Battle of Guilford Courthouse

15 March 1781  

On this date in 1781...

A 2,100-man British force under the command of Lieutenant General Charles Cornwallis defeated Major General Nathanael Greene's 4,500 Americans at the Battle of Guilford Court House in what is now Greensboro, North Carolina. The British Army lost as much as 27% of its strength, contributing to the ultimate failure of the British Southern strategy and leading to Cornwallis’s defeat at Yorktown.

Other Years:

• 1767 - U.S. President and General Andrew Jackson was born in the Waxhaws, North Carolina.
• 1818 - General Andrew Jackson invaded Florida to begin the First Seminole War with a force of 800 U.S. Army regulars, 2,000 Georgia and Tennessee volunteers, and about 1,400 Creek warriors.
• 1855 - Louisiana established the first health board in the U.S to regulate quarantine.
• 1858 - After fighting the Americans for almost 25 years, Seminole leader Billy Bowlegs surrendered with 163 of his followers and were shipped west to Indian Territory.
• 1863 - The British ship H.M.S. Britannia ran the Federal blockade and arrived in Wilmington, North Carolina.
• 1869 - Col. George Armstrong Custer discovered several large Cheyenne villages on Sweetwater Creek near the Texas-Indian Territory border. Custer captures four Cheyenne Chiefs and threatens to hang them until the Cheyenne surrender.
• 1922 - The first Southern radio station, WSB in Atlanta, Georgia began broadcasting.
• 1960 - The National Observatory at Kitt Peak, Arizona was dedicated.
• 1965 - Addressing a joint session of Congress, U.S. President Lyndon Johnson called for new legislation to guarantee every American’s right to vote.

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