1781 Siege of Yorktown

— Colonial National Historical Park —

"The next night, which was the sixth of October ? We this night completed laying out the works. The troops of the line were there ready with entrenching tools and began to entrench, after General Washington had struck a few blows with a pickax, a mere ceremony, that it might be said "General Washington with his own hands first broke ground at the siege of Yorktown."
Joseph Plum Martin, Sappers and Miners

This reconstructed line of earthworks replicates a French artillery battery of the Allies' First Siege Line. A gentle rain was falling on the night of October 6, 1781, as 1,500 soldiers quietly began constructing these fortifications, following a row of pine strips laid out by the engineering officers. Another 2,800 soldiers, with muskets, silently stood guard in case of a British assault.

The British troops manning the left or eastern portion of the British Inner Defense Line remained unaware of the Allied soldiers to their front, enabling the allies to work all night without interference. By dawn, American and French troops stood safely behind their first siege line. Over the next two days, they completed the battery positions for the heavy artillery. Major General Henry Knox, Washington's Chief of Artillery, recalled that "The first parallel, some redoubts, and all our batteries were finished by the 9th at 2 o'clock P.M. when we opened our batteries and kept them playing continually."

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