Henry Knox

by Mark Puls

  Rahl emerged to mount his horse, screaming for his men to form a line of battle: "Forward, march; advance, advance!" His men fired up the street, shooting Washington's horse beneath him and wounding James Monroe. Just then, Knox's artillery from Captain Thomas Forrest's company opened fire from the head of the street with six cannons a mere 300 yards away. The shots ripped through the Hessian line, tearing soldiers apart. Knox was stunned at the destructive power of cannons in such close-range fighting. "Here succeeded a scene of war of which I had often conceived, but never saw before," he would write his wife. "The hurry, fright, and confusion of the enemy was not unlike that which will be when the last trump shall sound. They endeavored to form in streets, the heads of which we had previously the possession of with cannon and howitzers; these, in the twinkling of an eye, cleared the streets.“14

  The booming cannons disheartened the Hessians, who abandoned hopes of breaking the American lines and instead took cover. Continental troops circled around the barracks. Those with good powder fired at the crouched soldiers, and others menaced with bayonets. Rahl's men found an open lane in the American line and raced to an orchard east of the town near the road to Princeton. Knox had posted cannons on all the routes leading out of town, however. "It was impossible for them to get away," he relayed to Lucy.15

  Washington was concerned that the Hessians would assemble and try to attack his men on the north side of town and push the Americans toward the river.

  Rahl ordered a charge to retake the town. Knox recalled: "The poor fellows after they were formed on the plain saw themselves completely surrounded, the only resource left was to force their way through numbers unknown to them. The Hessians lost part of their cannon in the town; they did not relish the project of forcing [a charge]." American muskets fired, sending up a cloud of smoke as shots pelted the Hessians. Rahl was hit and fell from his horse, mortally wounded. The Continental troops, almost delirious with fury, charged with bayonets. The beleaguered Hessians "were obliged to surrender upon the spot.“16 With Knox's cannons sweeping the field, Washington thought that the enemy realized they must surrender or "they must inevitably be cut to pieces.“17

  A total of 23 officers and 886 men were taken prisoner, and 6 field guns and 1,200 small arms were captured. About 25 Hessian soldiers were killed and 7 were wounded. Among the Americans, 4 were killed and 8 wounded. Two other men froze to death. A sizable number of Hessians escaped with the British light horse along the river because the American commanders Cadwalader and Ewing had been unable to cross the Delaware the previous night and cut off the retreat route.

  For Knox, the victory demonstrated how effective the use of mobile field guns could be in leading an assault. He had proven to Washington and the rest of the army that he knew how to fight a modern war with guns ahead of columns rather than dragged behind them in support and that his military knowledge was not idle theory but practical on the battlefield. This strategy was the same one that Napoleon, who also began his career in an artillery unit, would later use to great advantage in Europe.

  Knox and his men had hauled eighteen cannons under the most difficult conditions imaginable—snow, sleet, hail, and freezing temperatures, across an ice-packed river—and yet were able to place guns with the vanguard of the army in a surprise, quick-strike attack.

  The soldiers found two hogsheads of rum, which they broke open and drank, in hopes of taking the chill out of their bodies. Washington realized the Hessian and British soldiers who had escaped would soon sound the alarm to the British posted at Princeton and the surrounding area. Not wanting to risk being trapped against the river, he ordered his troops to return to Morrisville. As exhausted as Knox was, he directed the loading of the artillery along with the captured Hessian guns aboard the flat-bottom barges for another arduous crossing of the Delaware.

