A History of the city of Newark, New Jersey : embracing practically two and a half centuries, 1666-1913, Volume I, Part 27

Author: Urquhart, Frank J. (Frank John), 1865- 4n; Lewis Historical Publishing Company. 4n
Publication date: 1913
Publisher: New York, N.Y. ; Chicago, Ill. : The Lewis Historical Publishing Co.
Number of Pages: 1186


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 27


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A SKIRMISH AT MARKET AND BROAD STREETS, WITH A 1913 BACKGROUND From a drawing made by Edwin S. Fancher for the Newark Sunday Call


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sion that they did, especially when we remember that throughout the whole neighborhood were many Tory sympathizers who, while maintaining an outward attitude of inoffensive neutrality, in order to protect their property from confiscation, were constantly fur- nishing information to the enemy.


On more than one of these forays the British sought to capture Dominie Macwhorter of the First Presbyterian church, whose house, when he was at home during those long seven years of war, was guarded to prevent his being surprised. The British would have been more jubilant had they landed him safely in prison than over the taking of a battalion of the Continental line.


With each succeeding descent upon this region the enemy showed more ferocity and at the same time increasing caution. They were continually feeling their way towards the interior, seek- . ing for the best means to get to Morristown and seize the powder works and the stores which Washington had accumulated there.


CONNECTICUT FARMS, JUNE 7, 1780.


Their most ambitious attempt was made in June, 1780, when two dashes were made from Elizabethtown as a base, in the direc- tion of Short Hills, on the seventh and the twenty-third. We know these engagements today as Connecticut Farms " and the last battle of Springfield. Although little more than skirmishes, when one considers the actual numbers engaged and the total of casualties, they were of far-reaching importance, since they served to rouse the Jersey fighting spirit to the highest point reached during the entire war, and gave a new impulse and fresh encouragement to the army as a whole.


KNYPHAUSEN'S BLUNDERS.


General Knyphausen, the Hessian officer left in command of the British forces in New York, when General Clinton moved south early in 1780, planned this expedition, and from all accounts he was


5 In Union County, known as the town of Union. Four miles north- west of Elizabeth. The place was settled about 1687, chiefly by English from Connecticut.


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led into it by the Tories, who assured him that the people through. out all this region were weary of the war and only awaiting his coming to flock to his standards. He appears to have been con- vinced that the Jersey militia, at least, would throw down their arms at his approach and that large numbers of the soldiers in the line regiments (who, to tell the truth, were now mutinous because they had not been paid for many months and were forced to see recruits coming to the colors with far greater inducements extended to them than had been offered the veterans at the time of their enlistment) would likewise become disaffected. But Knyphausen was fearfully mistaken.


He showed even greater inability to comprehend the attitude and temper of the people than the British officers. Added to this he permitted fiendish outrages on the part of his troops at the first engagement, at Connecticut Farms, rousing the militia in particular to the frenzy of desperation. The crowning act of brutality was the barbarous murder of the wife of the "fighting parson," the Rev. James Caldwell." The militia had flocked from every direction upon the arrival of the enemy at Elizabethtown, and had stubbornly opposed the advance to Connecticut Farms. The inhuman killing of Mrs. Caldwell left them wild for revenge, and at Springfield they fought as they had never fought before, winning glowing words of praise from Washington himself and from Major General Greene, who was in command of all the forces in and near Springfield.


THE MURDER OF MRS. CALDWELL AND ITS EFFECT UPON THE PEOPLE.


This account of the Connecticut Farms affair, graphically yet tersely given in the New Jersey Journal a few days afterward, needs little amplification :


"Chatham, June 14-Last night sennight, between 11 and 12 o'clock, a body of the enemy commanded by General Knyphausen in person landed at Elizabeth Town Point, who being timely discov-


" Mr. Caldwell was pastor of the First Presbyterian Church at Eliza- bethtown which was burned by the British in January of the same your. He had removed his family to Connectleut Farms when Knyphausen landed at Elizabethtown Point.


