The Revolutionary services of John Greenwood of Boston and New York, 1775-1783

26 December 1776

Battle of Trenton

Chapter HI

Retreat from Canada to Ticonderoga; regiment joins General Washington in New Jersey; battle of Trenton ; Greenwood leaves the army 34

INTRODUCTION

No relic in connection with his services, over which the stirring events which marked the Revolution might have cast a halo, has come down to the present gen- eration save the blade of the sword which he took, as he relates, from the body of a Hessian artillery- man at Trenton, and a manuscript music-book upon which he set great store as having been given him by an English fifer. The tunes are all English, but the water-mark^ of the paper being foreign, I am led to suppose this also is a memento of the battle of Trenton. Greenwood's regiment was appointed to guard the Hessian prisoners across the river, and among them was their band of nine musicians, who participated next year in the celebration of July 4 at Philadelphia. The fife which had cheered "the 15th" onward through many a weary march was thoughtlessly given away^ by Dr. I. J. Greenwood about 1 830, and has long since, we may presume, passed into oblivion.

ARMY

When we arrived at Albany (25) we were ordered on board vessels for Esopus (or Kingston), and thence proceeded, still without tents and some of our men without even shoes, over the mountains to a place called Newton, in Pennsylvania, passing on the way through Nazareth and Bethlehem.-^ A day or two after reaching Newton we were paraded one afternoon to march and attack Trenton. If I recollect aright the sun was about half an hour high and shining brightly, but it had no sooner set than it began to drizzle or grow wet, and when we came to the river it rained. Every man had sixty rounds of cartridges served out to him, and as I then had a gun, as indeed every officer had, I put the number which I received, some in my pockets and some in my little cartridge-box. Over the river we then went in a flat-bottomed scow, and as I was with

ARMY

In I went and the people were very glad to see me, for they had a son In the army and were delighted with my description of the battle of Trenton, where we had but two or three men killed in the whole affray and took upward of 900 prisoners. I was given a supper of mush and milk and a blanket to lie down on by the fireside, and, rising early to proceed on my journey, the people told me I had missed my road, and, carrying through the fields, showed me the right one. I bade them good-by and continued onward with my old horse, nothing material happening to me until my arrival at a place called King's Ferry^*^ on the west side of the Hudson or North River, in the State of New York. Here I was detained three or four days as the river was filled with large cakes of ice; these, however, at last parted in such a way as to leave an opening for the ferry-boat to venture across. The boat had four or five horses in it, besides being filled with passengers, and we just got across in time to jump out, for a large cake of ice, near half a mile long, coming down with the tide, struck the boat and carried it some distance down the river. Some of the horses, I recollect, were then in her, but whether I got mine out or not I have forgotten. This much I do remember, however, that I traveled home on foot from the east side of the North River. When I arrived at my father's house in Boston the first thing done was to bake my clothes and then to anoint me all over with brimstone.