You're listening to an Airwave Media Podcast. Hello and thank you for joining the American Revolution.

This week episode 308, the McDougal Court-Martial.

Last week we covered events in Philadelphia after Yorktown.

While everyone was celebrating the victory, there was still a war to be fought.

The Army desperately needed food and supplies. With the public no longer in fear of a

British attack, politicians were even less inclined to impose taxes necessary to support the Army.

Washington spent about four months in Philadelphia meeting and lobbying members of

Congress to support the Army.

Many, I think including Washington, had hoped that Yorktown would have convinced the British to give up and go home.

There were some indications in late 1781 that Washington expressed privately a hope that he would be back home by the spring of 1782.

By February, however, word arrived from London that the King had addressed Parliament after receiving

news of Yorktown. The King called on Parliament to continue

the war and not allow the loss at Yorktown to be the reason to give up on North America.

That speech let Americans know that Britain would not simply walk away and that the fighting would likely continue.

In March of 1782, Washington left Philadelphia, not home to Mount Vernon as he hoped, but rather to rejoin the Army in New York.

In New York City, General Henry Clinton became even more isolated after the British surrender at Yorktown.

The British general was always paranoid about his reputation.

General Cornwallis had sailed to New York in November after the surrender and then left for London in December.

Clinton knew that Cornwallis would spend the next few months blaming Clinton for

everything that happened. This was not just conjecture, Clinton had forwarded on letters

from Cornwallis to London, which essentially blamed the loss at Yorktown on

Cornwallis's obligation to follow Clinton's orders.

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