  That same day, Knox's plan for a Continental artillery corps and Washington's letter of support reached Baltimore and was read in Congress, causing a stir among the delegates. Francis Lewis, who had been appointed to the Cannon Committee just two days earlier, rushed a letter to fellow delegate Robert Morris, a financially astute businessman known as the financier of the American Revolution, who was rounding up critically needed money and supplies for Washington's army. "Congress has this moment received letters from the General recommending in the most pressing terms the necessity of having a number of brass and iron cannon provided as early as possible for the next campaign on which he seems to say the fate of America in a great measure depends," Lewis told Morris. "He also strongly recommends an augmentation of the Continental battalions to 110—with five battalions of artillery.“18

  A committee of three was immediately appointed, which included Samuel Adams, who had known Knox for years, along with Virginia's Richard Henry Lee and James Wilson of Pennsylvania, to consider the implications of the plan. The following morning, Friday, December 27, before news of the Trenton victory had arrived, Adams recommended that Knox be given the power to augment the artillery, and Congress resolved that "a brigadier general of artillery be appointed; and, the ballots being taken, Colonel Henry Knox was elected.“19 It was also resolved to authorize the building of two magazines, one in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and the other in Brookfield, Massachusetts, each to hold 10,000 stand of arms and 200 tons of gunpowder, as well as a powder factory. Congress also expanded Washington's dictatorial powers for six months, granting him the authority to raise the artillery battalions along with his other needs, which included sixteen battalions of infantry, 3,000 cavalrymen, and a corps of engineers.

  Back in Trenton on Saturday, December 28, Henry wrote Lucy, who had returned to Boston, with an account of the triumph at Trenton. After avoiding writing her for weeks during the discouraging retreats through New Jersey, he proudly proclaimed victorious news: "My Dearly Beloved Friend, you will before this have heard of our success on the morning of the 26th." He gave her a full account of the battle, from the difficulties of the crossing to the harrowing scenes of destruction. "His Excellency the General has done me the unmerited great honor of thanking me in public orders in terms strong and polite. This I should blush to mention to any other than to you, my dear Lucy; and I am fearful that even my Lucy may think her Harry possesses a species of little vanity in doing [it] at all.“20

  The Americans discovered that the British troops had evacuated the surrounding area after the Battle of Trenton, and Washington ordered his men to make yet another crossing on Monday, December 30. General Cadwalader took possession of nearby Bordentown, Mount Holly, and Burlington. Knox spent two days getting the artillery across the river, which was completely congested with ice. The following day, many of the troops packed up their gear for the trip home, as their enlistments expired December 31. Washington, Knox, and the brigadier and regimental leaders tried to convince them to extend their duty. Thomas Mifflin, a former delegate to Congress from Pennsylvania who served as quartermaster general for the army, rode before the troops, wrapped in a rose-colored coat that had been patched together from pieces of blanket. He told his men that they could follow up the victory at Trenton by retaking much of New Jersey, as Washington planned, and by protecting Philadelphia, and bask in the credit of having saved the American cause. But many men had not received their pay in several weeks, and the paymaster had no funds. In Philadelphia, delegate Robert Morris was going door to door in an effort to raise $50,000 to send to the army. The 6,000 American troops paraded, many for the last time, and stood at attention to hear an appeal from Washington, who rode before the men. His force would dwindle to a mere 1,500 men once the enlistments expired in the next few hours, unless they could be persuaded to remain. Drummers beat a cadence to signal volunteers to step forward and pledge to stay six weeks longer with the army. Not one single man heeded the call. Washington called off the drums and directed his horse to the center of the line. "My brave fellows," he exhorted in an affectionate tone, "[y]ou have done all that I have ever asked you to do, and more than could be expected; but your
country is at stake, your wives, your houses, and all that you hold dear." Washington promised them $10 of pay for an additional six weeks of service, which by that time he hoped fresh enlistments would invigorate the force. He felt it was a high price, but at the height of the alarm in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania had offered that amount to its militia. The commander in chief believed he must offer the going rate. To guarantee the offer, Washington told the men that he would pledge his own fortune to make certain they received the pay.

