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Archaeological dig planned for Glouco site of 1777 battle
Edward Colimore, Inquirer Staff Writer
Posted: Monday, March 30, 2015, 1:07 AM
The Hessians were out for blood that autumn day in 1777. They marched 10 miles from Haddonfield to Red Bank, hoping to surprise the American defenders of Fort Mercer on the Delaware River.
Instead, they fell into a trap.
Many of Britain's German allies passed over the abandoned earthen walls topped with pointed logs, and then cheered, thinking they'd breached the fort and were close to victory.
On the other side, though, was another wall - and a deadly hail of artillery and musket fire that cut through their ranks like a scythe.
Soon, the ground was blue with the uniforms of 400 dead and dying Hessians - fully a third of the assaulting German force.
Their remains were interred the next day outside the fort, at what is now the Red Bank Battlefield Park in National Park, Gloucester County.
In June, the mass burial sites and surrounding battleground will become an archaeological dig expected to give up numerous artifacts and clues about what happened 238 years ago. Research, including the translation of German and French accounts, is already shedding new light.
The effort - funded with a $46,200 grant from the National Park Service - will be detailed in a free public program at 7 p.m. April 9 in Room 500 of the Health and Sciences Building at Rowan College at Gloucester County in Sewell.
Among the relics likely to be recovered? Belt and shoe buckles, parts of weapons, musket balls, metal badges, shrapnel, cannonballs, and canister - metal balls fired from artillery like a giant shotgun. Their distribution may show where the fight was hottest.
What happened at Red Bank is a great story, said Jennifer Janofsky, curator of the Red Bank Battlefield Park and Whitall House and also the Giordano Fellow in Public History at Rowan University. "I think it's just as compelling a story as Valley Forge.
Read more at Archaeological dig planned for Glouco site of 1777 battle
Edward Colimore, Inquirer Staff Writer
Posted: Monday, March 30, 2015, 1:07 AM
The Hessians were out for blood that autumn day in 1777. They marched 10 miles from Haddonfield to Red Bank, hoping to surprise the American defenders of Fort Mercer on the Delaware River.
Instead, they fell into a trap.
Many of Britain's German allies passed over the abandoned earthen walls topped with pointed logs, and then cheered, thinking they'd breached the fort and were close to victory.
On the other side, though, was another wall - and a deadly hail of artillery and musket fire that cut through their ranks like a scythe.
Soon, the ground was blue with the uniforms of 400 dead and dying Hessians - fully a third of the assaulting German force.
Their remains were interred the next day outside the fort, at what is now the Red Bank Battlefield Park in National Park, Gloucester County.
In June, the mass burial sites and surrounding battleground will become an archaeological dig expected to give up numerous artifacts and clues about what happened 238 years ago. Research, including the translation of German and French accounts, is already shedding new light.
The effort - funded with a $46,200 grant from the National Park Service - will be detailed in a free public program at 7 p.m. April 9 in Room 500 of the Health and Sciences Building at Rowan College at Gloucester County in Sewell.
Among the relics likely to be recovered? Belt and shoe buckles, parts of weapons, musket balls, metal badges, shrapnel, cannonballs, and canister - metal balls fired from artillery like a giant shotgun. Their distribution may show where the fight was hottest.
What happened at Red Bank is a great story, said Jennifer Janofsky, curator of the Red Bank Battlefield Park and Whitall House and also the Giordano Fellow in Public History at Rowan University. "I think it's just as compelling a story as Valley Forge.
Read more at Archaeological dig planned for Glouco site of 1777 battle
