rleton and
other officers condemned Cornwallis sharply for not persisting in the
effort to get away. Cornwallis was a considerate man. "I thought it
would have been wanton and inhuman," he reported later, "to sacrifice
the lives of this small body of gallant soldiers." He had already
written to Clinton to say that there would be great risk in trying to
send a fleet and army to rescue him. On the 19th of October came the
climax. Cornwallis surrendered with some hundreds of sailors and about
seven thousand soldiers, of whom two thousand were in hospital. The
terms were similar to those which the British had granted at Charleston
to General Lincoln, who was now charged with carrying out the surrender.
Such is the play of human fortune. At two o'clock in the afternoon the
British marched out between two lines, the French on the one side, the
Americans on the other, the French in full dress uniform, the Americans
in some cases half naked and barefoot. No civilian sightseers were
admitted, and there was a respectful silence in the presence of this
great humiliation to a proud army. The town itself was a dreadful
spectacle with, as a French observer noted, "big holes made by bombs,
cannon balls, splinters, barely covered graves, arms and legs of blacks
and whites scattered here and there, most of the houses riddled with
shot and devoid of window-panes."

On the very day of surrender Clinton sailed from New York with a
rescuing army. Nine days later forty-four British ships were counted off
the entrance to Chesapeake Bay. The next day there were none. The
great fleet had heard of the surrender and had turned back to New York.
Washington urged Grasse to attack New York or Charleston but the French
Admiral was anxious to take his fleet back to meet the British menace
farther south and he sailed away with all his great array. The waters
of the Chesapeake, the scene of one of the decisive events in human
history, were deserted by ships of war. Grasse had sailed, however, to
meet a stern fate. He was a fine fighting sailor. His men said of him
that he was on ordinary days six feet in height but on battle days six
feet and six inches. None the less did a few months bring the British
a quick revenge on the sea. On April 12, 1782, Rodney met Grasse in a
terrible naval battle in the West Indies. Some five thousand in both
fleets perished. When night came Grasse was Rodney's prisoner and
Britain had recovered her supremacy on the sea. On