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ered by our guards, gave the troops that were in town, commanded by Colonel Dayton, an opportunity to assemble; but, on recon- noitering them, our force was found inadequate for an attack, of course a retreat became indispensable, which was performed in good order, with the enemy in their rear, until they arrived at Connecticut Farms, where they fell in with the Jersey Brigade (Maxwell's], and being joined by a few militia, they posted them- selves on an advantageous piece of ground, thinking it advisable to check the advance of the enemy, which, with singular bravery, they effectually did, and annoyed them considerably, driving them back some distance.


"They [the enemy] brought up some field pieces, which played briskly but happily without any effect. Our people kept them there two hours, until they were reinforced by the second division, which had landed some time after the first, and had marched up hastily.


"The enemy then gained that ground, though not without considerable loss on their side, and some wounded on ours. Their advance after that was very tardy, yet they seemed to show an inclination to possess themselves of Springfield until we gave them a few shot from a piece of cannon, not without some effect, which obliged them again to retreat, and the day was spent in continual skirmishing by which the enemy suffered amazingly, we having, since their retreat, found forty or fifty of their dead, which they had secretly buried. * * "


The Journal now describes the high-handed and altogether heartless procedure of the Hessians and such British as were with them. This vivid account was the last touch needed to rouse all upper New Jersey to a state bordering upon frenzy. It is as follows:


"As soon as they came to Connecticut Farms, seven miles from the place of their landing, they began the exercise of their awful cruelty. They first set fire to the house of Deacon Wade, and then to the Presbyterian Church ; but soon advancing to the house of the Rev. Mr. Caldwell, they had opportunity of reaching the summit of that cruelty after which they have been climbing for so many years. Mr. Caldwell could not remove all his property, nor all his family. His amiable wife with a babe of eight months, and one of three years old, with the housekeeper and a little maid, were left.


"Mrs. Caldwell having dressed and put her house in order, retired with those into a back room which was so situated that she was entirely secured against transient shot from either party, should they dispute that ground, which happened not to be the case.


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The babe was in the arms of the housekeeper, the other child the mother held by the hand, all sitting upon the side of the bed, when one of the barbarians advancing around the house, took advantage of a small space through which the room was accessable, and fired two balls into that amiable lady, so well directed that they ended her life in a moment.


"This horrid deed appears the more cruel in the eyes of all who knew the lovely person, the sweet temper and the not only inoffensive but benevolent life of that dear mother of nine children now living, the oldest of which is but just turned sixteen.


"From some circumstances this appears not to have been the act of one rash, inconsiderate villain, but the effect of deliberate orders given previous to their coming to the place, that she should be murdered. She was stripped of part of her clothes, but her corpse was preserved from the flames by two or three of the enemy whose humanity was not yet extinct. This was a murder without provocation, and most opposite to humanity ; for although her hus- band has uniformly defended the American cause, yet he has not only avoided cruelty himself, but used his utmost endeavors to prevent it being done by others; and as to herself, one would have thought her sweet appearance, and amiable life, would have pro- tected her from even British or Tory cruelty. Not satiated by this horrid deed, after stripping the house, they set fire to it and eleven more dwelling houses in the neighborhood, with the outhouses, etc.


"Thus has British cruelty been led to perfection by the hireling of Hesse. Six widows are burnt out; some very aged and others with small families; and almost all the houses in the neighborhood which were not burnt, were torn to pieces and entirely plundered.


"Consider Americans! what you have to expect from such enemies, and what you have to do. If the tribes of Israel rose as one man to revenge the cruelty offered an individual, of no good character, (Judges XIX) what ought to be our conduct when the fairest innocence is no protection; when the condition of widow- hood attended with age, or of a large offspring, is no defence.


"The militia on this occasion turned out more expeditiously and fought more bravely than ever known before. In the night the enemy retired to Elizabeth Town Point, where they were followed by the militia and a detachment from the army, who bravely attacked their advanced parties, and took about twenty prisoners on this occasion.


"From what we can collect from the inhabitants of the Farms, many of whose houses were filled with the wounded, they must have suffered considerably.


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"Their brutality to some women in the Farms would have made even savages blush ; and we are informed, from undoubted author- ity, that the same line of conduct has been pursued in Elizabeth Town toward some of their first characters.


