The British surrendered at Yorktown on October 19, 1781, ending major fighting in the American Revolutionary War.
American and French forces under George Washington and the Comte de Rochambeau trapped Lieutenant General Charles Cornwallis’s army at Yorktown, Virginia. French naval forces also helped prevent a British rescue fleet from controlling the Chesapeake Bay.
After a siege lasting from September 28 to October 19, Cornwallis’s position became untenable. His surrender of roughly 8,000 troops was a decisive American victory and effectively ended large-scale combat, although the war did not formally conclude that day.
The Treaty of Paris was signed in 1783 and recognized the independence of the United States. Yorktown is therefore best understood as the military conclusion of the Revolution, while the treaty was its diplomatic conclusion.