Tis the season... a brief remembrance for a Christmas long ago

My luggage has been recovered and I am slowly recovering from a nasty flue/cold that I picked up back east while home for my step-mother's funeral. Computer issues continue though I do have some hope for some sort of resolution in the not too distant future. On the upside I have been catching up on some reading.

I just finished reading David McCullough's "1776" which I found a very good chronicle of what was arguably the most fateful year in the history of our republic. It is difficult for many of us to realize just how close things were in that terrible winter. By December of 1776 the Continental Army had been soundly defeated at the battle of Brooklyn Heights (Long Island) and driven from York Island (Manhattan). At every collision between British forces and ours we were whipped so badly that it is hard to understand how we survived at all.

George Washington had only narrowly avoided encirclement and the total annihilation of his army by the thinnest of margins on no less than five occasions. As late December arrived our army had been driven across New Jersey and forced to retire to the opposite side of the Delaware River. It was outnumbered by no less than 5 to 1 by the combined forces of the British Army and the Hessian mercenaries hired by King George III. Most of the soldiers had not been paid in months. Many could not remember their last hot meal. All were poorly clothed with frightening numbers lacking even shoes. Desertions were high and moral was at rock bottom. In the days immediately before Christmas, General Lee (no relation to the later Confederate) was captured by the British.

It was clear that the army was at the end of its rope and Philadelphia was likely to be occupied at any time. Faced with the real possibility of a final crushing defeat Washington resolved upon a do or die attack. His crossing of the Delaware to attack the Hessian garrison at Trenton (then a relatively small town) on Christmas night in the teeth of a ferocious blizzard was a desperate gamble. When he arrived on the other side he could not have known that half his troops sent to cross farther down the river had been blocked by ice flows. Adding a final blow to his plan he was informed that a large contingent of what was left of his forces had wet gunpowder and their muskets would not fire.

Washington stood silent for a moment and then ordered his troops to attack with the bayonet.

And the rest as they say is history.

There are times when I am truly humbled by those who have gone before us.