"The loss sustained the first day, by the Jersey brigade, was 1 Ensign and six rank and file killed; 4 subalterns and 30 rank and file wounded, and 12 missing. * * We have taken about fifty prisoners, and several deserters have come in."


AFTER THE BATTLE; STATEMENT OF A CONTINENTAL OFFICER.


The following extract from a letter written by a Continental officer of high rank from the camp at Springfield and dated June 13, published in the New Jersey Gazette, gives one a close personal touch with the affairs of the moment, so valuable in historical records :


"The British troops are now on the Point, below Elizabeth- town; their flanks are secured by the water, which at present makes them unattackable. They advanced on their landing to Connecticut Farms, burning and pillaging; but on the appearance of our army, retreated under cover of a heavy shower of rain before midnight, and took their present position.


"The distress occasioned by their devastations is too shocking to reflect on; an American who could have beheld the scenes and not swore vengeance against these savage enemies ought to have a mark set on him as a curse to the human race.


"We proceeded, and came where they had burnt Mr. Caldwell's house after shooting his wife thro' a window as she was sitting on her bed, with a brace of balls; one entered her left breast, and the other her waist. I saw her corpse, and was informed by the neighbors it was with infinite pains they obtained leave to bring her body from the house before they set fire to it.7


MILITIA FLOCK TO THE COLORS.


"I never saw soldiers pant for revenge more than ours do- not a deserter from us since we came to the ground, but all anxious for the happy hour when they shall receive orders to engage an enemy who has with coward violence only desolated the weak and unprotected.


"The militia universally flock in from all parts, and behave to admiration."


" Probably correct.


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Another interesting letter written on June 15, from the Ameri- can camp, contains this: "They [the British] are very angry at being deceived by the Tories, who assured them the militia would not fight, but join them." Still another writer said: "The militia behaved to a charm."


A BRITISH EXPLANATION.


The widespread outcry at the murder of Mrs. Caldwell caused the British in New York to attempt to escape the responsibility for it. A statement, signed "A British Officer," was published in Rivington's Royal Gazette, in which it was asserted that the par- son's wife had been killed by a bullet from a "rebel's" gun, fired at random, as the Americans were retreating before the British. This was proven, it was contended, by the fact that the bullet entered the house from the west and not the east side. As a matter of fact, the house was put to the torch before anyone had time to examine the walls to locate the bullet hole, and subsequent examination of eye-witnesses made it certain that the murder was an outrage com- mitted by one of the enemy. Parson Caldwell himself issued a public statement placing the blame upon the British in such clear and convincing words that it was never thereafter questioned.8


AMERICANS GREATLY OUTNUMBERED.


Knyphausen had landed at Elizabethtown Point with about five thousand men. On his retreat after the affair at Connecticut Farms he seems to have called for reinforcements, and when he started on his second expedition to Springfield his force was considerably


" In 1905 there was unveiled in front of the parsonage of the Presby- terian church at Union, a monument provided by the State, the inscription on which reads as follows: "Near this spot stood the parsonage in which Hannah Caldwell, wife of the Rev. James C. Caldwell, was killed by a British soldier, June 7, 1780." At the same time there was unveiled a tablet let into the front wall of the church at Union, with this legend: "Connecti- cut Farms. Here stood the Presbyterian church and here was fought the battle, June 7, 1780, between American forces under General Maxwell and *


Colonel Dayton and the British army on its advance to Springfield. * The British advance here formed Into two columns and moved to Springfield where they were repulsed." This tablet was also supplied by the State.


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augmented and included besides the infantry a strong body of cavalry and between ten and twenty cannon. The actual American force in New Jersey was about 3,000 effective Continental troops. The militia assembled at and near Springfield after the fighting at Connecticut Farms may have numbered as many more and this total was increased as the country became inflamed over the out- rages at the Farms. General Clinton had now returned from the south and the British by this time had, at Elizabethtown and in New York, fully 12,000 men.


THE LAST BATTLE OF SPRINGFIELD.


