This year we are participating in the Colonial Williamsburg Electronic Field Trips, which occur about once a month during the school year.
This month we time-traveled to the Battle of Yorktown, the last effective battle of the American Revolution.
Battle of Yorktown
Numerous events miraculously fell into place for the badly beleaguered Continental Army to finally become victorious.
Over the course of six years, this was only the second major defeat of the British (the first being Saratoga), but it was enough to cause England to withdraw from efforts to dominate America.
Within the next two years, King George III finally recognized America as being “…free, sovereign and independent states.”
Lt. Col. John Laurens
One of the story lines was about Lt. Col. John Laurens who not only helped to capture Redoubt 10 at Yorktown, but also negotiated the terms of surrender with the British.
Laurens’ story on the screen piqued our curiosity, so we dug deeper to discover more about this fascinating individual who fought for liberty for all, even slaves.
His personal story came to the surrender table and, following General Washington’s orders, he firmly resisted British pleas to lighten the terms of surrender.
Washington strictly ordered that as the British dishonored General Lincoln in Charleston in 1780, so would the British be treated the same at this surrender ceremony.
Denied the honors of war, they could neither fly their flags nor play a song of the victor.
The kids and I agreed this was contrary to our way of thinking. We cannot imagine a conquered group wanting to play a song of the victor.
As I told the kids, we must put ourselves into their shoes.
For the conquered, to play the music of the victor is a sign that they fought honorably.
Col. Laurens spoke some French in the movie and that intrigued us.
Why would an American officer speak French?
Further research answered this question and helped us to more fully understand his story.
Since we don’t speak French, we felt we were missing out on that part of the story.
Therefore we went through the script and found the French parts.
I had the kids look for words they recognized that relate to English, like “courage”.
Other words are similar to the Latin we are now studying.
My son recognized one word immediately, “hommes” which was also part of the name of John Paul Jones’ ship, he reminded us.
My daughter knew the actual meaning from her Latin.
The rest we put through a French/English translator.
This was not easy but it was fun. We were surprised by the translations!
It brought more meaning to our understanding of the story.
Emailing George Washington about Artillery
My son was insistent that bombs could be shot from a field cannon which has a straight trajectory.
I figured they could, but I didn’t think it was practical.
Not satisfied with my explanation, he e-mailed General Washington about it that night, because you can do that with CW EFTs!
In the morning my son asked if I had checked the e-mail yet and had General Washington replied? Well, no. I told him that the general was an hour ahead of us and probably was thinking about bed the night before.
My son piped up and said the general might have e-mailed early this morning.
I suggested he let the general eat his breakfast first!
It wasn’t even 7am our time!
Shortly before the morning’s live broadcast of “Yorktown”, the e-mail to my son arrived!
General Washington seemed a bit surprised at the idea of using a bomb in a field cannon.
The trajectory is all wrong to use it effectively.
Of course he was extremely patient and polite in his explanation, which he signed, “Your most obedient servant, G. Washington.”
Thank you General Washington for answering my son’s imaginative question!
Emailing George Washington about Cannons
Wed night my daughter e-mailed General Washington “What were the advantages you had with the field and garrison cannons, as opposed to the howitzer and the mortar? Which ones were often preferred for use in battle?”
After the morning’s EFT live broadcast, we found the reply in the e-mail and we were pleasingly surprised!
General Washington wrote an entire page to answer her questions in fascinating detail.
Thank you, General Washington, for taking the time to answer her questions so completely!
More Artillery Musings
Over lunch, we started talking about artillery. (Doesn’t everyone?)
My son was still asking questions about all the various possibilities of how bombs could be used in the 18th century, none of which were practically done.
It finally dawned on me that my son is approaching this like a 21st century boy who has lots of time and imagination to fiddle with all the possibilities of an item, because he lives in a free society and doesn’t have to worry about an enemy marching down our street and pillaging our home.
I told him that warfare is life or death.
The soldiers use proven methods.
They look at their objectives and use the means that will attain the best possibility of arriving at their goals with the least amount of work in the shortest amount of time.
This sort of made sense to him, due to all of the GA Henty books we read.
