Charles O ' Hara General Charles O ' Hara ( 1740 – 25 February 1802 ) was a British military officer who served in the Seven Years War , American War of Independence , and French Revolutionary War , and later served as Governor of Gibraltar . During his career O ' Hara personally surrendered to both George Washington and Napoleon Bonaparte . Early life . Charles O ' Hara was born in Lisbon , Portugal , the illegitimate son of General James O ' Hara and his Portuguese mistress . Charles was sent to Westminster School . On 23 December 1752 , at the age of twelve — a young but not uncommon age for a subaltern of the era — he became a cornet in the 3rd Dragoons . He became a lieutenant in the 2nd Regiment of the Coldstream Guards on 14 January 1756 shortly before major warfare broke out in Europe . Seven Years ' War . During the Seven Years War O ' Hara served in Germany as an aide to the Marquess of Granby , the senior officer of the British contingent serving with the Duke of Brunswick ' s army . In 1762 he served under his father in Portugal in the same campaign with Charles Lee . He also saw service in Germany . Although a disciplinarian , he was extremely popular with the troops under his command . Senegal . On 25 July 1766 , O ' Hara was appointed commandant of the Africa Corps in Senegal , colony which had been captured from France in 1758 , with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel . This unit was made up of British military prisoners pardoned in exchange for accepting life service in Africa . It came at a time when the British government were trying to build up a base in West Africa . In 1769 , he was appointed as a captain in the Coldstream Guards . The development of Senegal was a disappointment for the British and O ' Hara was uninterested in civil governance . Despite the constitution which had been created offering generous rights to settlers , very few British colonists ever came to West Africa . The territories would ultimately be ceded back to France at the Treaty of Paris in 1783 . American War of Independence . In July 1778 , Lt . Col . O ' Hara arrived in America and immediately commanded forces at Sandy Hook , New Jersey . Lt . Gen . Henry Clinton , commander of the British army in America , gave him that assignment as the French fleet under Admiral d ' Estaing threatened New York City . Southern Campaign . In October 1780 , O ' Hara was promoted to brigadier and became commander of Brigade of Guards . He became Lieutenant General Charles Cornwallis ' second - in - command and good friend . During Cornwallis ' pursuit of Major General Nathanael Greene to the Dan River , O ' Hara distinguished himself at Cowan ' s Ford , North Carolina on 1 February 1781 . He also led the British counterattack at the Battle of Guilford Courthouse on 15 March 1781 , which led to General Greene withdrawing from the field of battle . He was seriously wounded during this battle , but was able to remain with the army as it moved toward Yorktown , Virginia . His son , who was a Lieutenant of the artillery , was killed during the battle . Yorktown . General O ' Hara represented the British at the surrender of Yorktown on 19 October 1781 , when General Cornwallis pleaded illness . He first attempted to surrender to French Comte de Rochambeau , who declined his sword and deferred to General George Washington . Washington declined and deferred to Major General Benjamin Lincoln , who was serving as Washington ' s second - in - command and had surrendered to General Clinton at Charleston in May 1780 . O ' Hara was exchanged on 9 February 1782 , and was sent to the Caribbean in command of a detachment of reinforcements . Following the conclusion of the war with the Treaty of Paris he returned to Britain having been promoted to Major General . The Sword of Surrender . There are various accounts of what became of the surrender sword after the battle : some claim General Washington kept it for a few years and then had it returned to Lord Cornwallis , while some believe the sword remains in America ' s possession , perhaps in the White House . However , in what is generally regarded as the definitive modern study of the Yorktown campaign , The Guns of Independence ( 2005 ) , U . S . National Park Service historian Jerome S . Greene writes simply that O ' Hara extended Cornwallis ' s sword and , " Washington took the sword , symbolically held it a moment , and then returned it to O ' Hara . " Thus , this most symbolic of war trophies remained with its original owner . After the war . In 1784 , O ' Hara fled from England to the Continent due to gambling debts . While in Italy he met the writer Mary Berry and began a long relationship with her . After Cornwallis offered him help to pay off his debts he was able to return to Britain . When Cornwallis was made Governor General of India in 1786 he offered to take O ' Hara with him , but the Irishman declined . In 1792 , he was appointed lieutenant governor of Gibraltar . Toulon . In 1793 , he was promoted to Lieutenant - General . On 23 November 1793 , he was captured at Fort Mulgrove in Toulon , France during operations that gained Napoleon the attention of his superiors . O ' Hara had been leading a bold sortie by the besieged British troops . Napoleon had personally directed the capture operation and accepted O ' Hara ' s formal surrender . O ' Hara was treated as an " insurrectionist " and was imprisoned in the Luxembourg Prison and threatened with the guillotine . He spent two years in prison in Paris . O ' Hara thus has the distinction of having been personally taken prisoner by George Washington and Napoleon Bonaparte . Later years . In August 1795 , he was exchanged for Comte de Rochambeau . Later that year he became engaged to Mary Berry , but the engagement was broken when he was named Governor of Gibraltar for a second time on 30 December 1795 , and she would not leave England . He was promoted to full general in 1798 . O ' Hara is known for the folly that was O ' Hara ' s Tower on Gibraltar and his debates with John Jervis , 1st Earl of St Vincent over the redesign of Gibraltar to serve the needs of the British Fleet . St Vincent , who was Admiral in Charge of the Mediterranean Fleet , recommended that the Royal Navy Victualling Yard be relocated to the Rosia Bay area , just south of the New Mole . Governor O ' Hara did not approve of St Vincent ' s plan as he proposed to finance it by selling the naval stores at Waterport and Irish Town . However St Vincent had poor regard for O ' Hara who let the garrison enjoy the ninety pubs on the Rock . It has been proposed that he needed the income to finance his many households and mistresses . St Vincent however won with regard to his navy ' s needs . The poor morale in the garrison led to a plot to let Spain have Gibraltar . O ' Hara discovered the plot and 1 , 000 people were exiled from the Rock . He died on 25 February 1802 , from complications due to his old wounds . In popular culture . In the Roland Emmerich film " The Patriot " starring Mel Gibson , Charles O ' Hara is played by Peter Woodward . This was criticised , as the real O ' Hara , despite his Portuguese birth and English education , spoke with an Irish accent rather than the upper - class English voice portrayed in the film .