Alexander Leslie (1731-27 December 1794) was a Major-General of the British Army during the American Revolutionary War, serving as the commander of Great Britain's forces in the American South from 1781 to 1782 after Charles Cornwallis' capture.
Biography[]
Alexander Leslie was born in 1731 in Scotland, and he joined the 3rd Foot Guards of the British Army in 1753, becoming a Lieutenant-Colonel in the 64th Regiment of Foot in 1766. In 1776, he was promoted to Brigadier-General, and he fought in the American Revolutionary War in the New York campaign, leading the British at the Battle of Harlem Heights on 16 September 1776. His nephew William Leslie was mortally wounded at the Battle of Princeton in January 1777, and Leslie was promoted to Major-General in 1782, being given command of the British forces in the south after Charles Cornwallis' capture at the Siege of Yorktown in 1781. Leslie defended Charleston in South Carolina as the Continental Army pushed the British and Tories back towards the city, and he evacuated the city in December 1782 as the war drew to a close. Leslie died in Scotland in 1794.