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Updated: June 13, 2025
McClellan moved in March, 1862, upon Richmond by way of the Yorktown Peninsula, a swampy wild region over which it was difficult, indeed, to move an army. He commanded 125,000 men, and 40,000 more were in the neighborhood of Washington to make a diversion in his favor in case of necessity.
The surrender of Burgoyne in 1777 had brought about the treaty with France; the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown, four years later, was the beginning of peace and the cause of the treaty with England.
The shifting figures of the troops on parade; the martial and daring manoeuvres of the regimental band; the groups of ladies seated on benches under the trees, attended by gallants in uniform, momentarily off duty and full of information, and by gallants not in uniform and never off duty and desirous to learn; the ancient guns with French arms and English arms, reminiscences of Yorktown, on one of which a pretty girl was apt to be perched in the act of being photographed all this was enough to inspire any man to be a countryman and a lover.
After Yorktown their depredations ceased for a time, but as the British government delayed peace their atrocities were renewed. It was a mongrel crew of this character that was giving chase to the sleigh and its occupants. They were easily recognized by their accouterments. On! And on! And on! To Peggy the whole landscape was featureless save for the farmhouse in the far distance.
The arm he had lost at Yorktown; a temper too hot to hold he daily lost, but he had the art to keep his friends. There were duels to his account, as well as a reputation for great courage and coolness during the late war.
"And after Yorktown every one thought that of course peace was just a matter of a few months. That it would be declared at once," sighed Sally. "Oh, dear! It makes me sad to think the war is not over yet!" "And I have been the marplot to spoil this merry company," said Mr. Owen contritely. "Let's declare a truce to the matter for the time being, and discuss that pepper-pot. Is't ready, lass?"
The participation of the descendants of Baron von Steuben in the Yorktown festivities, and their subsequent reception by their American kinsmen, strikingly evinced the ties of good will which unite the German people and our own. Our intercourse with Spain has been friendly. An agreement concluded in February last fixes a term for the labors of the Spanish and American Claims Commission.
There were nearly seventeen thousand Allied troops at Yorktown of whom three thousand were militia of Virginia. The British force under Cornwallis numbered less than eight thousand men. Months were required before the truce between the two belligerents resulted in peace. But the people of America hailed the news of Yorktown as the end of the war.
It does not appear that parties rode to hounds after the fox any more at Mount Vernon. And then there were the irreparable gaps that could not be filled. At Belvoir, where his neighbors the Fairfaxes, friends of a lifetime, used to live, they lived no more. One of them, more than ninety years old, had turned his face to the wall on hearing of the surrender at Yorktown.
But the soldiers were far from being despondent; although some cursed our luck, others laughed and joked the growlers. The next day great numbers visited Yorktown through curiosity, and watched the Federal Fleet anchored off Old Point Comfort. Here happened a "wind fall" I could never account for.
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