The Battle of Guilford Courthouse

In March 1781, General Nathanael Greene decided to finally confront Lord Charles Cornwallis’s British army in a pitched battle and selected Guilford Courthouse in western North Carolina as the spot. Greene positioned his troops as Daniel Morgan had at Cowpens, with two ranks of militia in front and a final line of seasoned Continentals led by Colonels Otho Williams and John Howard. With hand-to-hand fighting raging just in front of him and the contest hanging in the balance, Cornwallis ordered his artillery to fire grapeshot point blank into the mass.