Good Morning...Huge Upset Win for the Home Team

[Okla-homey]

Oct. 19, 1781: Cornwallis surrenders at Yorktown

http://img204.imageshack.us/img204/192/bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbpositionsyorktownnc2.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

229 years ago, on this day in 1781, British General Charles Cornwallis formally surrenders 8,000 British soldiers and seamen to a French and American force at Yorktown, Virginia, bringing the American Revolution to a close.

http://img204.imageshack.us/img204/1589/bbbbbbbbbbbbbbcornwallisfc2.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Charles Cornwallis

Previously, Cornwallis had driven General George Washington's Patriot forces out of New Jersey in 1776, and led his Recoats in victory over General Horatio Gates and the Patriots at Camden, South Carolina, in 1780.

His subsequent invasion of North Carolina was less successful, however, and in April 1781, he led his weary and battered troops toward the Virginia coast, where he could maintain seaborne lines of communication with the large British army of General Henry Clinton in New York City.

http://img208.imageshack.us/img208/3858/bbbbbbbbbbbbbbroutegg3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

After conducting a series of raids against towns and plantations in Virginia, Cornwallis settled in Yorktown in August. The British immediately began fortifying the town and the adjacent promontory of Gloucester Point across the York River

Washington instructed the Marquis de Lafayette, who was in Virginia with an American army of around 5,000 men, to block Cornwallis' escape from Yorktown by land. In the meantime, Washington's 2,500 troops in New York were joined by a French army of 4,000 men under the Comte de Rochambeau.

http://img207.imageshack.us/img207/826/bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbmarquisdelafayettelgca5.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
The then 30 year-old Marie Jean Paul Joseph Roche Yves Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de LaFayette, in the uniform of a US major general.

Washington and Rochambeau made plans to attack Cornwallis with the assistance of a large French fleet under the Comte de Grasse, and on August 21 they crossed the Hudson River to march south to Yorktown. Covering 200 miles in 15 days, the allied force reached the head of Chesapeake Bay in early September.

http://img208.imageshack.us/img208/2794/bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbrochambeaugrandpo7.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau (1725-1807)

http://img208.imageshack.us/img208/3871/bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbphoto04bp5.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
François, Joseph, Paul, Comte de Grasse

http://img208.imageshack.us/img208/5497/bbbbbbbbbbbbbbusscomtedegrassedd974sp2.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
de Grasse's naval forces played such a pivotal role in the US victory, he has a destroyer named for him in the US Navy. DD974 USS Comte de Grasse

Meanwhile, a British fleet under Admiral Thomas Graves failed to break French naval superiority at the Battle of Virginia Capes on September 5, denying Cornwallis his expected reinforcements.

Beginning September 14, de Grasse transported Washington and de Rochambeau's men down the Chesapeake to Virginia, where they joined Lafayette and completed the encirclement of Yorktown on September 28.

http://img208.imageshack.us/img208/4242/bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb57vcsi0.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Image in contemporary British media depicting the encircling American and French forces as an evil rattlesnake coiled around the poor unfortunate British forces at Yorktown

De Grasse landed another 3,000 French troops carried by his fleet. During the first two weeks of October, the 14,000 Franco-American troops gradually overcame the fortified British positions with the aid of de Grasse's warships. A large British fleet carrying 7,000 men set out to rescue Cornwallis, but it was too late.

http://img209.imageshack.us/img209/9809/bbbbbbbbbbbbbbtrumbullqh7.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Isaac Trumbull's famous painting of the surrender. The French guys on the left under the white Bourbon banner of France. Americans on the right. Cornwallis' subordinate General O'Hara passes his sword to the victor's representative.

On October 19, General Cornwallis surrendered 7,087 officers and men, 900 seamen, 144 cannons, 15 galleys, a frigate and 30 transport ships. Pleading illness, he did not attend the surrender ceremony, but his second-in-command, General Charles O'Hara, carried Cornwallis' sword to the American and French commanders.

In reality, Corny couldn't bring himself to pass his sword to Washington, thus disrespecting his conqueror. As the British and Hessian troops marched out to surrender, the British band played the song "The World Turned Upside Down," symbolic of the fact the world's strongest power had been beaten by a kluged-up band of rag-tag, "undisciplined" colonial forces and their French allies. IOW, "...the Cat had been chased into a hole by the Mouse."


