Early Life
Charles Cornwallis (December 31, 1738-October 5, 1805) was born into a privileged, powerful and well-connected family that had received a barony for serving the Stuart cause during the civil war and the following exile, and then received an earldom for service to the Hanoverians. His military career commenced when he became an ensign with the Grenadier Guards at age eighteen. Unlike the majority of his peers who believed that the primary requirement of an officer was to stand unflinching in front of troops during battle, he chose to receive a military education from the well-regarded military academy at Turin. When the Seven Years’ War (1756-1763) broke out, he served for three years as a staff officer to the Marquis of Granby, the commanding officer of British forces on the continent. In May 1761, he became lieutenant colonel of an infantry regiment, which he led into battle on several occasions.

The death of his father forced him to leave his regiment before the war finished and to return to England to take his father’s seat in the House of Lords. He further broke with tradition in 1768 when he married the daughter of a colonel even though she offered an extremely small dowry. Although Cornwallis continued to sit in the House of Lords he purchased the colonelcy of an infantry regiment in 1766. While he opposed the government’s policy toward the American colonies, he was a loyal servant of the crown and he agreed to serve when the American Revolution (1775-1783) commenced.

American Revolution
In North America, he participated in the invasion of Long Island in August 1776 and then led the pursuit of the rebel army after it abandoned New York City. Taken by surprise when General George Washington crossed the Delaware to capture Trenton on Christmas Day, he failed to catch the rebels before they escaped to winter quarters. Cornwallis commanded half of the British army at Brandywine during the Philadelphia Campaign of 1777 and then again at Monmouth Courthouse during the retreat from Philadelphia the following year. When Lieutenant General William Howe resigned, he was replaced as commander of British forces in the American colonies by Lieutenant General Henry Clinton with Cornwallis as his second-in-command, even though he had to be persuaded to accept the position. Actually, Cornwallis’ relationship with Clinton was strained because he had repeated to Howe a complaint made by Clinton during a battle that he was tired of serving under Howe. When pressed by Clinton, he apologized but Clinton was not the type to forgive and forget.

Cornwallis resigned from the army when he learned that his wife was seriously ill, but her sudden death drove him to return to America to escape his memories of their happiness. When Clinton led an invasion of the southern colonies in early 1780, Cornwallis was once again second-in-command. He finally received an independent command when Clinton returned to New York following the surrender of Charleston on May 9. While Cornwallis was a skilled general on the battlefield, he lacked a solid grasp of the strategic situation in the colonies, which would hamper his efforts to pacify the Southern colonies.

Ordered to first gain control of South Carolina and then advance into North Carolina, events initially went in Cornwallis’ favor. The British established a series of forts across Southern Carolina and the main rebel army in the South was crushed at Camden on August 17. However, the number of partisans exploded and since the Loyalist militia was unable to control them, he could not move into North Carolina. Major General Nathanael Greene, the new commander of rebel forces in the South, realized that his troops were in no shape to face Cornwallis’ army of British regulars, so he forced Cornwallis to overextend his supply chain by sending half of his army under Brigadier General Daniel Morgan to threaten the series of British posts stretching across South Carolina while he took the rest of the troops in North Carolina. His strategy bore fruit when Morgan lured the rash Lieutenant Colonel Banastre Tarleton into a trap at Cowpens on January 17, 1781 and 85% of the British force was killed or captured in the space of an hour.

An infuriated Cornwallis then chased Greene through North Carolina into Virginia, but after many days of slogging through muddy roads, Greene’s men were being fed in Virginia while Cornwallis’ army was 240 miles away from its nearest supply base and was on the verge of starvation. Despite his men’s pinched bellies, Cornwallis still outfought Greene at Guilford Courthouse on March 15 but it did not change the overall situation. Greene soon received supplies and reinforcements but Cornwallis was unable to replace his losses, so he abandoned the Carolinas and moved into Virginia.

After arriving in Virginia he linked up with the British army that was there and quickly took the offensive against rebel forces in the area. Fearing a combined Franco-American assault against New York City, Clinton ordered him to select a base near the coast, so his army could be picked up by the navy. Yorktown was selected and Cornwallis reached it in mid-July. To both his and Clinton’s surprise, the combined Franco-American offensive was directed against Cornwallis, and Yorktown proved to be a weaker position than expected. Outnumbered more than two to one, Cornwallis endured an intense bombardment in his inadequate fortifications while hoping to be relieved by Clinton. Unfortunately, Clinton was moving lethargically, so Cornwallis was forced to surrender on October 17, which enabled the opposition to gain control of Parliament the following February and a formal peace treaty was signed a year later.

Post Revolution Career
Despite the surrender at Yorktown, Cornwallis was received as a victor in England, largely because his friends had come to power. More important, the king genuinely liked him, so he was made Governor General of Bengal in 1786. While he had not been known for his administrative talents in the American colonies, he took his duties more seriously in India and he introduced needed reforms to the land taxation system. Furthermore, he had learned to pay more attention to logistics, instead of simply relying on British steel. As a result, when Tippoo Sahib, Sultan of Mysore, attacked a raja who was under British protection, Cornwallis organized an invasion of Mysore and forced the Sultan to surrender half of his territory. When he returned to England in 1793, he was made a marquess in recognition of his accomplishments.

In 1798, he became Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, but he resigned three years later because the king refused to permit Catholic emancipation. However, he returned to service in 1802 to represent England during the negotiations for the Treaty of Amiens. Despite his age, he accepted a second term as Governor General of Bengal in 1805 but he died on October 5 in India.

Related Movies:

The Patriot (2000)
Directed by Roland Emmerich, starring Mel Gibson and Heath Ledger
A peaceful farmer, haunted by his savagery during the Seven Years’ War (1756-1763), wants to remain neutral during the American Revolution but the death of his son drives him to become a guerrilla. (please click here to read the review)

Further Reading:

The Road to Guilford Courthouse: The American Revolution in the Carolinas-John Buchanan, New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1997.

The author’s descriptions of the terrain show that he has spent a great deal of time visiting historical sites in the Carolinas, which bring the terrain to life for the reader, although the overly detailed descriptions can be a bit distracting at times. Although it focuses on the Carolinas Campaign (February 1780 to August 1781), the author provides brief but insightful biographical sketches and portraits of all of the major leaders in the South on either side in order to provide more depth. It is not a one stop examination of the Carolinas Campaign since it ends with the battle at Guilford Courthouse in March 1781, hence the name. Buchanan is the rare historian who is an excellent researcher and an entertaining writer, and he has produced an excellent book that sets the standard for other works in the field.


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