USA > New Jersey > Essex County > Newark > A History of the city of Newark, New Jersey : embracing practically two and a half centuries, 1666-1913, Volume I > Part 26
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. They went Directly up to Second River, & on Saturday morning towards wadsesson [in their attempt to turn the militia's left] our People atackted there, Where they had a Smart Senrmage. Some of our People got wounded there; but I do not learn that any was killed, there was Several Killed of the regulars, but the Number is yet unascertained."
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CHAPTER XV.
WAR-WORN NEWARK, 1778-1780.
CHAPTER XV.
WAR-WORN NEWARK, 1778-1780.
T HE winter of 1777-1778 was that which the Continental army spent in terrible privation and hardship at Valley Forge, followed by the evacuation of Philadelphia by the British in the middle of June, 1778, and the pursuit of the enemy by Washington across New Jersey to Monmouth, where the famous battle of that name was fought on June 27 and 28. Had it not been for the treason of Major General Charles Lee, the same who had designedly kept Washington in uncertainty as to his move- ments while the Continental Army was in Newark in November, 1776, the British would have been severely beaten. As it was, they left the field during the night of the 28th and managed to make their way to transports and thence to New York, in safety.
During the late summer and fall of 1778 Washington and a large part of his army were posted along the Hudson guarding that "Mississippi of the Revolution," while the French fleet and the New England militia with a comparatively small force of the line were busy at and near Newport. Washington's winter camp for 1778- 1779 was at Middlebrook (now Bound Brook), with small detach- ments at Elizabethtown and Newark, Ramapo, West Point and Fishkill.
THE SECOND JERSEY CONTINENTAL LINE REGIMENT'S WINTER IN NEWARK.
Here in Newark was stationed, from the fall of 1778 to the middle of May, 1779, Colonel Israel Shreve's Second regiment, New Jersey Continental line. When the regiment was about to break camp, "a number of the inhabitants of the town," says a newspaper account of the time, "gave an elegant entertainment to the officers of the regiment, and appointed Dr. William Burnet, jun., one of the surgeons in charge of the Newark soldiers' hospital, to present to
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the Colonel the following address in testimony of their apprecia- tion and esteem: 'Deeply impressed with a grateful sense of the obligation the inhabitants of this town are under unto you, Sir. and the other officers of the 2d New-Jersey regiment, permit me in the name, and by order of a committee appointed for that pur- pose, to assure you that we shall always retain the warmest senti- ments of gratitude and respect for the great attention you have paid to the welfare, peace and safety of the town during your command here.
"'The great regularity and good order that has been main- tained among the troops, their respectful treatment of the inhabit. ants and the constant harmony that has subsisted between them and the soldiery, we are sensible, has been greatly owing to the prudence, diligence and care of their officers.
"'As your vigilant conduct here must have gained the appro- bation of the Honorable Congress, and his Excellency the Com- mander in Chief, we doubt not, if it was consistent with the more general public good, but you would be continued longer on this station, which would give great pleasure and be no small security unto us.
"'Since it is otherwise, we silently submit, and are happy in this opportunity of expressing the great satisfaction we have had in your behavior among us; and wherever divine Providence may call you, we most ardently wish you may be useful and happy, and gloriously instrumental in the salvation of your country.' "
PATRIOTIC TOASTS IN 1779.
A high tribute, indeed. Few communities upon which soldiers have been quartered for months see them depart with such feel- ings. Colonel Shreve responded gracefully. Then the company sat down to dinner in one of the Newark taverns. "After dinner," continues the newspaper account, "the following toasts were drank, and the day was spent with agreeable festivity and mutual satisfaction and joy :
1. The United States of America. 2. The Congress. 3. His Excellency Washington. 4. The Army and Navy. 5. The King and Queen of France and all our foreign Allies. 6. Doctor Frank- lin and our Ambassadors at Foreign Courts. 7. The Governor and
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State of New Jersey. 8. The memory of all those worthies who have gloriously fought and bled in defence of their country. 9. The glorious minority of the British parliament. 10. The friends of freedom throughout the world. 11. May the glorious example of the first asserters and defenders of American freedom be always hallowed by their posterity. 12. A speedy, honourable and lasting peace. 13. May the American fair never give their hearts or hands to any but those who have virtue and courage to defend them.
