With reinforcements sent from the north, Cornwallis commanded an army of 7,200 men. With this formidable force, he set out to crush Major General Lafayette. When the young Frenchman realized his army of 3,000 Continentals and militia could not stand up to Cornwallis, he began a retreat, hoping to rendezvous with a force of Virginia Continentals raised by Major General Von Steuben and 800 Pennsylvania Continentals under Brigadier General Anthony Wayne, who had been sent south by Commander-in-chief Washington.
While local militiamen provided some resistance to the movements of Phillips and Arnold, Cornwallis and his forces chased after Lafayette’s much smaller Continental Army until the British Commander-in-Chief of North America, Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton Cornwallis ordered him to establish a fortified deep-water port at either Yorktown or Portsmouth. Cornwallis chose Yorktown Virginia, where the last major battle of the American Revolutionary War was fought. For more information Click Here.