A Spainard’s Pivotal Role in the Yorktown Triumph

Nowhere in the struggle that was the American Revolution was outside assistance more significant than at the siege of Yorktown during the autumn of 1781.[1] The French provided significant support from land troops, but it was the French Navy that really clinched the affair with their naval blockade that ultimately trapped the British army of Gen. Charles Cornwallis. However, there was another ally, not an ally of the United States (at least not officially) but an ally of France whose assistance was critical to enabling this naval entrapment to take place. That ally was Spain.

Spain provided significant illicit support during the war in terms of troops and supplies, all the while never being a declared ally of the United States (though it eventually declared war on Great Britain). In fact, several of its high-ranking diplomats and politicians were against American independence, likely due to the concern of an independence contagion spreading to Spain’s colonial holdings. What they did want, however, and sometimes working through the Americans was the way to do it, was to disrupt the international commerce and influence of their enemy, Great Britain. There were several ways that Spain, working both independently and with the French, accomplished this. The combination of the French and Spanish navies was enhanced to outnumber the vaunted British navy, thus posing a very real threat of an invasion of Great Britian itself. Although it was never conducted, this poorly kept secret presented enough of a threat to the British that they had to hold some of their navy back to protect the homeland. This diluted their effectiveness elsewhere around the world and curtailed their naval actions in the Americas.

Spain also had some positive goals of its own, most prominently to obtain Gibraltar and Minorca, though it ultimately secured only the latter. Finally, working with France in some cases, and in other cases on their own, they sought gains in the Caribbean, West Indies, and the Gulf coast. Most prominent here was the plan, after Yorktown was completed, to take Jamaica from the British (though it also never happened). As such, Spain had numerous targets, and if by helping the Americans they could get closer to those, the Americans were happy take that aid.

What they did to support the Yorktown operation is one of the forgotten and under-credited stories of the American Revolution. In fact, some have argued that Spain was the linchpin to winning (or at least winning more quickly) the war. How did this happen? Spain sent no ships to help the French. Nor did it send troops. Let us look at how they did help, first by going back to earlier in 1781.