And all this with peace over four years away! It serves to show, however, that the popular hope for ultimate victory was now waxing stronger, although Newark was still to feel the heavy hand of war, many times over, and the mettle of her sons was to be put to the test again and again.
It was probably the officers of this regiment who celebrated St. Tammany's day, May day, 1779, as told by the New Jersey Journal: "Saturday last being the anniversary of St. Tammany, the titular saint of America, the same was celebrated at Newark by a number of the gentlemen of the army." These celebrations were good-natured May day rollickings under the name of an old Indian chief, Tamemund, with no political significance and origi- nated before the war. New York's Tammany grew out of them, but not until after the War for Independence.
DID GENERAL WAYNE CAMP IN NEWARK?
There seems to be no way of ascertaining the location of Colonel Shreve's camp. No known records give any hint of its location. It is a striking coincidence, however, that Newark has cherished for generations a tradition that General Wayne, "Mad Anthony," was in camp in what is now the Woodside section of Newark in the winter of 1778-1779. Until a few years ago there stood between Summer and Mt. Prospect avenues a modest little stone building known throughout the neighborhood as the place where General Wayne stopped. This structure was a few hundred yards north of what is now Ellwood avenue. It is hard to under-
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stand how the newspapers of the day should, on several occasions during that same period, note that a regiment of the New Jersey line was located in Newark and overlook the fact that Wayne, with a much larger force, was near at hand-if it were so. The Con- tinental newspapers might naturally suppress the fact, in order not to give information that would be of value to the enemy. But pro-British prints in New York told of the presence of Shreve and his men and make no mention of Wayne. It is quite within the realm of possibility, then, that the Wayne camp was really the camp of Colonel Shreve's command, as in this place it would be quite near enough to the village of Newark to furnish succor, and at the same time be much freer from surprise by the enemy than if quartered in the centre of the village. Moreover, it would have been better for the morale of Shreve's regiment and for the well- being of the village to have the troops on the outskirts.
' The camp, whether that of Colonel Shreve or of General Wayne, has been defined as extending north from about Ellwood avenue along the ridge now paralleled by Mt. Prospect, Clifton avenue and Ridge street, to Second River. Traces of the encamp- ment were reported to have been discovered some thirty or more years ago, along the ridge, and also near Second River, in the neighborhood of the present branch of the Erie Railroad. But these last mentioned traces might well enough have been vestiges of the two days' struggle at that point already described in the last chapter. The soldiers, whoever they were, cut down much of the wood on the surrounding land and later the State reimbursed the owner, Minard Coeyman. There is a tradition in Woodside to this day, that at roll call the soldiers would emerge from their huts, throw down their caps in the deep snow and stand on them in their bare feet.
One tradition has it that Wayne moved his men out of this camp and on up the old Bloomfield road and thence to Morristown by way of Bloomfield, Montclair, Caldwell and Whippany, because
1 See Newark Daily Advertiser, December 12, 1884. Also, "Woodside," by C. G. Hine, pp. 79-83.
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of rumors that the British were approaching in force. It is also recounted that the march was made in the deep snow, in February, 1779, and that the soldiers left the marks of their bloodstained feet in the snow. The old Bloomfield road ran into what is now Mt. Prospect avenue at Abingdon avenue, and into what is now Belle- ville avenue by way of Second avenue.
During the winter of 1778-1779 Washington remained upon the south bank of the Hudson, at West Point.
"LIGHT HORSE HARRY" LEE'S DESCENT UPON PAULUS HOOK.
There were but two military events in the northern section of the country in 1779, Anthony Wayne's capture of Stony Point on July 17 and the descent upon Paulus Hook (now Jersey City), by "Light Horse Harry" Lee. This last achievement was received with great joy by the patriots of Newark and of all Essex. Young Lee descended upon the fortifications at Paulus Hook, the place then being nothing more than a garrison fort, captured 158 men and left in a hurry before the enemy in New York could send rein- forcements.
CAPTURE OF TORY RECRUITS AT SECOND RIVER.
