“South Carolina says the Revolutionary War was won there. But was it?”

WaPo: “South Carolina’s new license plate, now one of two default options in the state, features a simple slogan: “Where the Revolutionary War Was Won.”

The change, part of the state’s celebration of the nation’s 250th birthday, recognizes South Carolina’s contributions in the Revolutionary War, which helped secure victory for the Continental Army.

The problem, however, is thatthe National Park Service, the White House and essentially everyone who was once an American schoolchild agree that the war ended when British Gen. Charles Cornwallis surrendered in Yorktown, Virginia, on Oct. 19, 1781.

So, was the Revolutionary War won in South Carolina?

“It’s not incorrect,” said S. Max Edelson, who teaches about colonial South Carolina at the University of Virginia, “but it doesn’t mean what you think it means.”

Edelson is one of four historians who told The Washington Post that the Battle of Yorktown was the war’s final major military battle. But some in South Carolina argue that the actions of militias there during the battles of Kings Mountain and Cowpens severely weakened Cornwallis’s forces, making a win more difficult in Yorktown.”