We went through what seemed a million scenarios for him to figure this out.
Through this discourse, I also realized he kept thinking of a bomb as a missile.
Once I mentioned that, everything seemed to fall into place for him. Whew! By George, I think he’s got it now!
British Red Regimentals
The day before the live broadcast, we previewed the “Yorktown” video and watched the Q&As from the 2006 broadcast. One of our favorite questions answered then was “Why did the British wear red uniforms?”
Col. Laurens gave a fantastic answer that we understood completely.
It goes all the way back to the fierce Spartan soldiers whom the British wanted to emulate.
Even my son wanted to recreate their fierceness when we studied them a few years ago!
This year’s Q&A featured Colonel Laurens, a loyalist, a historian from the Yorktown National Park Service, and a historian from Colonial Williamsburg in charge of the African American program.
As in the 2006 program Q&A on the Yorktown website, we not only learned from the excellent answers given, but also thoroughly enjoyed Col. Laurens and the loyalist being respectfully rude to each other!
We could easily imagine how they would act if they were real people instead of actors.
Representing different viewpoints of the war, neither one of them liked the other’s answers.
Writing Projects
I wanted my 13yos and 15yod to do a three-page writing assignment from the CW EFT. They each chose the one they liked the best, then worked diligently on it to present to their dad on the weekend.
We read four different accounts of the Battle of Yorktown, from different points of view.
Using the perspective of one of these accounts, my daughter decided to write a letter to a friend about the siege on Yorktown.
She chose the perspective of a German soldier, who was in the French army, fighting for America.
Since my daughter already had a colonial dress that she wore for our 18th Century History Presentation and to Colonial Williamsburg last summer, I suggested that she dress up for the part to present her paper.
She typed her paper into her computer, changed the font to a fancy script, then we printed it out on parchment.
My Daughter Interprets Yorktown
She began her little skit by finishing the letter with her quill.
Then she read the entire letter aloud to us.
This writing assignment was an excellent challenge for her, since she needed to stay within the parameters of the viewpoint of the Continental Army instead of telling the British viewpoint of being stuck in that defenseless position.
It was also a challenge for her to stay within the 1781 mindset in predicting the impact of Yorktown.
She had some excellent ideas and had fun with the assignment.
She also used some information we learned from Col. Laurens during the Q&A.
She represented “baggage” (what a term) or non-combatant who followed the army to do laundry and cooking.
Watch the video of my daughter’s presentation at my Youtube channel.
My Son Becomes Lafayette
My son asked, “Mom, can you make me a Lafayette costume?”
I offered to sew one for him last spring for our 18th Century Becoming History Presentation, when I had more time than now, but no. He wasn’t interested. He preferred a Yorktown boy’s costume. With NO ruffles!
But since meeting Lafayette last summer in Williamsburg, my son is all in and wants to look just like the actor. Now he wants ruffles!
My son was ecstatic to finally have a General Lafayette costume! He already had parts of the costume from other occasions.
While I sewed the vest and coat in the last couple of days, he worked industriously on recreating the CW Lafayette’s sword while making time to conquer the speech about Lafayette.
While in Williamsburg, we only got to hear the events of the Marquis’ life up to Yorktown.
Now my son added Lafayette’s perspective during Yorktown.
During our research, we learned that Col. Laurens served under Lafayette’s command.
Also we learned that Lafayette made the decision for the method of attack made on redoubt ten.
Presenting Marie Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette
Can you imagine his mother calling him that when he was in trouble as a little boy?
My son worked all week on that by listening to the actor’s podcast. we do have it memorized! I memorized it too.
He described Lafayette’s involvement and impressions at Yorktown.
Then he told about his life afterwards during the French Revolution, the era of Napoleon and his Grand Tour of America.
Then he finished with what America and independence meant to him.
Watch the video of my son’s Lafayette presentation at my Youtube channel.
They finished their presentation with a joint Q&A session where they went into more detail about artillery, fortifications, and anything else enquiring minds might want to know.
Because of this electronic field trip, I think our Yorktown experience has almost come full circle.
Four years ago we visited the Yorktown Victory Center which is a hands-on area for kids (young and old) next door to the actual battlefield.
