Page:The Marquess Cornwallis and the Consolidation of British Rule.djvu/20

14 and French armies, strong in men and material, artillery and engineers, closed round the English forces, nothing was left for the Commander but to surrender his post or to try and cut his way out through the enemy. When the latter alternative had been tried in vain, the surrender of an exhausted garrison and crumbling works naturally followed.

This event practically put an end to the contest. Cornwallis remained a prisoner of war for about three months and was allowed to leave on parole for England. It is pleasant to note that in his letters he mentions with gratitude and good-feeling the delicacy and courtesy shown to him and others by the French officers. Eventually, after a long and troublesome correspondence about his exchange with Colonel Laurens, an American prisoner of high rank, he was released from his parole at the beginning of 1783.

Without analysing the numerous pamphlets and letters in which the responsibility for our failure was long and acrimoniously discussed, it is quite possible to form an estimate of the merits of Cornwallis as a military man and a strategist. That he did not possess the quick perception and the rapid glances which distinguish great captains in the field, may be readily admitted. But there is every reason to think that under a first-rate commander, Cornwallis at the head of a division, or despatched to carry out some distinct combination, or to operate in a particular