General Clinton ordered a demonstration made on the Hudson in order to draw Washington away from Morristown and to leave the field comparatively free for Knyphausen's operations, and Washington immediately left headquarters, moving toward the Hudson, leaving Major General Greene to watch Knyphausen with about a thousand Continental troops and the militia. When Knyp- ยท hausen left Elizabethtown early on the morning of June 23, Greene had made his dispositions to check him. The American commander saw to it that the Jersey militia bore most of the first shock of the attack, probably on the theory that the citizen soldiers, knowing that they were fighting for their own soil and homes, and still enraged at the cruelties and wanton destruction practised by the enemy on June 7, would prove particularly effective. He was not mistaken. 1


The main body of the enemy took the old King's highway through Connecticut Farms, the same upon which it had advanced in the previous encounter. This is the old Morris County Turnpike, although not over entirely the same ground as that which it occu- pies today, the old road being in some instances fully a mile further south than the present thoroughfare. Knyphausen went with this column. A second body, under General Matthews, took the old Vauxhall road, to the right. This road, like the turnpike, is today preserved only in part. It left the turnpike near Connecticut Farms


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and ran in winding fashion to a point southwest of Irvington and Hilton, whence it turned quite sharply to the left, toward Spring- field.


Washington was quickly informed of what the British had on foot, and detached a brigade of Continentals from his command with instructions to move so as to strike Matthews' column on its right flank. Washington himself prepared to reinforce Greene by way of Short Hills, should that officer need his help. But in the meantime Major Lee had gone from Springfield to the left, to meet the British right column coming up the Vauxhall road, while Col- onel Dayton and his regiment, composed very largely of Newark and Essex County men, had marched down the main road (Morris County turnpike) to hold back Knyphausen and the British left.


In the extreme advance was Colonel Angell and his regiment of. Rhode Island men, among the best fighters in the entire Continental Army, and who suffered greater losses that day, according to one account, than all the rest of the army put together. With the American artillery and Angell's two hundred men facing them, the British left met its first check, at the bridge over the Rahway river. In the rear of this bridge Colonel Shreve and his regiment of the New Jersey Continental line (which, as we have already seen, passed one winter in Newark), guarded a second bridge.


Lee managed to reach a stream crossing the Vauxhall road where he could post his men to advantage ready to meet the British right, and soon after as the advancing force struck Lee, Knyp- hausen's van brought down the initial fire of the American guns at the first bridge on the main road. Colonel Angell held to his posi- tion with splendid stubbornness, despite the fact that the force in front outnumbered him many times over. He used his advantage of location to the utmost extremity, and after a full half hour, see- ing that Knyphausen was moving to turn his left and surround him, the sturdy Rhode Islander withdrew, slowly and with com- posure, bringing away his wounded. Colonel Shreve and his com- mand held their position until Angell had retired to Springfield and then followed. Lee held to his bridge on the Vauxhall road, the


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American left, until in danger of being surrounded, when he, too, retired to Springfield. The entire American force was then with- drawn to the higher ground beyond the town of Springfield toward the Short Hills, and the British reduced the church and most of the houses to ashes.


STEADINESS OF THE JERSEY MILITIA.


The whole defense, from the bridge over the Rahway on the main road and that on the Vauxhall road, had been conducted with remarkable stubbornness, the militia moving with not the slightest semblance of the panicky uncertainty so depressingly familiar to Washington in some previous battles. The Americans simply fell slowly back before greater numbers, taking advantage of every favorable spot in the ground to send death into their enemies, giving General Greene plenty of time to withdraw his guns and to make a new disposition of his troops on the higher ground toward Short Hills, whither every man, from the commander down, hoped and prayed Knyphausen would follow them. Because of the spirit of the patriots, the British did not actually obtain control of the town of Springfield until late in the afternoon. Then, maddened at what were virtually reverses, since he was still, to all intents and purposes as far off from the "rebel" stronghold at Morris- town as ever, the enemy vented his rage upon the few weak women and feeble old folk in the town and left it in flames.


