I
consider North Carolina the arena of storms. It's where the 6,000 foot
high Black Mountains constrain invading cold dry Canadian air so it
clashes with the moist tropical on-shore winds born from the Gulf
Stream just off Cape Hatteras. The spinning earth puts a twist on
the collision of these conflicting air currents, and the jet stream
rushes each cyclonic eddy away, drawing in even more warm air,
dropping the barometric pressure at the ever tightening center of
each newborn tempest. The leading edge of these storms is first felt
by the farmers and seamen of New Jersey, New York and New England
coming from the north northeast, or nor-northeast, which is why the
storms came to be called Nor'easters
Christmas
morning of 1776 in the Delaware River Valley was overcast, with
temperatures well below freezing in a soft northeast wind. After a
meager breakfast, the foot soldiers of the Continental army were told
there would be no drilling, but were issued fresh flints for their
muskets, and told to pack three days rations After almost a year of
service they knew what this meant. They were soon going into action.
The few who had paper, composed letters home. Most spent the morning
struggling to repair their clothing, tying rags about their
disintegrating shoes, fashioning their new blankets into repairs for
overcoats and pants and gloves. In those hours, even the most
fanatical must have wondered what the hell they were doing, suffering
for a commander who had so far had brought them nothing but defeat,
retreat and misery.
After
noon, as the thermometer struggled to climb under lowering clouds,
the men were were told to leave their personal effects in their huts
and tent dugouts, and form into companies. The roll was called, and
then the companies formed into battalions. The men were now issued 60
balls and powder, and about three in the afternoon, with the winter
solstice sun fading, 2,400 marched eight abreast in tight formations,
three miles south to the ferry operated by Samuel McConkey. Major
John Wilkinson, following on horseback, tracked his unit's progress
through the hard packed week old snow “tinged here and there with
blood from the feet of the men who wore broken shoes.” Near the
ferry the troops formed up
again, hidden from the river by high ground, to wait for darkness in
a spitting rain. And to pass the time, the officers read them a new
pamphlet from the quill pen of Thomas Paine.
Ben
Franklin had recruited Thomas Paine (above) to American two years earlier
ago, just as the ruling English conservatives were about to have the
author of “Common Sense” arrested. Paine served on Washington's
staff, and suffered the grinding retreat across New Jersey, inspired
by the experience to scribble out a new monograph. Once safely across
the Delaware, Paine had hurried ahead to Philadelphia, but found
the government gone, and the town filled with “fears and
falsehoods”. It had taken him ten days to find a printer who could
have “The American Crises” produced as a pamphlet, but it's
inspiring cadence would prove as effective for the American cause as
a broadside from a 44 gun man-of-war.
“These
are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the
sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of
their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and
thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered;
yet... it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as
freedom should not be highly rated. Britain, with an army to enforce
her tyranny, has declared that she has a right...”to bind us in all
cases whatsoever,”....Even the expression is impious; for so
unlimited a power can belong only to God...There is a natural
firmness in some minds which cannot be unlocked by trifles, but
which, when unlocked, discovers a cabinet of fortitude; and I reckon
it among those kind of public blessings...that God hath blessed
(General Washington) with...a mind that can even flourish upon
care....”
The
44 year old George Washington had personally planned the entire
crossing, having the Durham boats brought down river over several
nights and hidden behind Taylor Island near the ferry point. The
Congress had not provided funding for a dedicated staff, so Washington
surrounded himself with fellow FFVs, members of the First Families of
Virginia, a social class he understood and could trust. But his new
responsibilities also brought him into a new world. A year ago, when
he first arrived in Boston he had been accompanied by a “body
slave”, dressed in an exotic oriental costume. But he had noticed
the reaction of men like Hancock and Adams, and he was beginning to
doubt slavery was economically viable or morally defensible for a man
leading a war for freedom. In a year, he would be writing to the
manager of his Virginia plantation that he intended to free all his
slaves in his will. The password he gave to his command this night was "Victory". And the answer was to be, "Or Death."
