removed to the western
bank out of the reach of the enemy, and put under guard. He was
disappointed in his hope of making a stand on the banks of the
Raritan. All the force he could muster at Brunswick, including the New
Jersey militia, did not exceed four thousand men. Colonel Reed had
failed in procuring aid from the New Jersey legislature. That body,
shifting from place to place, was on the eve of dissolution. The term
of the Maryland and New Jersey troops in the flying camp had expired.
General Mercer endeavored to detain them, representing the disgrace of
turning their back upon the cause when the enemy was at hand; his
remonstrances were fruitless. As to the Pennsylvania levies, they
deserted in such numbers that guards were stationed on the roads and
ferries to intercept them.

Washington lingered at Brunswick until the 1st of December in the vain
hope of being reinforced. The enemy, in the meantime, advanced through
the country, impressing wagons and horses, and collecting cattle and
sheep, as if for a distant march. At length their vanguard appeared on
the opposite side of the Raritan. Washington immediately broke down
the end of the bridge next the village, and after nightfall resumed
his retreat. At Princeton, Washington left twelve hundred men in two
brigades, under Lord Stirling and General Adam Stephen, to cover the
country, and watch the motions of the enemy. Stephen was the same
officer that had served as a colonel under Washington in the French
war, as second in command of the Virginia troops, and had charge of
Fort Cumberland.

The harassed army reached Trenton on the 2d of December. Washington
immediately proceeded to remove his baggage and stores across the
Delaware. In his letters from this place to the President of Congress,
he gives his reasons for his continued retreat: "Nothing but necessity
obliged me to retire before the enemy, and leave so much of the
Jerseys unprotected. Sorry am I to observe that the frequent calls
upon the militia of this State, the want of exertion in the principal
gentlemen of the country, and a fatal supineness and insensibility of
danger, till it is too late to prevent an evil that was not only
foreseen but foretold, have been the causes of our late disgraces."

In excuse for the people of New Jersey, it may be observed that they
inhabited an open, agricultural country, where the sound of war had
never been heard. Many of them looked upon the Revolution as
rebelli