Battle of Guilford Courthouse the Research Paper

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"The second line comprised the two battalions of Foot Guards, the Light Infantry, and the Grenadiers… Tarleton's Light Dragoons formed the final reserve." ("The Battle of Guilford Courthouse 1781.")

Without much of a choice, due to the terrain, Cornwallis was forced to make his attack head-on, straight at the center of the American line. While suffering major casualties, the British, stopped on the flanks, were able to break the center of the Americans' first line and continued to advance toward the second. The Americans of the second line inflicted even greater casualties on the British before they too were forced to retreat in the face of the British onslaught. As they British destroyed the second American line, they then encountered rough terrain on their way to the third American line. It was in this rough terrain that the flanks of the American third line attacked the advancing British; forcing the British right flank to retreat and destroying the left completely. In response, the British brought up their 3 pound canons, and then were in a position to directly attack the center of the American line. The Americans had inflicted a great number of casualties on the British while suffering relatively few of their own and so Nathanael Greene decided the time was right to withdraw from the field. Although this allowed the British to claim victory, Greene's forces would still be "fully capable to engage in immediate action," while the British had suffered tremendous losses. ("The Battle of Guilford Courthouse 1781.")

While the British could claim this battle as a victory, after all they held the field and the Americans withdrew, it was a pyrrhic victory at best. The British suffered more than 550 dead and wounded, while the Americans lost only 250; and the 550 men lost to the British were more than a quarter of their entire force.

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And while the Americans technically lost the battle, Nathanael Greene's use of terrain and the principle of maneuver, allowed him to place the enemy in a series of disadvantaged positions through his flexible use of combined military power. His use of militia in the first two lines, supported by sharpshooters and cavalry, permitted the untrained and less reliable militia to fire and withdraw, inflicting massive casualties but suffering relatively few. When the British finally made their way through the rough terrain to the American third line, their concentrated force was enough to break the Americans, and so Greene chose to withdraw and to lose the battle, but keep his army intact. And with Greene's army still a viable fighting force, Cornwallis was forced to seek a more secure location, ultimately forcing him all the way to Yorktown and the British defeat which ended the Revolution.

With the Revolution stalemated in the North, the British chose to invade the South and at first met with some success. However, after a time, forces under the command of British General Charles Cornwallis met General Nathanael Greene's larger army at the Battle of Guildford Courthouse, and while inflicting a tactical defeat on the Americans, Cornwallis' forces were so battered that the victory ultimately forced him to withdraw to Yorktown.

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