The only warlike episode in the Newark neighborhood during the year, after the departure of Colonel Shreve and his men, was the sudden dash, in June, of a party of patriots upon a man named Lawrence at Second River (Belleville) while he was enlisting men for the British service. At the moment of his capture Lawrence's wife threw the enlistment papers into the fire, and the patriots became so intent upon saving them that the prisoner escaped. On the strength of the information gathered from the half-burned muster roll, however, thirteen men of the neighborhood were arrested and sent off to Morristown to jail.
It is pleasant to know that even in these troublous times New- ark was blessed with at least one "general store," as the following advertisement in the New Jersey Journal for July 3, 1779, makes plain :
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A NEWARK STORE OF 1779.
"BEACH and HEWS have for sale in Newark, for cash or country produce, the following articles, viz .:
"Black cloth, mohair of different colours, mohair and basket buttons, regimental ditto, sewing silk, fine thread by pound or less, ribbands, pins by the packet or paper, apron and cap tape, chintz and callicoes, white figured mode, stripe and figured gauze hand- kerchiefs, black ditto, long lawns, skeleton wire, blue stamp linen handkerchiefs by the dozen or single, cotton romals, sewing needles, horn combs by the dozen or less, smiths' and carpenter files, sleeve buttons, women's black gloves, writing paper, Dilworth's spelling books, New England primers, thimbles by the dozen, silver brooches, platteen and plated shoe buckles by the dozen, white metal shoe, knee and stock ditto by the dozen, double flint glass tumblers, bonnet papers, bohea tea, sugar, indigo, snuff by the bladder, tobacco, copperas, pepper, brimstone, ginger, Philadelphia made earthen ware, rock and shore salt, cyder spirits by the barrell or gallon. Also sundry articles too tedious to mention."
Thus we get a most instructive and at the same time enter- taining glimpse of the actual life in Newark of the time, through the commodities most in demand. It is impossible to this day to . definitely locate the store. A few years after the war David Beach had a coach manufactory in Broad street, on the east side, a little above Market street. It is possible that this store may have been conducted there.
In December, 1779, Washington withdrew his headquarters from the Hudson and made his encampment at Morristown for the last time during the war. One division remained along the Hudson to protect West Point and points lower down. It was Washington's original intention to make his camp at Scotch Plains, but he finally decided that Morristown possessed more advantages. From this point small parties were continually being sent out to aid in pro- tecting the country in the neighborhood of the North River and Newark, Elizabeth and other sections comparatively close to Staten Island where a large body of the British were encamped. Through- out this winter, 1779-1780, the west bank of the Passaic in Newark and to Second River and above was patrolled by the Continental pickets.
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"We hear," remarked the New Jersey Gazette, on February 8, 1780, "that on Wednesday last 3 brigades of our army were detached from Morristown to Newark and Elizabethtown in order to cover those parts of the country from the depredations of the enemy."
BURNING OF NEWARK ACADEMY AND THE MARTYRDOM OF JOSEPH HEDDEN.
But these precautions were not taken until serious damage had been done by the enemy both in Newark and Elizabethtown. It was a winter remarkable in the annals for its severity. The Hud- son was frozen over between New York and what is now Jersey City to considerable depth; the British moved their troops over it with ease, as was, of course, the case with the Passaic." On the night of January 25, 1780, a regiment descended suddenly upon Newark, proceeding from New York to Paulus Hook on the ice, marching over Bergen Hill, across the Hackensack and thence to the Passaic. One of the most significant features of the enterprise was that, although the British marched miles on a bitter cold night to get here, they are said to have remained less than twenty min- utes. They focused their attack upon the town Academy, a sub- stantial two-story brown-stone structure at the southern end of Washington Park, about opposite the head of Halsey street. The Academy was built in 1774 and was the pride of the community. It was very useful during the early years of the war as a hospital for American soldiers, was used for school purposes during the quiet periods, and at the time of the British assault upon it on that crisp night in January, 1780, was a barracks for a small out- post of Washington's army.
The Continentals were too few to make a successful resist- ance, although they appear to have made as spirited a defence as
2 Rivington's Gazette, early in February, 1780, told of the seizure by a party of Tories of "three handsome sleighs with 10 good horses, all of which were yesterday driven to New York from Staten Island over the ice, an enter- prise never yet attempted since the first settlement of the country."
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was possible under the circumstances, since the British reported seven or eight of them killed. The enemy burned the Academy and took a number of prisoners.