The World Turned Upside Down

If buttercups buzz'd after the bee,
If boats were on land, churches on sea,
If ponies rode men and if grass ate the cows,
And cats should be chased into holes by the mouse,
If the mamas sold their babies
To the gypsies for half a crown;
If summer were spring and the other way round,
Then all the world would be upside down.

http://img120.imageshack.us/img120/1168/bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbkingrecno5.gif (http://imageshack.us)

http://img209.imageshack.us/img209/9769/bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb1001046202cd2.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
The Yorktown victory was heralded in France as well. The Froggies hadn't had much to celebrate in wars with the Brits until this period. This painting hangs in the Louvre to this day. It depicts Washington and laFayette conferring during the siege

Although the war persisted on the high seas and in other theaters, the Patriot victory at Yorktown effectively ended fighting in the American colonies. Peace negotiations began in 1782, and on September 3, 1783, the Treaty of Paris was signed, formally recognizing the United States as a free and independent nation after eight years of war.

http://img206.imageshack.us/img206/4315/bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbyorktownil1.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Brits hang their heads in shame after stacking their arms at the surrender.

Hey, if you find yourself in tidewater Virginia, check out the battlefield where America sealed its independence by force of arms five years after publication of the formal Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia.
http://www.nps.gov/archive/colo/Yorktown/ythomevc.htm

http://img120.imageshack.us/img120/903/insane7zosw1.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

[Taxman71]

Good stuff, thanks. Yorktown is a great site visit. Plus, it is very close to Jamestown and Willliamsburg.

Did Cornwallis every get his great danes back from Mel Gibson?

[12]

http://img207.imageshack.us/img207/826/bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbmarquisdelafayettelgca5.jpg

Marie Jean Paul Joseph Roche Yves Gilbert du Motier

With a name like that, a man-toe is perfectly acceptable.

Sorry, Colonel. I didn't mean to cheapen your much-appreciated lesson.

[TUSooner]

2006 - 1781 = 225 (years ago).

Just sayin.... :D

[sooneron]

Rochambeau's HQ in Newport RI was next door to the inn that we stay at every year. Very Cool.

I was wondering about that mean dude that killed Gibson's kids. why no mention of him in your lesson, Homey?

[Taxman71]

More importantly, did Mel Gibson ever formally hook-up with his dead wife's sister? She was hot in an 18th century no showering or shaving sort of way.

[BeetDigger]

Good stuff, thanks. Yorktown is a great site visit. Plus, it is very close to Jamestown and Willliamsburg.

Agreed. Great place to spend a couple of days learning about three different, but important, points of interest in American history. I highly recommend the two hour drive to Charlottesville as well. You can spend some time in Richmond too.

Homey, you left out the part about the trenches and readouts. When you go on the tour there, they talk about how the British took weeks to dig theirs. We dug ours overnight such that the British woke up and they were there. We had them surrounded. They realized they needed to retreat, but the river was blocking them.

[Okla-homey]

Agreed. Great place to spend a couple of days learning about three different, but important, points of interest in American history. I highly recommend the two hour drive to Charlottesville as well. You can spend some time in Richmond too.

Homey, you left out the part about the trenches and readouts. When you go on the tour there, they talk about how the British took weeks to dig theirs. The first line of allied entrenchments were dug by our forces, augmented by several hundred slaves borrowed from local plantations, and were thrown up practically overnight. The British woke up and they were scattered lunettes, redoubts and shallow trenches blocking their avenues of retreat from the city.

In the ensuing weeks, those allied field fortifications were strengthened, improved and brought concentrically closer to the British positions. Early on, the Brits realized they needed to evacuate their position at Yorktown, but the river was blocking them and unless the Brit Navy could swoop in and extract them, they were in a tight spot --as the bag they were in was drawn tighter and tighter each day.

That "bag tightening" was largely due to the efforts of dedicated allied combat engineers (aka "sappers") and the hard work of enslaved folks -- who would have been better off in the long run if the Brits had won, since slavery was made illegal in British dominions far earlier than it ended in the US.

Fixed it.:D

[StoopTroup]

In this picture Cornholio is surrounded by American Patriots.

http://www.thegreatcornholio.com/images/cornholio/buzzsaw.jpg

[tulsaoilerfan]

More importantly, did Mel Gibson ever formally hook-up with his dead wife's sister? She was hot in an 18th century no showering or shaving sort of way.

Oh yeah, after the war, he was all over that:D

[sooneron]

Oh yeah, after the war, he was all over that:D
Well, that and getting hammah'd and knocking on the jews!