On October 19, 1781, General Lord Charles Cornwallis surrendered 7,000 British soldiers to the Continental Army after a crushing defeat at the Battle of Yorktown. Lord North, along with the rest of Parliament and King George III, realized that victory over the Thirteen Colonies was not inevitable. In actuality, victory required significantly more troops, more resources, and more money than Parliament could give to the effort. Instead of sending more troops across the sea to North America, British delegates were sent to France to begin forging a peace treaty with the United States. Two years later on September 3, 1783, the Treaty of Paris was signed and the Revolutionary War officially came to an end.
On the 19th of October in the year 1781, General Lord Charles Cornwallis conceded defeat, surrendering his force of 7,000 British soldiers at the Siege of Yorktown to the American Continental Army. This pivotal event led Lord North, the British Parliament, and King George III to confront the harsh reality that subduing the American colonies was far from a foregone conclusion. Indeed, a victory on British terms would necessitate a much larger deployment of troops, more supplies, and greater financial investments than what the British Parliament was willing or able to allocate to the conflict. Instead of escalating their military presence in North America, the British government chose to initiate peace negotiations, sending representatives to France to discuss terms with the fledgling United States. The culmination of these diplomatic efforts materialized on the 3rd of September, 1783, with the signing of the Treaty of Paris, which officially marked the cessation of the American Revolutionary War.