  Knox believed that Washington was demonstrating remarkable leadership skills, and as he listened to the general's appeal, he felt a surge of patriotic inspiration. Many of the men realized that they could not leave with so much at stake. Washington preserved a force of about 3,300 men who agreed to stay for another short stint.21

  Henry was greatly relieved that the army had not been reduced to a skeletal force. "Our people have exerted great fortitude, and stayed beyond the time of their enlistment, in high spirits, but want rum and clothing," he wrote to Lucy three days later.22 Washington justified the offer to Congress by pointing out that "[t]he troops feel their importance and would have their price. Indeed as their aid is so essential and not to be dispensed with, it is to be wondered, they had not estimated it at a higher rate.“23

  The Americans spread out a camp in and around Trenton and posted picket troops a mile to the north to watch for an attack. Knox stationed most of his guns in a strong defensive position on the east side of Trenton across the Assunpink, a tributary that during the summer was a small creek but by winter became a swollen, ice-jammed river. A sixteen-foot-wide wooden bridge extended over it. Between the hill and the Assunpink, the Americans built a line of fortifications and tried to construct entrenchments in the frozen ground. Knox strengthened the position with forty cannons at the base of the hill and two field guns on its crest. On the first day of the year, 3,600 soldiers arrived to reinforce the Americans, swelling the force to about 6,800 men. The army received intelligence that Major General Cornwallis had advanced to Princeton, just twelve miles away, with 8,000 men and was eager for battle, believing that expired enlistments had decimated the Continental Army and that the Delaware River could no longer offer protection for the remaining American troops.

  On Thursday, January 2, news of Knox's promotion arrived from Baltimore. He excitedly wrote to Lucy that day, uncertain whether his wife would prefer that he quit the service and return to her rather than become even more wedded to the army: "Will it give you satisfaction or pleasure in being informed that the Congress have created me a general officer—a brigadier—with the entire command of the artillery? If so, I shall be happy." Henry failed to tell her that he had threatened to resign if not promoted and somewhat disingenuously reported: "It was unsolicited on my part, though I cannot say unexpected. People are more lavish in their praises of my poor endeavors than they deserve. All the merit I can claim is industry. I wish to render my devoted country every service in my power."

  In preparing for another attack, however, he was still troubled by the bloodshed he had witnessed a few days before. To his wife he confided, "The attack of Trenton was a most horrid scene to the poor inhabitants. War, my Lucy, is not a humane trade, and the man who follows [it] as such will meet with his proper demerits in another world.“24

  Shortly after Knox finished the letter, a British column attacked, the vanguard of 6,000 troops under Cornwallis. At three o'clock, the redcoats pushed back the pickets and outlying troops, and drove them back into Trenton. The American troops retreated across the Assunpink Bridge, seeking refuge behind Knox's artillery guns. The two field guns on the hill afforded a sweeping command of Trenton and provided the men cover as the British rushed forward and began a heavy musket fire. "The enemy advanced within reach of our cannon, who saluted them with great vociferation and some execution," Knox later wrote Lucy. The redcoats were able to bring cannons into place and fire at the fortifications, but in the descending darkness they did little damage.

  Knox kept up sporadic cannon fire. "A few shells we now and then chucked into town to prevent their enjoying their new quarters securely," he wrote to his wife.25

  Knox realized, however, that the Americans could not hold their position for long. They were pinned with the Assunpink to their front and the Delaware, which was now completely impassable by boats, on their left. If the British overwhelmed their right, they would be trapped and destroyed. Knox and the other generals agreed that the army should evacuate. Washington decided to send the army to the rear of Cornwallis's force. By cutting off his supply lines and communication with the rest of the British forces in New York, the Americans would be able to take back New Jersey.

  Washington ordered the army to move out and march to Princeton to attack the British Seventeenth, Fortieth, and Fifty-fifth regiments, believed to consist of 1,200 men. About 400 troops were assigned to keep the campfires burning with rail fences and posts to make it appear that the army was bivouacking for the night. Before dawn, these men were to slip away and join the rest of the army. Men also were left to maintain the mock noise of engineers building fortifications to add to the ruse; they too were to escape in the early-morning darkness. Knox left men to continue to shell Trenton to disrupt the enemy's sleep.