The
first to be polled across the Delaware River in the gathering winter
gloom were 40 mounted dragoons under Captain William Washington
(second cousin to the General), and including future President Lt.
James Monroe, another FFV'er. Their assignment was to ride three miles
north of Trenton and block the road to Princeton for six hours, then
rejoin the army either at Trenton, or back on the Pennsylvania shore.
About six, as the sun set and the wind increased, the light rain
began to come down harder, and to turn into sleet. Washington sent a
note to Lieutenant Colonel John Cadwalader, preparing to cross
over at Bordentown, “I am determined, as the night is favorable, to
cross the River.” . But the night was not favorable. One soldier
described conditions as a “violent
storm of rain, hail, and snow [the nor’easter] coupled with the ice
flows and high winds, (which) slowed operations.” Said another, "It blew a hurricane."
In
direct command of the crossing was 26 year old barrel chested 280
pound Henry Knox (above) . Henry helped throw tea into Boston Harbor, had
witnessed the Boston Massacre, and it was Henry who had manhandled
captured cannon 100 miles across snowbound Massachusetts to
Dorchester Heights, forcing the British to evacuate Boston.
Henry
had been caught behind British lines in the battle for Manhattan, and
now Washington was relying on Henry's booming voice to keep the 2,400
infantry, 18 cannon and 100 dray horses ferried safely and
efficiently across the 300 yard water. Noted John Greenwood,
“no sooner had the sun set than it began to drizzle, and when we
came to river, it rained.”
Washington
went across with the second wave, landing on the New Jersey shore
about 7 pm. He stood on the bank, “...wrapped in his cloak,
superintending the landing of his troops. He is calm and collected,
but very determined. The storm is changing to sleet and cuts like a
knife.” Said Greenwood, “...it commenced to snow about
eleven, and the river ran strong with ice. “
Henry Knox said , “It hailed with great violence.”
With
each minute, the crossing fell farther behind schedule. Washington
considered canceling the attack, but as there was no alternative, he
sat on a box and kept his concerns to himself. By midnight, all the
infantry were over, and Knox started to load the 18 cannon, their
dray horses and ammunition. It was Knox who took the cannon out of
order, in case Washington decided to attack with only infantry. By
the time the big Durham boats could be adjusted to carry their new
load, it was snowing heavily. Wrote Greenwood later, "The
noise of the soldiers coming over and clearing away the ice, the
rattling of the cannon wheels
on the frozen ground, and the cheerfulness of my fellow-comrades as I
acknowledge myself
to be, I felt great pleasure, more that I now do in writing about it. "
At
the same time, and some 20 miles to the south, near Bristol, Pennsylvania, Colonel Cadewalder
ferried his 1,500 infantry across the river, to begin his
diversionary attack against Bordentown. But river ice kept his
artillery on the Pennsylvania shore, so by midnight, Cadewalder had
pulled his infantry back to Pennsylvania. Thus, Washington's
diversion did not bring von Dunop rushing back to Bordentown, just 9
miles or half day's march south of Trenton. As Napoleon would say a
generation later, “I do not want a good general, I want a lucky
one.”
The
last gun and dray horse landed on the Jersey shore, about 3 in the
morning of Thursday, 26 December,
1776, Boxing Day. At about 4 am, as the army set off on the nine
mile march to Trenton, the
snow, which had slowed, whirled down the Delaware Valley again, with renewed force. Private Greenwood captured the night decades later. "During
the whole night it alternately hailed, rained, snowed,
and blew tremendously. I recollect very well that at one time, when
we halted on the road,
I sat down on the stump of a tree and was so benumbed with cold that
I wanted to go to sleep;
had I been passed unnoticed I should have frozen to death without
knowing it; but as good luck
always attended me, Sergeant Madden came and, rousing me up, made me
walk about. We then
began to march again, just in the old slow way, until the dawn of
day, about half-past seven in
the morning." By eight in the morning, Washington's small army was in position to attack. The men could not know, the hardest part of the operation was already over.
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