Battle of Yorktown

Yorktown, VA

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Welcome to Historic Yorktown, Virginia. In 1691, the General Assembly at Jamestown established the city by the "Act for Ports," a piece of legislation that was designed to encourage growth in the Tidewater region. Yorktown eventually grew into an important port for exporting tobacco from local plantations and became a thriving business hub. Yorktown is best known because it was the site of the final battle of the American Revolution and the place where Lord Cornwallis surrendered to George Washington, which ended the war. Between 1740 and 1770 Yorktown had nearly 2,000 residents and was nearly as large as Williamsburg, the state capital. Unfortunately, the Siege of 1781, a "Great Fire" in 1814, and the 1862 Peninsula Campaign destroyed most of the town, and it never again regained its former prominence. Many historic buildings survived, however, and others have been reconstructed to give visitors an idea of how Yorktown looked during the eighteenth century. Visitors can also visit earthworks that were built by the British during the Revolutionary War. Join us as we take you on a fun GPS guided audio experience to visit some of these historic sites!