He was born on the last day of 1738, at home in Grosvenor Square, London, although his family’s estates were primarily in Kent. The oldest son of the fifth Baron Cornwallis, he entered a life of privilege. Christened Charles, like his father, his destiny in North America might have been foretold: His uncle Edward Cornwallis founded Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Young Charles attended Eton and Cambridge, and was commissioned in the army, where he purchased a captaincy and was promoted to lieutenant colonel. After serving in the Seven Years’ War, he entered Parliament in the House of Commons for the village of Eye, in Suffolk, then succeeded his father, as the second Earl Cornwallis, in 1762, which put him in the House of Lords.
“How is it,” Samuel Johnson asked in 1775, “that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of Negros?” But Cornwallis had a distinct sympathy for the American colonists’ yelps. In 1765, when the Stamp Act came before the Lords, to tax the colonists more, Cornwallis was one of five peers to vote No. Still, he knew his duty. Made a colonel in 1766, he was promoted to major general late in 1775 and put himself forward for service in the colonies, where the Americans were threatening secession.
At the Battle of Long Island, in summer 1776, Cornwallis commanded the division that chased Gen. George Washington – an illustrious slave-driver – and his army across New Jersey. In some ways the two figures were similar, each jealous of his honor and position, although the Americans would soon abolish hereditary titles.
Two years of intermittent fighting passed, Cornwallis was made second in command of the British forces and then, ominously, France entered the war on the colonists’ side.
Late in 1779, Cornwallis led a force south in the belief British loyalists would help put down the rebellion. Instead, his forces were harassed by Patriot guerrillas. He won a series of battles against Continental regulars as he moved north but his supplies were running short.
In Virginia, Cornwallis’ army clashed with Continentals under the Marquis de Lafayette and then moved to establish a fortified position on the Virginia Peninsula, where he could receive relief from the British navy. Instead, a French fleet arrived and he was trapped between it and combined French-Continental forces advancing on him under Washington. When, late in 1781, a British fleet was defeated by the French near the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay, his goose was cooked.
On Oct. 19, Cornwallis sent a brigadier general to surrender Cornwallis’ sword to Washington, saying he was ill. Washington had his second in command accept it. Cornwallis enters history indisposed.
The major fighting of the Revolutionary War ended there, at Yorktown. It was a great victory for the Americans, and the French – but not as great a defeat for Cornwallis. Early in 1782, he returned to Britain, with Benedict Arnold, to adulation. In 1785, he was sent to the court of Frederick the Great as an ambassador, where he found Prussian military maneuvers ridiculous. In 1786, he was made governor-general and commander in chief in India, where he was credited with civil reforms including outlawing child slavery. In 1798, he was sent to put down the Irish Rebellion and helped secure the United Kingdom.
Sent back to India in 1805, he died there of fever, where he is buried by a memorial rotunda. In Suffolk, a pub, The Marquis of Cornwallis, was named for him that today, after a 2015 makeover and conversion to a luxury hotel, is simply known as Marquis – almost as though he never existed.
