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War in the South
In December 1778 the British invaded the southern colonies where they hoped to regain control by recruiting Loyalists. This operation would also keep the Royal Navy closer to the Caribbean, where the British needed to defend their possessions against the French. The war in the South witnessed savage fighting and atrocities were committed by both sides. On 29 December 1778 the British captured Savannah in Georgia. On 12 May 1780 Charleston, the South's biggest city and port, was taken after a short siege. The loss of the city and its 5,000 troops was a serious blow to the Americans.
Lieutenant-Colonel Banastre Tarleton, Loyalist cavalry commander in the South, c1782.
NAM. 1987-09-22
The British then routed a newly raised American army at Camden, South Carolina, on 16 August 1780. American casualties were 1,000 killed, wounded or captured, with another 132 missing, including the French general Baron De Kalb. The Americans lost most of their supplies and artillery. British losses were 313 killed and wounded, and 64 missing.
The death of Baron de Kalb at the Battle of Camden, 1780.
NAM. 1990-06-67-2
Lord Cornwallis advanced into Virginia, but ran into two fresh American armies. He won a series of minor victories against them, but short of supplies, he was forced to withdraw to the port of Yorktown where he hoped he would be supported by the Royal Navy. Cornwallis was soon besieged by a Franco-American force of 17,000 men. The arrival of a French fleet in Chesapeake Bay in September 1781 sealed his fate. With no prospect of relief, and under fire from land and sea, Cornwallis asked for terms. On 19 October 1781 he surrendered.
The British surrender at Yorktown, 1781.
Steel engraving after John Francis Renault, 1781; engraved by J Stephenson; published by Virtue and Company Limited, 1860.
NAM. 1982-08-62
Yorktown was not the end of the war: the British still had 30,000 troops in North America and still occupied New York, Charleston and Savannah. Fighting continued on land and at sea. But Yorktown finally convinced the British that, faced with their world-wide commitments, the war was unwinnable. Peace negotiations were opened in April 1782 and concluded with the Treaty of Paris in September 1783 when Britain recognised the independence of the United States. The British Army had performed relatively well on the battlefield and had shown an ability to adapt their tactics to suit the North American terrain.
But the problems of logistics were insurmountable and the entry of France and Spain into the war on the side of the colonists negated British naval dominance and proved decisive.
Reddition de L’Armee Angloise commandee par my lord Comte de Cornwallis aux Armees combinees des etats unis de L’Amerique et de France.
Tinted line engraving published by Mondharc, 1781.
NAM. 1971-02-33-474
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