One of the most active and fearless patriots in Newark, in fact, in all the region, was Joseph Hedden, junior, who was at that time confined by illness in his home on the east side of Broad street, about midway between Lombardy and Bridge streets. He had been a tireless worker for the cause of liberty and as one of the three Newark men constituting the local Committee of Safety organized in 1775, had been largely instrumental in enforcing the laws of the new State with regard to the confiscation of Tories' estates. It was probably one of these who informed the leaders of the Brit- ish attacking party as to Hedden's whereabouts, for, while the Academy was burning, a detachment was sent across Broad street to his home to get him.
In response to loud knockings on the door, clearly heard above the din by some of his neighbors in their homes near by, Hedden's wife opened the door, robed only in her nightdress. She strove to prevent her husband's removal without proper clothing and in the seuffle received two slight bayonet wounds. Hedden was roughly hauled from his bed and with very little more than his nightclothes upon him and with no shoes on his feet, forced, with a few others of his fellow-citizens, to march with the soldiers all the way to Paulus Hook, being transported from there to New York, where he was thrown into the sugar house prison. Late the next summer his relatives procured his release and he was brought home to Newark, where he soon after died, a martyr to the cause for which he had given the best that was in him with absolute fearlessness and efficiency. Hedden's death was directly due to exposure in that night of intense cold. Both his legs became mortified.
While the British were intent upon their depredations here, the sky in the direction of Elizabethtown suddenly became illumined and the redcoats in Newark, fearful lest the whole countryside was aroused and arming to attack them in great numbers, retreated with some haste. As a matter of fact, the turmoil in Elizabeth-
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town was caused by another detachment of British which had moved upon the town from Staten Island, neither expedition having any knowledge that the other was projected. The old First Pres- byterian church in Elizabethtown was burned on that night, and other damage done. The enemy had evidently selected this night of extreme cold, believing that the fighting men of the county could not be readily assembled in such weather.
Had it not been for the scare given the Newark attacking party by the demonstration in Elizabethtown, Newark would probably have suffered more severely. In leaving Newark the British are believed to have proceeded down Centre street, along what is now River street, and thence to the Plank road (Ferry road, as it was then called). Eleazer Bruen, who lived at what is now the corner of Commerce and Market street plaza, braved the wrath of the British, and running from his home, is said to have thrown a blanket over Hedden's shoulders. Hedden died in September, 1780, and was laid to rest in the Old Burying Ground. On his tombstone was carved the following inscription :
"This monument is erected to the memory of Joseph Hedden, Esq., who departed this life the 27th of September, 1780, in the 52nd year of his age.
He was a firm friend to his country In the darkest times. Zealous for American Liberty In opposition to British Tyranny, And at last fell a victim To British Cruelty."
Newark has let over one hundred and thirty years slip by without doing the memory of this patriot even the simple honors which community self-respect would seem to demand.
BRITISHI AND AMERICAN ACCOUNTS OF THE EXPEDITION.
A British account of the expedition, as published in Riving- ton's Gazette in New York, on January 29th, was in part as follows :
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"Major Lumm of the 44th Regiment marched from Powles Hook about 8 at night, having under his command the flank com- panies of that regiment, with detachments from the 42nd Anspach and Hessian corps in garrison in this city, and passing the rebel patrols on the banks of the Passaic, reached the town of Newark unperceived by the enemy, about an hour later than Col. Buskirk's arrival at Elizabethtown. Small parties were instantly posted to guard the principal avenues to the town, and Major Lumm seized possession of the Academy which the rebels had converted into a barrack. A momentary defence being attempted, seven or eight of the enemy were killed. The remainder, consisting of 34 non- commissioned officers and private men, were taken prisoners, as were likewise a rebel magistrate 3 remarkable for his persecuting spirit, and another inhabitant. The Captain who commanded in Newark escaped. The Lieut. is said to be killed."
Fortunately, there is preserved to us, in the New Jersey Jour- nal of February 2, 1780, another account, written from the Ameri- can viewpoint. That portion of it dealing with the depredations in Newark is as follows:
"The same night another party of the enemy, consisting of draughts from the different regiments stationed in New York, ยท passed over the North River, in sleighs, to Powles Hook, from thence through Bergen, the nearest way to Newark. They entered the town in three divisions, and immediately proceeded to the academy, where they surprised and took about fifteen men, being all the troops that were on duty in the town. A lieutenant, not- withstanding he was twice a prisoner with the enemy, by his vigilance, effected his escape.
