[2] This was Vergennes; see Bancroft’s “History of the United States.”

This prophecy was now fulfilled.  After the Americans had defeated Burgoyne in 1777 the English ministry became alarmed; they declared themselves ready to make terms; they offered to grant everything but independence;[3] but they had opened their eyes to the facts too late, and nothing short of independence would now satisfy the colonists.  Attempts were made to open negotiations with General Washington, but the commander in chief declined to receive a letter from the English Government addressed to him, not in his official capacity, but as “George Washington, Esq.,” and so the matter came to nothing.

[3] This was after France had recognized the independence of the United States, 1778.

553.  The Battle of Yorktown; the King acknowledges American
     Independence, 1782.

The war against the rebellious states was never really popular in England.  From the outset great numbers refused to enlist to fight the Americans, and spoke of the contest as the “King’s War” to show that the bulk of the English people did not encourage it.  The struggle went on with varying success through seven heavy years, until, with the aid of the French, the Americans defeated Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown in 1781.[1] By that battle France got her revenge for the loss of Quebec in 1759 (S545), and America finally won the cause for which she had spent so much life and treasure.

[1] It is pleasant to know that a hundred years later, in the autumn of 1881, a number of English gentlemen were present at the centennial celebration of the taking of Yorktown, to express their hearty good will toward the nation which their ancestors had tried in vain to keep a part of Great Britain.

George III could hold out no longer; on a foggy December morning in 1782, he entered the House of Lords, and with a faltering voice read a paper in which he acknowledged the independence of the United States of America.  He closed his reading with the prayer that neither Great Britain nor America might suffer from the separation; and he expressed the hope that religion, language, interest, and affection might prove an effectual bond of union between the two countries.

Eventually the separation proved “a mutual advantage, since it removed to a great extent the arbitrary restrictions on trade, gave a new impetus to commerce, and immensely increased the wealth of both nations."[2]

[2] Goldwin Smith’s lectures on “The Foundation of the American Colonies.”  In general see “Lecky’s American Revolution,” and the “Leading Facts of American History” or the “Student’s American History,” in this series.

554.  The Lord George Gordon Riots (1780).