At two o'clock in the afternoon the British marched out between two lines, the French on the one side, the Americans on the other, the French in full dress uniform, the Americans in some cases half naked and barefoot.

No civilian sightseers were admitted, and there was a respectful silence in the presence of this great humiliation to a proud army.

The town itself was a dreadful spectacle with, as a French observer noted, "big holes made by bombs, cannon balls, splinters, barely covered graves, arms and legs of blacks and whites scattered here and there, most of the houses riddled with shot and devoid of window-panes." On the very day of surrender Clinton sailed from New York with a rescuing army.

Nine days later forty-four British ships were counted off the entrance to Chesapeake Bay.

The next day there were none.