"They then set fire to the academy, which they consumed; dur- ing which time a party was detached to several of the inhabitants' houses, which they rifled of the most valuable effects; that which was not portable they destroyed. They took off Justice Hedden, and Robert Neil, jun.' two of the inhabitants. The former gentle- man was taken out of his bed and without any other clothes on except his shirt, and a pair of stockings, carried off, notwithstand- ing the strongest solicitations of Mrs. Hedden, to the officers for permission for her husband to dress himself, who received two wounds with a bayonet, one in the face, the other in her breast, by those mighty veterans of his fallen Majesty. They continued in
3 Joseph Hedden.
+ One of the town's merchants before and after the war, a staunch patriot and an officer in the militia.
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the town about fifteen or eighteen minutes. A few militia being hastily collected, pursued their rear, by which five of the enemy fell into their hands. Two of them died a short time after with the intense cold.
"We are informed that Justice Hedden is so frost-bit that he will lose both his legs."
There is an old story to the effect that a young son of Joseph Hedden, terrified at the capture of his father, escaped from the house at the rear, ran down to the frozen river and made his way on the ice to a house on the Gully road, just north of what is now Mt. Pleasant Cemetery. From there he is supposed to have gone on to friends in Bloomfield. It has never been satisfactorily verified, however.
Throughout the remainder of that winter Newark was too heavily guarded by detachments from headquarters at Morristown for the British to venture near. Late in May, however, a strong party of British, in command of a major, landed on the Newark meadows at 2 o'clock in the morning. They reported that they captured thirty-four "rebels," killing four, having four of their own men wounded. They had the grace to admit that their contem- plated surprise of the town was only partially successful, which really means their movement was discovered by the patrols and that the militia were quickly mobilized and made stiff enough opposition to cause the commanding officer to decide it was not wise to go further.
Here is an American account of the same affair from the New Jersey Journal :
"Chatham, May 31 .- On Friday morning last about daybreak the Fifty-seventh regiment from Staten Island entered the town of Newark, plundered some of the inhabitants to a very consider- able amount, and carried off about twenty of them prisoners. When they retreated, a few spirited militia pushed their rear very hard and wounded a few, but we do not learn they killed or took any prisoners. The late gallant officer, Capt. Henry Knox (who com- manded the forlorn hope at Stony point fort) and another of our people, were wounded; the former it is feared will not recover, being wounded in the face and his tongue shot away."
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A SKIRMISH AT MARKET AND BROAD STREETS.
The British never came to Newark without paying for it in blood. They well knew that the people would attack them from "behind each fence and farmyard wall," from the moment they faced about and made for Bergen Hill. On one of these occasions, after a foraging expedition to the westward, a detachment of the enemy hard pressed by militia, made a brief stand at the corners of Market and Broad streets, according to an apparently well- authenticated story. The patriots blazed away at them from the houses, and the British noticed that the fire was particularly brisk from the house on the northwest corner. At last a charge was ordered and a few British dashed up to the house (which was owned and occupied by John Alling and his family), beat open the door and chased three or four young men out of the rear of the house, through the orchard at the rear, wounding one of the Allings. In the house they found an old man who is said to have been load- ing the guns for the younger men to fire. One of the soldiers was about to kill the old man, but one of his more humane comrades stopped him.
REPRISALS-AN UNDERGROUND RAILWAY.
Goaded by the frequent incursions and by the innumerable insults heaped upon them, the militia, in common with their brethren in various parts of the State adjoining the Hudson, New- ark Bay and below, organized little expeditions of reprisal on their own account. Various stories have been handed down concerning the prowess of local characters, but none of them is preserved with sufficient clearness and reliability to warrant publication here. Newark was during the greater part of the war a station on a kind of "underground railway," where. prisoners escaping from the prison ships in New York harbor and from the Sugar House prison in New York were harbored and passed on at favorable times to safer regions. One marvels at times that the people of Newark and Essex County, living, one might say, almost under the very guns of the enemy, maintained the stalwart resistence to oppres-
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