British vessel, the sloop Bonetta, to be sent without any sort of inspection to carry dispatches from Cornwallis to New York; Americans, suspecting that either runaway slaves or provincials might be aboard, were prevented from searching the vessel. When the British garrison marched out of their positions on October 19 to surrender, it was with colors cased, possibly playing the British tune "The World Turned Upside Down". Cornwallis, claiming illness, did not attend the ceremony, sending his deputy General O'Hara to deliver his sword. O'Hara at first sought to deliver it to a French officer, but he was finally directed to one of Washington's officers, Benjamin Lincoln, the defeated commander at Charleston. Lincoln briefly held the proffered sword and then returned it to O'Hara. Over the following weeks, the army was marched under guard to camps in Virginia and Maryland. Cornwallis and other officers were returned to New York and allowed to return to England on parole. The ship on which Cornwallis sailed in December 1781 also carried Benedict Arnold and his family. Disposition of the allies The local militia that supported the siege were dismissed from service. Some of the American Continental forces were returned to the New York City region, where Washington continued to stand against the British presence until the end of the war; others were sent south to assist in General Greene's efforts in the Carolinas. Issues of pay and condition were an ongoing problem until the war ended, but Washington fought no more battles. The French forces that came with de Grasse were reembarked, and he sailed for the West Indies, with the fleet of de Barras, in early November. After recapturing a number of British-held targets there, de Grasse was preparing to join with the Spanish for an assault on Jamaica when Admiral Rodney defeated him in the April 1782 Battle of the Saintes, capturing him and his flagship. The forces of General Rochambeau wintered in Virginia, and marched back to Rhode Island the next summer. Disposition of the slaves During the Yorktown campaign, numerous enslaved African-Americans had fled from their enslavers towards British lines in hope of freedom. On October 25, Washington issued an order which stipulated that all fugitive slaves who had joined the British were to be rounded up by the Continental Army and placed under the supervision of armed guards in fortified positions on both sides of the York River.