Siege of Yorktown, 1781

In the autumn of 1781 American and French armies under George Washington and the Comte de Rochambeau converged on Yorktown, Virginia, while a French fleet blocked British relief by sea. Siege trenches, artillery batteries and assaults on advanced redoubts steadily reduced the British position.

Charles Cornwallis’s attempt to escape failed, and his army capitulated on 19 October. The surrender did not immediately end every campaign, but it broke Britain’s ability to continue major offensive operations in the thirteen states and prepared the way for peace negotiations.

Ashes brings Isabel, Curzon and Ruth into the allied camp and the final siege. The military victory is set beside the uncertain fate of enslaved and self-emancipated Black people, preventing national independence from functioning as a simple conclusion to their search for freedom.