word arrived that Rawdon was bringing troops to relieve the siege. However, the actions of Greene and militia commanders like Francis Marion drove Rawdon to eventually abandon the Ninety Six District and Camden, effectively reducing the British presence in South Carolina to the port of Charleston. Augusta, Georgia was also besieged on May 22, and fell to Patriot forces under Andrew Pickens and Harry "Light Horse" Lee on June 6, reducing the British presence in that state to the port of Savannah. Greene then gave his forces a six weeks' rest on the High Hills of the Santee River. On September 8, with 2,600 men, he engaged British forces under Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Stewart at Eutaw Springs. Americans who fell in this battle were immortalized by American author Philip Freneau in his 1781 poem "To the Memory of Brave Americans." The battle, although tactically a draw, so weakened the British that they withdrew to Charleston, where Greene penned them in for the remaining months of the war. Yorktown Upon arrival in Virginia, Cornwallis took command of the existing British forces in the region, which had been commanded first by turncoat Benedict Arnold, and then by Major General William Phillips. Phillips, a good friend of Cornwallis, died two days before Cornwallis reached his position at Petersburg. Having marched without informing Clinton of his movements (communications between the two British commanders was by sea and extremely slow, sometimes up to three weeks), Cornwallis sent word of his northward march and set about destroying American supplies in the Chesapeake region. In March 1781, in response to the threat of Arnold and Phillips, General Washington had dispatched the Marquis de Lafayette to defend Virginia. The young Frenchman had 3,200 men at his command, but British troops in the state totaled 7,200. Lafayette skirmished with Cornwallis, avoiding a decisive battle while gathering reinforcements. It was during this period that Cornwallis received orders from Clinton to choose a position on the Virginia Peninsula—referred to in contemporary letters as the "Williamsburg Neck"—and construct a fortified naval post to shelter ships of the line. In complying with this order, Cornwallis put himself at risk to become trapped. With the arrival of the French fleet under the Comte de Grasse and General Washington's combined French-American army, Cornwallis found himself cut off. When the Royal Navy fleet, under Admiral Thomas Graves, was defeated by the French at the Battle of