THE BLOODY RETURN TO ELIZABETHTOWN. -


"They possessed themselves of Springfield," said the New Jer- sey Journal in its issue of July 5, 1780, less than two weeks after the battle, "our army retreating to the Short Hills, where it was determined to give them the second addition, but from the specimen they had of our prowess at Springfield, old Knyp showed no inclina- tion of advancing further, but savage-like, contented himself with burning that beautiful village; and under cover of the flames and smoke, endeavored to steal a retreat; but our people were so vigilant that they could not effect it unnoticed, when we pushed their rear hard and killed a number of them, some of which they carried off on their field pieces, which were well loaded with dead carcasses when they arrived at [Elizabeth] town.


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"Had Mr. Knyphausen's temerity prompted him to advance to the Short Hills, we query if he would ever have led on another division of German boors to accomplish his satanic designs again.


"The inhabitants of Elizabethtown inform us that they counted eighteen wagon loads of dead and wounded, many of the former laid in the bottom and the latter upon them.


"Our loss on this occasion was trifling, considering the heavy fire we sustained from their musquetry and artillery. Colonel Angell's regiment of Rhode Islanders suffered near as much as the whole army besides." 9


THE LAST BATTLE IN NEW JERSEY.


The American loss was given as 13 killed, 62 wounded and 9 missing. The British loss was never definitely known. Knyp- hausen arrived at Elizabethtown Point about midnight on the 24th. He retired to Staten Island immediately and his forces were off New Jersey soil shortly after daybreak on the 25th.


The British never again appeared in any force in this State. Springfield put a period to their melancholy work here. They realized that they would need a far larger army to take Morristown than they could assemble. Their withdrawal was also in part due to the rumors that a large fleet of the French allies was coming up the coast and the British commanders wished to concentrate in New York to meet an attack there or at Newport.


In the same issue of the New Jersey Journal in which the account of the conclusion of the battle of Springfield, already quoted from was given, appeared the following:


" The writer of these artleles was probably the editor and owner of the Journal, Shepard Kolloek. He enlisted In the artillery from Elizabethtown, in 1776, as first lieutenant, with Alexander Hamilton as his captain. in 1779 he was permitted to resign his commission on condition that he set up a newspaper in East Jersey to counteract the influence of pro-British papers in New York City. He started this paper, in February, 1779, at Chatham, now Morris County, and very materially aided the patriot cause. He sus- pended publication for a week at the time of Knyphausen's incursion, announcing in his paper afterward that this had been necessary in order to move his printing shop further into the hills. It is more than probable that he was in the thick of the fighting. After the war he moved his paper to New York and published it under a different name. Subsequently he revived the Journal and published it at Elizabeth.


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WASHINGTON COMMENDS THE JERSEY MILITIA.


"Extract from General Orders, Springfield, June 22, 1780 .- The Commander in Chief cannot leave this post without expressing the highest sense he entertains of the conduct and bravery of the officers and men of Maxwell's Brigade [New Jersey Continental Line], in annoying the enemy in their incursions of the 7th instant. Colonel Dayton merits particular thanks. He also with pleasure embraces the opportunity of testifying that the behaviour of the militia has been such as to do them signal honor and to entitle them to the warmest approbation. There never since the com- mencement of the contest appeared a more general ardour than animated all ranks on this occasion."


The above was issued by Washington as he was about to move toward the Hudson to investigate the British movement up that river. After the affair at Springfield Washington wrote of the New Jersey militia in a report to Congress: "They flew to arms uni- versally and acted with a spirit equal to anything I have seen during the war."


Thus did the citizen soldiers of Newark, Essex and all the region of upper Jersey atone for their failures of 1776, when Washington used the highly uncomfortable adjective "infamous" in describing their conduct.


We may well believe that it was a time of intense excitement and strain for the people of Newark. Nearly every able-bodied man with real red blood in his veins must have shouldered his musket and made his way to Connecticut Farms and Springfield. The sounds of battle were clearly heard in Newark on those warm June days. All Newark knew that if the enemy had its way with the determined little force opposing it they might look for scenes of wantonness and bloodshed far surpassing anything to which they had been subjected so far during the war. Springfield was then reckoned as partly in the township of Newark and partly in Eliza- beth. Essex County then extended to and included Chatham to the west, Plainfield and Rahway to the south; the Arthur Kull, Newark Bay and the Passaic on the east, and extended a little beyond Paterson on the north. These boundaries had been laid down in 1710 by an act of the Assembly.




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