Silent Night...Silent Might

Christmas celebrations in colonial America were much more staid than those we know today. December 25th in colonial America was just another day unless it fell on a Sunday, in which case it was just another Sunday. America's celebration of Christmas as a very special holiday began with the large wave of German immigrants in the early 1800s. Germans always held Christmas as the most special of days. Christmas's role in the English-speaking world peaked during the Victorian era. Victoria's consort, Albert, brought many Christmas traditions with him, and later Charles Dickens and other novelists popularized the season. Of course, Santa Claus is derived from Sant Niklaus, a Dutch character based on the original Saint Nicholas, a Roman bishop in what is today Turkey. Full disclosure: the original Saint Nicholas is buried in my grandparents' home city of Bari, Italy.

As Christmas approached in December 1776, the fortunes of the American rebellion had plummeted. The British juggernaut advanced into the Jerseys (back then, New Jersey was sometimes referred to as East and West Jersey). Lord Charles Cornwallis led the invading vanguard of some 5,000 British and Hessian troops in pursuit of Washington's dwindling army. Washington abandoned Fort Lee and maneuvered to Hackensack, where he checked the British only briefly before retreating without pause through Newark, New Brunswick, Princeton, and Trenton. On the 8th of December, Cornwallis and his scouts reached the east bank of the Delaware just in time to watch Washington and his personal escort depart on the last boat.

Herssian Grenadier

The patriot cause was at its nadir. Panic had set in, especially in Philadelphia. Lord Howe had issued a proclamation offering amnesty to any rebels willing to swear an oath to the King. Some had begun to accept it. Worse still, many of Washington's best troops had enlistments expiring, with little likelihood that replacements would arrive. Fearful of a British assault on the capital, the Continental Congress fled and turned governance over to the military. To stall the British, Washington had all the serviceable boats along a 70-mile stretch of the Delaware confiscated. The British advance had to await their engineers to plan a crossing. Fortunately, Lord Howe had decided he had all but whipped the rebels and ordered his army into winter quarters, with brigade-sized garrisons at Brunswick, Trenton, Princeton, Bordentown, and Cherry Hill. The remainder took quarters on Staten Island or Manhattan.

Gathering Boats was Critical

But morale across the colonies remained dismal. The end seemed in sight, as Howe assumed. The December 23rd edition of Thomas Paine's pamphlet "The Crisis" inspired many Americans. A desperate Washington gambled on a winter strike against the rebels before many of his best regiments dissolved. He had the pamphlet read to his troops and conceived a plan for a Christmas thrust in three divisions to take the enemy garrisons at Trenton and Bordentown. At first, demoralized by the British advance, New Jersey militia units began probing and harassing the British garrisons, isolating them in their posts. Then General John Sullivan arrived with a division from the Hudson Highlands. These reinforcements gave Washington the strength he needed to complete his plan.

Dramatic portrait - Washington crossed over
in the dark of a December night

On the night of December 25, Washington made his famous crossing at McConkey's Ferry and marched nine miles along the Delaware to Trenton. Divisions under Generals Cadwallader and Ewing (mostly Pennsylvania and New Jersey units) were to cross near Bordentown and link up with Washington, but worsening weather and rapidly forming ice floes prevented them from crossing. Nevertheless, Washington struck with just over 2,000 men just after dawn, even as a mix of rain and snow descended on them.

Overrunning the Hessian guns at Trenton

So what's the Christmas connection? The German garrison, a brigade under the command of the renowned Hessian Colonel Johann Gottlieb von Rall, was caught unprepared. Germans celebrate two days of Christmas, and Washington struck between them. Indeed, the Germans themselves had been worn out by the rigors of the campaign, and the Jersey militia had played a part in tiring them and causing a "hunker down" effect. But Rall never expected the onslaught that caught them in the weary hours of their holiest of days. Rall fell mortally wounded while rallying his battalions, and soon after the garrison surrendered more than one thousand men. The battle did not last an hour. The stunning victory saved the American cause, which was all but finished.