Guilford Courthouse, Battle of

Guilford Courthouse, Battle of (1781).A pivotal Revolutionary War battle, the engagement at Guilford Courthouse, North Carolina, strategically altered the war's course and ultimately led to victory in the South and at the Battle of Yorktown.

Stymied in the North, England in 1780 initiated a “Southern strategy,” the state‐by‐state reinstallation of loyalist governments. Georgia and South Carolina fell, and North Carolina and Virginia awaited invasion by Gen. Charles Cornwallis. In December 1780, Maj. Gen. Nathanael Greene assumed command of a tiny, demoralized segment of the Continental Army in the South. Brilliant and innovative, Greene restored discipline and morale, then divided his small force and took the strategic initiative. Following the U.S. victory at the Battle of Cowpens (January 1781), Cornwallis cut communications and launched a pursuit. Greene concentrated his detachments and in a punishing, epic march led the enemy deep into North Carolina.

At Guilford Courthouse on 15 March, Greene sought battle. He copied Daniel Morgan's successful Cowpens tactics—militia backed by Continentals with cavalry in reserve—but without Morgan, who was ill. Cornwallis launched a frontal assault. The militia bolted, but Greene's staunch Maryland and Delaware Continentals held. Desperate, Cornwallis's artillery fired into the melee, killing friend and foe alike. Greene withdrew, leaving Cornwallis a hollow victory (American casualties numbered 261; British 532). Cornwallis left for Virginia, and Greene returned south. In six months, he had liberated the entire region, confining the British to two seacoast strongholds, Savannah and Charleston.
[See also Revolutionary War: Military and Diplomatic Course.]

Bibliography

M. L. Treacy , Prelude to Yorktown: The Southern Campaigns of Nathanael Greene, 1780–1781, 1963.
Franklin and and Mary Wickwire , Cornwallis: The American Adventure, 1970.
John Buchanan , The Road to Guilford Courthouse: The American Revolution in the Carolinas, 1997.

John Morgan Dederer