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Rh government had secretly encouraged the revolt of the colonies, and had furnished them with supplies of arms and military stores, without which it would have been almost impossible to carry on the war. Franklin, Silas Deane, and Arthur Lee had been sent by congress as commissioners to France shortly after the declaration of independence, but received no open countenance from the court till after the surrender of Burgoyne. That event decided the negotiations in their favor; and in February, 1778, treaties of alliance and of amity and commerce were signed at Paris. Sir Henry Clinton, who succeeded Howe as commander-in-chief of the British, evacuated Philadelphia in the night of June 17 with more than 17,000 men, and on the 18th began his march toward New York. Washington pursued, and on the 28th the two armies engaged in battle on the plains of Monmouth, near the village of Freehold, N. J. The action was not decisive, but the Americans remained masters of the field, while the British retreated to New York and remained inactive for the rest of the summer. On July 8 a French fleet from Toulon, under Count d'Estaing, anchored in Delaware bay, but too late to intercept the British squadron and transports retreating from Philadelphia. An attempt made in August with the assistance of the French fleet to drive the British from Ehode Island proved a failure, and d'Estaing, without having accomplished anything of importance, sailed in November for the West Indies. At the close of the campaign of 1778 the position of the British was not at all advanced from that which their forces held in 1776. They occupied nothing but Rhode Island and the island of Manhattan, while the Americans had gained largely in knowledge of the art of war, and had secured the powerful alliance of France. But great embarrassment was felt from the wretched condition of the national finances, the continental money issued by congress having depreciated to a very low point. In this emergency the patriotism and the financial skill and credit of Robert Morris were of the highest value. In 1779 the principal theatre of war was at the south, where Gen. Benjamin Lincoln commanded the Americans. Toward the end of 1778 Gen. Clinton had sent an expedition to Georgia, which defeated the American forces at Savannah, and took possession of the city, Dec. 29; and the colony was soon completely in the power of the British. In September, 1779, Savannah was besieged by a French and American force, and on Oct. 9 an assault was made upon it, which was repulsed with a loss to the allies of nearly 800 men, among them Casimir Pulaski. The siege was thereupon abandoned. About this time the British evacuated Rhode Island, to concentrate their forces at New York. Paul Jones, commanding an American frigate, captured on Sept. 23 two British ships of war in the English channel, in one of the most desperate naval battles ever fought. During the whole war in fact Paul Jones was actively employed against the enemy on the sea, and, together with a swarm of privateers from New England, inflicted immense loss on the mercantile marine of England. One of the most brilliant achievements of the war was the storming (July 16) of Stony Point on the Hudson by Gen. Wayne at the head of 1,200 men, taking 543 prisoners; only 15 of his men were killed, while the British killed numbered 63. About the beginning of 1780 Clinton, leaving the Hessian general Knyphausen in command at New York, sailed south with 8,500 men to carry the war into the Carolinas. Charleston was besieged for several weeks, and Gen. Lincoln after a feeble defence surrendered on May 12, the garrison becoming prisoners of war. The rest of the state of South Carolina was overrun by detachments of the British, and nominally submitted to the restoration of the royal authority, so that Clinton, deeming his conquest complete, sailed for New York on June 5, leaving Lord Cornwallis in command. But a guerilla warfare, under the command of Sumter, Marion, and other partisan leaders, continually harassed not only the British but the tories, as the American royalists were commonly called, of whom there were great numbers in the state. Congress sent Gen. Gates to recover South Carolina. On his first encounter with Cornwallis at Camden, Aug. 16, he was routed with great loss, Baron de Kalb, a French officer of experience, who was second in command, being mortally wounded. Gates with the remnant of his force fled to North Carolina. Within three months two American armies had been destroyed, while the most formidable of the partisan bands, that of Sumter, had been dispersed by Col. Tarleton. Early in September Cornwallis marched into North Carolina, where on Oct. 7, at King's mountain, a detachment from his army was totally defeated by 900 militia, who killed and captured upward of 1,100 of the enemy. This serious reverse, and the renewed activity of Marion, Sumter, and other partisan leaders, induced Cornwallis to withdraw to South Carolina. During the summer the only military operation of importance in the north was an unsuccessful irruption of the British into New Jersey. Soon after, on July 10, a French fleet arrived at Newport, bringing the count de Rochambeau and 6,000 soldiers. Washington went to Hartford in September to confer with the French officers, and during his absence it was discovered that Benedict Arnold, who commanded the important fortress of West Point, had agreed to deliver that stronghold and its dependencies into the hands of Sir Henry Clinton. Arnold escaped, but Major André, the British officer who communicated with him, was caught and hanged as a spy. The principal military operations of 1781 were in the south, where Greene had been made commander in place of Gates. At Cowpens, S. C., on Jan. 17, Gen. Morgan won a brilliant