Ninety Six played a significant role in the struggle for American independence from British rule. It was the site of the first southern land battle of the Revolutionary War in 1775 and the scene of its longest field siege in 1781. Early in the war the British focused on conquering the North, but after setbacks in New York, New Jersey, and Philadelphia they turned to the South. Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, and South Carolina supplied cash crops including rice, indigo, and tobacco to markets in England, and because of this economic tie many southern colonists remained loyal to British rule. These Loyalists were recruited by the British Army to fight the Patriots, who wanted independence, and the battles at Ninety Six were fought between Loyalists and Patriots who were all born on American soil. In the South Carolina backcountry, residents often shifted alliances according to advantage or oppression. At Ninety Six the town was in Patriot hands in 1775, but by 1780 it had become Loyalist territory just before the siege there. After Patriot victories at Kings Mountain and Cowpens, the British were pushed northward and forced to surrender at Yorktown in October 1781, but the war did not end immediately, and revenge fighting between Patriots and Loyalists continued in parts of South Carolina until the United States and Britain signed a final peace treaty in 1783.