Decisive confrontation of the American Revolutionary War, the battle, or rather the siege of Yorktown illustrates the decisive role played by France in American independence. If we know especially the name of La Fayette, who left very early to help the Insurgents and commanding a light division in the continental army of George Washington, it is indeed the subsidies of Louis XVI as well as the direct intervention of a corps regular expeditionary of ten thousand men of the Count of Rochambeau and the fleet of Admiral de Grasse which will constitute the essential French contribution. And this contribution bears above all the name of Yorktown.
The context:the American Revolutionary War
Founded in the 17th and 18th centuries, the thirteen British colonies in America established along the Atlantic coast in America had a population of 1,200,000 around 1750. Each of them was administered by a governor appointed by the King of England, except for four colonies (Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Maryland and Rhode Island) which elect local assemblies and consider themselves nearly self-governing, although all colonies are subject to the British crown.
At the end of the Treaty of Paris of 1763, Great Britain recovered the French territories of New France. However, the British intended not only to make these new territories properties of the crown, but also to make the American colonists pay the costs of this very costly war. The settlers refuse the new taxes since they do not benefit from elected representatives in the British Parliament. London then put in place a tax on the stamp, the Stamp Act, in vain. In 1767, she replaced it with the Townshend Act, establishing various taxes on the products necessary for the colonies, including tea.
However, the East India Company is not affected by the tea tax, which is outrageous American settlers. To express their anger at this injustice, they decided to seize a cargo of tea valued at 100,000 pounds from one of the Company's ships anchored in Boston, and throw it overboard. This initiative, which took place on December 16, 1773 and remained famous under the ironic name of “Boston Tea Party”, provoked a violent response from London. Soldiers are sent to restore order and several laws are published (nicknamed "intolerable" by the settlers), including the Quebec Act attaching part of the territory of the rebel provinces to Canada.
Meeting in Congress in Philadelphia in September 1774, the representatives appointed by the thirteen colonies proclaimed a "Bill of Rights" which affirmed the independence of the colonies from the unilateral decisions of the British Parliament . Relations with the English continued to deteriorate when on April 19, 1775, in Lexington, near Boston, Massachusetts militiamen exchanged gunfire with English soldiers. This is the start of the War of Independence.
As the armed struggle of the thirteen colonies takes place, the insurgents are placed under the orders of George Washington, designated commander-in-chief of the continental troops. On July 4, 1776, a new meeting of the Congress of Colonial Representatives in Philadelphia adopts the Declaration of Independence, which puts a definitive end to subjection to the British crown.
France enters the conflict
At this time, France's support for the colonists began:in June 1777, the Marquis de La Fayette went to America with several French military leaders to train combatants and transport weapons and equipment. Despite this aid and a fierce desire to obtain their freedom, and although the English were only able to mobilize around 40,000 men at a time and were sometimes overwhelmed by this form of guerrilla warfare, the insurgents struggled to achieve victories. Only that of Saratoga, October 17, 1777, is an important victory:the Americans manage to make capitulate 5,000 English soldiers. It made it possible to rally most of the colonists to the war of independence and made this war credible, which now aroused much more interest in France, which saw in it a means of taking revenge on England.
The American Benjamin Franklin (inventor of the lightning rod) intervenes with the French Minister Charles de Vergennes, who manages to convince Louis XVI. Franco-American relations then grew with the signing in 1778 of a "Treaty of Friendship", leading to the outbreak of hostilities between France and England. A first French fleet of seventeen vessels, commanded by Admiral d'Estaing, sails towards America without managing to take a decisive advantage. Two years later, the Comte de Rochambeau landed in Rhode Island at the head of an army of 6,000 men responsible for supporting the American Revolutionary War.
French naval victory at Chesapeake and siege of Yorktown
In 1781, the conflict had been going on for five years with varying fortunes and Loyalist and British troops held large parts of the Thirteen Colonies. When they learn that General Cornwallis, at the head of nine thousand men, i.e. a third of the English forces, has taken up residence in Yorktown, Virginia, Rochambeau and Washington see all the benefit to be drawn from this position which can easily be blocked by land and totally isolated if a squadron blocked the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. Admiral de Grasse's twenty-four ships, then in the West Indies, played this essential role and, on September 5, indulged in a rare luxury in the annals of the French Navy, an authentic naval victory, certainly not very lethal, but decisive. on Admiral Hood's fleet which, slightly outnumbered, chose to withdraw rather than risk being destroyed.
Yorktown found itself besieged from September 28 by Washington's 6,000 men, the 5,500 men of Rochambeau's expeditionary force, joined by the forces of the Marquis de Saint-Simon and La Fayette's men, a total of 16,000 French and Americans. As Rochambeau brought in French cannons, artillery harassed the stronghold and ditches were dug by French engineers. As for the English, they tried in vain, on several occasions, to force the Franco-American lines.
After several weeks of siege, while French soldiers commanded by Charles de Lameth managed to take the first redoubts, the final assault was launched by the Marquis de La Fayette. His men, who attacked with cannon bayonets, succeeded in seizing the last redoubts and the most powerful English battery. When the English capitulated, on October 19, 1781, the Comte de Rochambeau had the elegance to refuse the sword of General O'Hara, Cornwallis' assistant, so that he could hand it over to George Washington...
The aftermath of the Battle of Yorktown
The consequences of the Battle of Yorktown, in a way the last great victory of the Old Regime, are immense in that the surrender of Cornwallis secures American independence through weariness British. As soon as the defeat was announced in London, in fact, Lord North's cabinet fell, leaving the supporters of peace to begin the negotiations that would lead to the Treaty of Paris in 1783.
For France, the price of "revenge" for the humiliating loss of Canada in 1763 was particularly high with little or nothing in return. The episode was however, at least on a symbolic level, to remain engraved in the American memory, much more than in the French memory...
To go further
- Yorktown (1781), by Raymond Bourgerie and Pierre Lesouef. Economica, 1992.
- The French in America during the American Revolutionary War 1777-1783.
- The Great Naval Battles:Chesapeake, by Jean-Yves Delitt. BD Glénat, 2017.