Fort Baton Rouge stood across River Road and was established in 1764 by Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Dickson, commander of the British Army. On September 21, 1779, during the Revolutionary War, General Bernardo de Gálvez, then governor of Spanish Louisiana, attacked and captured the fort. Free Black and Native American soldiers played a central role in the battle by making noise and shouting through the night, misleading the British into wasting their ammunition. The next day the British, still under Dickson's command, surrendered to Gálvez. George Washington recognized Gálvez's victories as a deciding factor in the outcome of the Revolutionary War. The Spanish retained control of the fort until 1810, and it passed to American control to 1819.