My Trip to Yorktown

  Last week my mom and I visited Yorktown, the site of the decisive battle that ended the American Revolution.  The battle of Yorktown lasted two weeks.  British general Cornwalis was trapped at Yorktown - the French fleet had the British blockaded by sea and the Continental Army and the French troops surrounded them by land.  Finally the British surrendered in 1781 and the war officially ended with the signing of the Treaty of Paris in 1783.

  During our visit we saw an encampment with tents behind the Yorktown Victory Center.  We got to see a cooking demonstration using an earthen mound with holes in the bottom of it to cook food over.  There was also a lecture on field medicine, surgery, and apothocary treatments (it was very nasty), but best of all, I got to help in an artillery demonstration.  We couldn't set off the cannon we were pretending to fire, but the people who worked there could!  After we showed how to set off a cannon, the people working there actually shot off a mortar with a loud BANG!

  Not far from the Victory Center is the actual battlefield.  You can still see the earthen battlements made by the soldiers.  Visiting Yorktown was a gratifying conclusion to my studies of the American Revolution.