Washington Crosses Delaware: Trenton Revives Revolution

The Continental Army was nine days from extinction. Enlistments expired on January 1, 1777, and most soldiers had made clear they would go home. George Washington had lost New York, retreated across New Jersey with a dwindling force, and watched his army shrink from 20,000 to fewer than 2,500 effective troops. On Christmas night 1776, he staked everything on a desperate river crossing and a surprise attack that saved the American Revolution. Washington chose to cross the ice-choked Delaware River at McConkey Ferry, nine miles north of Trenton, where 1,400 Hessian soldiers garrisoned the town under Colonel Johann Rall. The plan called for three separate crossing points, but only Washington column successfully made it across. Colonel John Glover Marblehead Regiment, fishermen and sailors from Massachusetts, manned the Durham boats that ferried 2,400 soldiers, 18 cannons, and horses through floating ice in a sleet storm that began at sunset and continued through the night. The crossing took nine hours, three longer than planned. Washington forces began the nine-mile march to Trenton at 4 AM. Two soldiers froze to death. The attack commenced at 8 AM on December 26, catching the Hessian garrison completely unprepared. Rall, reportedly recovering from a night of Christmas celebrations, was mortally wounded trying to organize a counterattack. Within ninety minutes, the battle was over: approximately 22 Hessians were killed, 83 wounded, and 896 captured. Washington forces suffered zero combat deaths. The victory at Trenton was militarily small but psychologically transformative. Enlistment extensions surged. Congress, which had fled Philadelphia in panic days earlier, regained confidence. Washington followed up with a second victory at Princeton on January 3, 1777, clearing the British from most of New Jersey. Frederick the Great reportedly called the Trenton campaign the most brilliant military operation of the century.