Christmas 1776... and now

Christmas Day 2020

The Declaration of Independence was signed in the warmth of a Philadelphia summer in 1776. But as 1776 came to a close, it appeared the Revolution might be doomed. George Washington and his forces had suffered a string of losses, and with each loss, there was less and less public support. After all, if the Revolution was lost and the British won, all who participated or aided in the revolt could be tried and convicted of treason against the Crown.

And so, when Washington and his depleted forces dared to cross the icy Delaware River on Christmas Night... then cunningly circled around and attacked Trenton from the north with the winds at their backs... sleepy-eyed Hessian defenders waking up on the morning after Christmas were greeted by wind-launched darts and tacks of stinging sleet in their faces and a hail of bullets from the Americans who could hardly be seen through the storm.

The stunning victory at Trenton proved to be the turnaround event that fueled the rebel fire once again. But that was far from obvious to George Washington as he and his forces recrossed the river and regrouped. The army was about to dwindle away. Enlistments were over at the stroke of midnight, New Year's Eve. Desperate, and without official authorization, Washington called on the soldiers to stay, offering them a bonus if they extended their enlistments. The soldiers did not respond at first, but then one stepped forward, then another... and then another.

They hatched a plan to attack the British once again. Meanwhile, the snow on the ground melted. The rebels crossed the Delaware again on New Year's Day. This time the British were ready, and the rebels were forced into a corner. They were stranded in muddy fields, backs to the river... with no way to escape. One bold attack by the British would wipe out the American forces and end the war. 

But George Washington was a Virginia farmer, and farmers watched the weather. He had experienced winter days with blue skies and northwest winds. He had seen the temperature hold steady during those days, then sink below freezing at night. He had a thermometer and at noon it was 39 degrees and holding. A stiff northwest had erased the 50-degree weather of the previous day. Washington ordered the troops to prepare huge bonfires before sundown and make the appearance of bustling around in the camp. 

Behind the fire glow, it became dark. We in the age of light pollution are not used to the kind of darkness that was faced every moonless night back in the 1700s. But in the darkness, Washington's troops readied their equipment, even wrapping wagon wheels in cloth to minimize the noise. The ground froze. The forces moved out, picking their way northward... away from the encamped British who were lying in wait to mount their own attack at first light. In George Washington's letter to Congress, he said they moved out at midnight. Some historians have questioned this, because if they really left that early, they would have approached Princeton earlier than they did. Recent research (Abrams and Mulvey, 2002) and others suggested it was later because night operations without moonlight required maximum torchlight, which could have tipped off the British. Checking lunar tables, we found that the lunar moonrise was at 1:23 AM. Sergeant Rodney, a soldier under General Washington, wrote in his diary that "the moon having arisen, we departed at 2 AM."

Dawn broke to the sight of rebel soldiers marching toward Princeton through fields laced with frost. The Battle of Princeton was fierce but lasted less than an hour. One casualty was General Hugh Mercer. Mercer County, New Jersey, is named for the fallen patriot. Oddly enough, injured soldiers from both sides were treated at the same place: the Clark House, located on the grounds of the Princeton Battlefield in New Jersey.

If the rebels had moved quickly to New Brunswick, New Jersey, they could have seized the British war funds, perhaps ending the war right there. But after departing Princeton, Washington noticed the ground was thawing. He could not risk having many of his troops captured by the pursuing British. George Washington and his weary forces set up camp in Morristown New Jersey, with hills to offer cover, and yet close enough to their enemy to spy on their activities.The British were defeated again and pulled back to their garrisons farther northeast in New Jersey.

News of the rebel victories spread like wildfire back in Europe weeks later (there was no CNN or Fox News to pass the word in seconds. No tweets were issued, except by wild birds in central New Jersey). Soon the French would be emboldened to declare war on Britain and help the American cause.

If George Washington had not been up on his weather knowledge and had not realized it would freeze at night as he did, his forces would have been surrounded and captured the next day. If he had not perceived the danger of an early January thaw, the hard-fought gains at Trenton would have been meaningless.

A vast and empty field marks the place where the Battle of Princeton was fought 243 years before this coming January. As I stood there in an icy wind several Decembers ago, storm clouds were increasing. There was a raw and unforgiving wind, a wind soon to be armed with sleet and freezing rain. 

Aside from the wind in the trees, it was silent in that field. Darkness was moving in. I closed my eyes for a moment, and could almost imagine the footsteps of some of our first war veterans rustling through the fallen frosted leaves so long ago. And I said a silent thank you. If they hadn't done what they did when they had to, we couldn't do what we want to in freedom... today.  

I just had Scotty out for an evening walk on this rainy Christmas Eve. The 7 p.m. service map shows an essentially NNE-SSW front across Pennsylvania with a low-pressure area centered in extreme northern West Virginia:

At 8 p.m., temperatures range from 19 in extreme western Ohio, 31 at Pittsburgh, 56 in Harrisburg, and 62 at Philadelphia. There were thunderstorms along the North Carolina coast. The next set of maps show how things should progress over the next few days.

At 1 a.m. pouring in the area from eastern Virginia to New Jersey, freezing rain and sleet in west-central Pennsylvania and eastern West Virginia, and snow that diminishes to flurries as you go from western Pennsylvania into Ohio. Warm and moist snow-eating winds made quick work of the remaining snowpack in eastern areas, deep fluffy snow became waterlogged and oozed rivulets and streamlets of water into adjacent spots as moving membranes of mist tried to hide the scene under the gray overcast, and it suddenly felt like April along the coastal plain from the Carolinas to New Jersey. The National Weather Service hazardous-forecast map shows many areas where the weather is far less frivolous:

By daybreak Christmas morning, cold air should've taken over all but extreme eastern New York and eastern Pennsylvania. It will be mild and rainy from New Jersey through most of New England. Icy, cold winds will hold temperatures in the 20s in western and central Pennsylvania and in the teens in most of Ohio.

At 1 p.m. eastern, New England will still be mild and wet, but the rest of the region is getting colder or is already very cold.

Most areas Saturday will be dry and cold, but Sunday somewhat less cold.

On Monday, a cold front will come through the Northeast, probably with some light snow or flurries from parts of Pennsylvania northeastward.

On Thursday, another cold front will come through the East with rain along it and flurries behind it.

New Year's Day looks cold and dry throughout the Northeast except where snow flurries linger downwind from the Great Lakes.

In my last report, I showed a prog showing a snowstorm around Jan. 5. The latest run of the same prog suggests snow in New England, and rain or snow farther south. Overall, the storm looks less organized than before. Remember we're talking about something two weeks away. In the meantime, I hope you and yours have a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

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