Nathanael Greene almost never won a battle, and yet he won a war. Given the ruined southern army in the darkest days of the Revolution, this self-taught Quaker-born general1 wore the British down through a brilliant campaign of manoeuvre and attrition, until Cornwallis marched away to his doom at Yorktown.
From forge to command
Born into a Rhode Island Quaker family in 17422, Greene taught himself the art of war from books3 and rose quickly in the Continental Army, becoming one of George Washington's most trusted generals. After the disasters in the South, Washington sent him to take command of what was left of the southern army2 at the end of 1780.
Major General Nathanael Greene in Continental Army uniform, painted from life by Charles Willson Peale in 1783. Public domain
The war of exhaustion
Rather than risk his small army in one battle, Greene divided and manoeuvred it2, drawing Cornwallis on exhausting marches. His subordinate Daniel Morgan destroyed a British force at2Cowpens, and at Guilford Courthouse Greene let the British win the field while bleeding them white4. 'We fight, get beat, and fight again5,' he wrote, and it was working.
Plan of the Battle of Guilford Courthouse, 15 March 1781, showing the British and American positions, published in London in 1787 (Library of Congress). Public domain
The South reclaimed
Too weakened to hold the Carolinas, Cornwallis marched into Virginia, where he was trapped at Yorktown. Greene, meanwhile, methodically retook the southern backcountry from the British2. He had lost most of his battles and won the campaign, a feat that ranks him among the finest American generals. He died young, in 1786.2
John Trumbull's Surrender of Lord Cornwallis (1820), in the US Capitol Rotunda, depicts the British capitulation at Yorktown in October 1781. Public domain
Sources and notes
Numbered notes in the text point to the works below.
Terry Golway, Washington's General: Nathanael Greene and the Triumph of the American Revolution (Henry Holt, 2005). ↩
Gerald M. Carbone, Nathanael Greene: A Biography of the American Revolution (Palgrave Macmillan, 2008). ↩
Lawrence E. Babits and Joshua B. Howard, Long, Obstinate, and Bloody: The Battle of Guilford Courthouse (University of North Carolina Press, 2009). ↩
Nathanael Greene, Letter to George Washington, Camp, 1 May 1781, text published by the American Battlefield Trust as 'We fight get beat and fight again', https://www.battlefields.org/learn/primary-sources/we-fight-get-beat-and-fight-again. ↩
He was a major general of the American Revolution (1742 to 1786), George Washington's ablest subordinate, who won the war's southern campaign.
What is Nathanael Greene famous for?
For his campaign of attrition in 1780 to 1781 that wore down Cornwallis and reclaimed the South, despite losing most of his battles.
Did Nathanael Greene win his battles?
Usually not. His genius was strategic: he traded ground and tactical defeats for British casualties and exhaustion until the enemy was fatally weakened.
How did Greene connect to Yorktown?
By wearing Cornwallis down in the Carolinas, Greene helped drive him into Virginia, where Cornwallis was trapped and forced to surrender at Yorktown.
Was Greene really a Quaker?
He came from a Quaker family but was effectively cut off from the pacifist community for taking up arms in the Revolution.
Win the South the hard way
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