Battle of Groton Heights 1781
Recorded location from Wikidata; battle sites are often approximate.
Key facts
| Date | 6 September 1781 | Wikidata |
|---|---|---|
| Year | 1781 | Wikidata P585 (point in time) |
| Era | Early modern (1500–1799) | derived from year |
| Location | United States | Natural Earth (modern borders) |
| Continent | North America | Natural Earth |
| War / conflict | American Revolutionary War | Wikidata P361 |
| Participants | Kingdom of Great Britain, United States | Wikidata P710 |
| Coordinates | 41.3536, -72.0794 | Wikidata P625 |
About the battle
The Battle of Groton Heights (also known as the Battle of Fort Griswold, and occasionally called the Fort Griswold massacre) was a battle of the American Revolutionary War fought on September 6, 1781, between a small Connecticut militia force led by Lieutenant Colonel William Ledyard and the more numerous British forces led by Brigadier General Benedict Arnold and Lieutenant Colonel Edmund Eyre.
Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton ordered Arnold to raid the port of New London, Connecticut, to divert General George Washington from marching against Lord Cornwallis's army in Virginia. The raid was a success, but the Connecticut militia stubbornly resisted British attempts to capture Fort Griswold across the Thames River in Groton, Connecticut. New London was burned along with several ships, but many more ships escaped upriver.
Several leaders of the attacking British force were killed or seriously wounded, but the British eventually breached the fort. As the British entered the fort the Americans surrendered, but the British continued firing and killed many of the defenders. However, the high number of British casualties in the overall expedition against Groton and New London led to criticism of Arnold by some of his superiors.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Battle of Groton Heights (revision 1372431780), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section; shortened by selecting paragraphs and trimming at a sentence boundary; formatting and citations removed. No text added.
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