Peace of Paris (1783) - The Path To Negotiation

The Path To Negotiation

News of the surrender of General Cornwallis at Yorktown reached Britain late in November 1781, shortly before Parliament was due to debate the military spending estimates for the following year. The hastily-revised plan was that forces in America were to be retained at their existing level, but the policy of "offensive" war and long campaigns away from well-supplied strongholds (which had also led to the Saratoga defeat four years earlier) was to be abandoned, in favour of a new approach, details of which had to remain secret. The budget was passed by a large majority, but a few days later news was received that the British fleet in the Bay of Biscay had been able to capture only a fraction of a very large French fleet, carrying troops for invasions of British colonies around the world. Parliament immediately ordered an inquiry into the administration of the Royal Navy, to be held after the Christmas recess. At the beginning of January it was learned that French forces had begun capturing small British-held islands in the West Indies even without the help of the new fleet (which had been driven back to France by storms), so a large British fleet was sent westwards as soon as possible. Also in that month, the government appointed a new commander for the American forces, General Carleton who had defeated the American invasion of Canada in the early phase of the war, and the Colonial Secretary, Lord George Germain, was replaced by the hawkish Welbore Ellis.

The inquiry into Navy administration was followed by a Parliamentary vote on 20 February in which the First Lord of the Admiralty, Lord Sandwich, narrowly escaped dismissal. The following week, Parliament voted for a guarantee of the "no offensive war" claim made the previous autumn, on the grounds that increased military commitment to America would, among other things, be "the means of weakening the efforts of this country against her European enemies". At the beginning of March news arrived which absolutely confirmed the wisdom of this position—the loss of two more West Indian islands in January (with a third seemingly at the mercy of the French navy), and of the Mediterranean base on Minorca in February. The opposition in Parliament then began tabling motions alleging that Great Britain had no confidence in its government; the first of these was rejected by just 10 votes, another a week later by 9 votes. Hours before yet another such vote was due, on 20 March, the government leader, Lord North, persuaded the King to accept his resignation (this set a precedent that successful Parliamentary votes of "no confidence" would automatically force a Prime Minister to resign). The King's choice as replacement, Lord Shelburne (who, though an old friend of Benjamin Franklin, had initially stated in February that he "would never consent, under any possible given circumstances, to acknowledge the independency of America") refused the post, leading to the formation of a strange new government team, nominally led by Lord Rockingham, whom the King hated, with Shelburne and Charles James Fox, who hated each other, as Secretaries of State.