This Week in History
December 23- 9, 1776
This week we focus our attention on Commander-in-Chief George Washington's bold move to cross the Delaware River, on Christmas Day 1776, a move which reversed the sagging spirits of the American forces and population after a long string of defeats in the Revolutionary War. This action reflects the quality of leadership which characterized Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and Franklin D. Roosevelt, and which is being demonstrated only by Lyndon LaRouche, in the crucial crisis we face today.
The situation of the American colonists was desperate, as we indicated in our last week's column on the Crisis paper of Tom Paine. On top of the string of defeats, and the retreat down New Jersey, were the threat that a large portion of the Army, which was made up of colonial militiamen who had enlisted for short periods of time, was about to go home; the enticement of an amnesty which had been offered by the British Commander Cornwallis; and the miserable condition, in terms of supplies, of the Continental Army itself.
Washington, then 43, was faced with the need both to defend Philadelphia, the seat of Congress, and to remoralize his forces. Having retreated across the Delaware River, the border between Delaware and Pennsylvania on one side, and New Jersey on the other, he decided to launch a counterattack back across the Delaware River into New Jersey, to ambush the British troops which were settling in for the winter. Washington's plan called for attacking all the British posts on the Delaware, but it ended up that several divisions didn't make it, leaving the major engagement to occur at Trenton.
One reason Washington was able to do this, was that he had commandeered all the boats along the Pennsylvania side of the river, denying them to the British who had wanted to cross over into Pennsylvania, and making them available for his bold plan. In addition, he had received reinforcements from the North.
It was a daring plan, which hardly could have been popular with Washington's ill-clad Army. It called for one column to cross the river above Trenton, on the night of Dec. 25, march south, and storm the British troops' winter quarters in Trenton. These troops, 2,400 in all, were to be led by General Washington himself.
According to the testimony of John Marshall, in his biography of General Washington, "The cold on the night of the 25th was very severe. Snow, mingled with hail and rain, fell in great quantities, and so much ice was made in the river" that it was impossible to keep the original schedule Washington had devised. Thus, while the General's contingent was supposed to cross the river starting at 12 midnight, and meet the body of Pennsylvania militia coming up from the South at 5:00 a.m., Washington's troops couldn't get across the Delaware until 3:00 or 4:00 a.m..
When Washington's troops arrived at the Trenton garrison at 8:00 a.m., they immediately attacked. When the British troops, largely Hessian (German) mercenaries who were commanded by a Colonel Rahl, recovered from their surprise sufficiently to muster a defense, Colonel Rahl was mortally wounded, and his troops thrown into confusion. The British were surrounded, and about 1,000 were taken prisoners of war.
General Washington took his prisoners, and some military stores, and went back across the Delaware, where he reconnoitered until deciding, at a later date, to launch a new offensive up into New Jersey, ultimately establishing a winter headquarters in western New Jersey.
Washington's aggressive and unexpected action had effectively flanked the British enemy, in large part because they believed that no such action was possible. He had restored morale with a minimal loss (two to four men), and signalled his intention to be satisfied with nothing less than victory.
Biographer Marshall, later the Supreme Court Chief Justice, describes the turning point this way:
"Nothing could surpass the astonishment of the British commander at this unexpected display of vigour on the part of the American General. His condition, and that of his country, had been thought desperate. He had been deserted by all the troops having a legal right to leave him; and, to render his situation completely ruinous, nearly two-thirds of the continental soldiers still remaining with him, would be entitled to their discharge on the first day of January. There appeared to be no probability of prevailing on them to continue longer in the service, and the recruiting business was absolutely at an end. The spirits of a large proportion of the people were sunk to the lowest point of depression. New Jersey appeared to be completely subdued; and some of the best judges of the public sentiment were of opinion that immense numbers in Pennsylvania, also, were determined not to permit the sixty days allowed in the proclamation of Lord and Sir William Howe, to elapse, without availing themselves of the pardon it proffered. Instead of offensive operations, the total dispersion of the small remnant of the American army was to be expected, since it would be rendered too feeble by the discharge of those engaged only until the last day of December, to attempt, any longer, the defence of the Delaware, which would by that time, in all probability, be passable on the ice. While every appearance supported these opinions, and the British General, without being sanguine, might well consider the war as approaching its termination, this bold and fortunate enterprise announced to him, that he was contending with an adversary who could never cease to be formidable while [there existed] the possibility of resistance."
Later, after being forced to surrender at Yorktown, General Cornwallis apparently told the victorious General Washington that he considered the successful Trenton attack to have been the "brightest garlands for your Excellency."
Indeed, Washington's Crossing of the Delaware, and subsequent victory, remain a shining example today, to those serious about winning the battle for the New American Revolution, and restoring the republican values of the first.
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