In March 1781, in a smoke-filled North Carolina forest, Lieutenant General Charles Cornwallis ordered grapeshot fired into a melee that included his own elite troops. This episode examines the Battle of Guilford Courthouse, a 90-minute clash with Major General Nathaniel Greene that the British won on paper but that dismantled their ability to hold the American South.

We trace the Race to the Dan, Cornwallis’s decision to burn his baggage train at Ramsour’s Mill, and the 600-mile pursuit that left his army starving and down to about 2,100 effectives. We then break down Greene’s three-line defense in depth, from the North Carolina militia at the split rail fence to the Continentals in the clearing, and follow the aftermath that led to Wilmington, Virginia, and Yorktown.

• Why burning the baggage train made the British faster at first but left them without tents or medical supplies
• How Greene used militia as a deadly speed bump, asking for two volleys before falling back
• The 40-yard volley that cut down half the attacking Highlanders and the chaos of fighting in the woods
• William Washington’s cavalry charge and Cornwallis’s grapeshot order to stop the American momentum
• The Pyrrhic victory: about 27 percent British losses and Charles James Fox’s famous warning