Which British commander surrendered at Yorktown, the decisive 1781 event linked to America250?

Charles Cornwallis was the British commander who surrendered at Yorktown, the decisive 1781 event linked to America250.

Cornwallis commanded the British army defending Yorktown, Virginia, during the siege by American and French forces. George Washington led the allied army, while French troops under the Comte de Rochambeau and French naval forces under the Comte de Grasse helped trap Cornwallis’s position.

Cornwallis requested terms on October 17, 1781, after the allied bombardment and attacks had made his defenses untenable. The surrender ceremony took place two days later, on October 19. Cornwallis did not personally attend the ceremony, reportedly citing illness; Charles O’Hara represented him and offered Cornwallis’s sword to American and French officers before it was accepted by Benjamin Lincoln.

The Yorktown surrender did not constitute the treaty that legally recognized independence. That came through the Treaty of Paris in 1783, after negotiations between Britain and the United States.