  At 1 A.M. on Friday, January 3, the army moved out. After several warm days, the temperature fell that night and the ground became hard and better suited for travel with heavy guns and carriages. "Our troops marched with great silence and order," Knox reported to Lucy.26 They marched a roundabout route to Princeton, which was twelve miles to the north, in order to avoid detection, traveling east through Sand Town and from thence north along Quaker Road. The march went smoothly with no major delays. The men reached Stony Creek, about two miles short of Princeton, shortly after daybreak, when they encountered 800 British troops marching to Trenton to join Cornwallis. The redcoats believed Washington's main force was still at Trenton and that these troops must only be a small detachment. "You may judge of their surprise when they discovered such large columns marching up," Knox relayed to Lucy. "I believe they were as much astonished as if an army had dropped perpendicularly upon them.“27

  Knox ordered cannons moved into place, and Washington sent 350 troops under General Hugh Mercer to cut off the road to Trenton. The British attacked Mercer, whose men gathered in a patch of woods and were already exhausted by the long march, the incessant cold, and lack of sleep over several days. Mercer's men fired a volley of muskets at the enemy, who returned shots darting around them among the trees. Several men fell wounded, crying out in pain.

  Then the redcoats let out a yell and charged with bayonets thrust forward. Mercer's men lost heart and fled, leaving the general unprotected. The British soldiers thrust the blades from their guns into his body and left him mortally wounded. Knox saw several of his comrades brutally attacked with bayonets, savage thrusts goring their bodies. The Pennsylvania militia tried to repulse the British, but they too had little strength left. Washington arrived and rallied the men as the rest of his force approached. Knox's artillery guns fired, signaling the full line of the Continental force to rush into place.

  Suddenly the British realized that they were facing Washington's main force as well as Knox's artillery guns. The field guns blasted holes in the enemy line. In desperation, the British commander led a bayonet charge through the American line near the road to Trenton and was able to flee south. Continental troops chased them for several miles, rounding up hundreds of prisoners before Washington called off the pursuit and ordered his men to push toward Princeton. By the time they arrived, the remaining 200 British troops had fled east and had barricaded themselves behind the thick stone walls of Nasssau Hall, a building at Princeton University. Knox ordered Captain Alexander Hamilton and the New York artillery to attack the position. Hamilton's men wheeled a four-pounder into position and ignited the touchhole. A booming shot sent a cannonball shrieking into Prayer Hall, where it punctured a portrait of King George III, decapitating hi
m. The British must have viewed this as an ominous sign. A second shot hit the cor-nice of Nassau Hall and ricocheted to kill the horse ridden by Major James Wilkinson. Then Hamilton ordered a charge, which convinced the remaining British soldiers to surrender. In the battle for Princeton, the British had 28 men killed, 58 others were wounded, and 323 soldiers captured along with 2 field guns and hundreds of blankets, shoes, and other provisions. The Americans suffered 23 killed and 20 wounded.

  Washington wanted to push farther north to New Brunswick, where the British had left much of their munitions and supplies, but his commanders told him that the men were too exhausted for another extended march and then another battle. "Our men having been without either rest, rum, or provisions for two nights and days, were unequal to the task of marching seventeen miles further," Knox wrote to his wife. "If we could have secured one thousand fresh men at Princeton to have pushed for Brunswick, we should have struck one of the most brilliant strokes in all history." Knox and the other commanders felt the capture of New Brunswick could have ended the war. He was jubilant, nevertheless, over the Princeton victory. "The enemy [was] within nineteen miles of Philadelphia, they are now sixty miles. We have driven them from almost the whole west Jersey."

  The Continental Army had been at Princeton just two hours when word arrived that Cornwallis was moving from Trenton and racing to protect their munitions at New Brunswick. "This they did, as we have since been informed, in a most infernal sweat—running, puffing, and blowing, and swearing at being so outwitted," Henry reported to Lucy.28