, and the land officers expected that a considerable body of troops would soon arrive from New York to strengthen the King’s forces for solid operations in Virginia, and likewise to garrison the works which were constructing for the advantage and protection of both army and navy. These suppositions, which were well grounded, diffused among the royalists general satisfaction: but their prospects of glory were suddenly obscured. On the 30th, the French fleet, of twenty-eight sail of the line, from the West Indies, under orders of the Count de Grasse, entered the Chesapeak. The advanced guard of his squadron, consisting of the Glorieux, a coppered seventy-four, and the Diligente and Aigrette frigates, met the Guadaloupe near the capes, who, not understanding their signals, kept aloof, and afterwards by swiftness, made good her retreat to York town; whilst the Loyalist, a bad twenty-gun ship, who was stationed in the bay, after a gallant struggle in the mouth of the channel, fell into the possession of the French.
The Count de Grasse, without loss of time, blocked up York river with three large ships and some frigates, and moored the principal part of the fleet in Lynhaven bay. Upon his arrival within the capes, he dispatched information of that event to General Washington in the Jerseys, and to the Marquis de la Fayette, who was encamped near the Chickahomany. The disembarkation of the troops brought in the line-of-battle ships from the West Indies immediately took place, and the continental army in Virginia advanced to the Green springs on the 3d of September, to form a junction with the Count de St. Simon. The Marquis de la Fayette soon after moved the French and Americans to Williamsburgh.
In the mean time Earl Cornwallis practised various means to send intelligence to New York of the situation and force of the French fleet. Patroles of the legion cavalry were continually detached to the shores of James and York rivers, and daily reported to his lordship every occurrence worthy of attention: They informed him of the movement of the boats with troops towards the Chickahomany, and of the different manoeuvres of the Count de Grasse. On the 5th, the French ships were observed to make repeated signals, and it was soon discovered that an English squadron was approaching. Notwithstanding the absence of a number of officers and seamen employed in the disembarkation of St. Simon’s brigade, and of another detachment engaged in procuring water, the French fleet got under way, and stood out of the capes.
This state of hope was interrupted by the arrival of Count de Barras’s division in the Chesapeak from Rhode Island. Intelligence soon after reached York town, that Count de Grasse had repulsed the British fleet, and was returning to the bay. Before this period accounts were brought to Earl Cornwallis that General Washington, with a large body of continentals, and Count Rochambeau, with the French army, were preparing to form a junction with LaFayette, by descending in transports from the head of Elk river in Maryland, under the convoy of the French ships. In this situation, blocked up by sea, and exposed to a powerful combination on shore, Earl Cornwallis turned his attention towards the corps already arrived at Williamsburgh.
Lieutenant-Colonel Tarleton,
A History of the Campaigns of 1780 and 1781.
3. The Allies Assemble at Williamsburg
Williamsburg, at the heart of the Virginia Peninsula, commanded the landward approach to Yorktown. Here, during September, the allied armies gathered, Washington and Rochambeau hastening down from the north to join the troops of Lafayette and St. Simon. Richard Butler, then a colonel of the Pennsylvania Line, serving with Lafayette, kept daily record of the scene.
Sept. 8th.—Received orders to march for Williamsburgh to join the allied army; arrived at our ground at 11 o’clock, had some difficulty in getting our baggage as we had to let the allied army have our wagons to bring on their whole train and camp, therefore had to lay in bough huts, on very dusty ground, for this day and night; the French army, the Pennsylvania and light-troops made a very elegant appearance in passing through the city.
Sept. 9th.—Obtained our baggage, pitched our camp. Lay by without any accounts of the enemy stirring on the eighth, the British fleet passed Cape Henry and came into the bay, and were gallantly engaged by the French, who drove them to sea, and pursued them, but leaving six ships of the line for the security of the bay. The Baron de Steuben arrived in camp with his suite.