In my last posting for the Englewood Report, I stated that Englewood and New Jersey are hallowed ground, worthy of "being nurtured with a high degree of financial and creative resources."  Before I present what I mean by this kind of quality stewardship, I wish to present the case for the national significance of our City, County and State.

As Americans, our American War of Independence is engraved into our psyches as the preeminent defining, transcendent event of our nation.  Abraham Lincoln certainly believed this. In November 1863, at the site of the Battle of Gettysburg, Lincoln delivered his immortal Address to a gathering of families who had lost brothers, sons and fathers, to assembled soldiers and, undoubtedly, a cadre of wealthy and powerful officials. Lincoln sought to console his listeners and to strengthen their resolve by making sense of the great loss — 50,000 casualties — that had so recently scarred our nation.

Lincoln began with words we all remember being taught in school:

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation...

Four score and seven years —87— from 1863 would bring us to 1776: the birth year of our country. Why would Lincoln, in the midst of a violent fratricidal war, begin his address by citing the nation's founding? Clearly, Lincoln believed that the sacrifices that his generation was making were in the same sanctifying spirit as those made by colonial Americans.

So, in fact, did the level of fighting that took place in Englewood and New Jersey during in our War of Independence make these places national sacred ground? And, other than the sacrifice of armed conflict, did our ancestral townsfolk and New Jerseyans sustain a heavy hardships during this war?

Historians of New Jersey often cite the term "Cockpit of the Revolution" to describe the calamitous condition our state was in at that time. New Jersey was the site of more fighting that any of the other 13 colonies.  Estimates range to over seven hundred episodes, from small skirmishes to large battles. ["Crossroads of The American Revolution", Fleming, New Jersey in the American Revolution]

A study of New Jersey's geographic place in colonial America begins to explain why the state was the epicenter of military action. With the colonies' largest city, Philadelphia, to its southwest, and its second largest city, New York, to its northeast, New Jersey inevitably was the de facto central player in these cities' defenses. New Jersey not only became a major battleground, but also a home to a large number of armed camps, both Whig and Tory.

And it was not just the amount of military activity that took place in New Jersey, but its importance to the overall history of the Revolutionary War that vouches for the state's pivotal role. Let's think back to the events of 1776. The Continental Congress, meeting in Philadelphia, had declared the country's independence. George Washington, appointed by the congress as the commander of American forces, had in some respects bluffed the British into surrendering Boston. Seeing their position as suddenly un-defendable, the British depart for Nova Scotia to regroup. These and other fortuitous events, along with inexperience on our part, lead many Americans to conclude that the British had no desire for a long and costly conflict, and that the war would be over in short order.

There was scarcely a militia man who did not think himself equal to two or three of the British.
[McCullough, 1776, 117]

Such miscalculations quite nearly brought an end to a group of revolutionaries who had just five-months earlier declared their sovereignty as a political body, and along with them, the end of an experiment in modern democratic statehood.

How this near collapse happened can be summarized so: following the British evacuation of Boston, Congress ordered the Continental Army to New York to defend the city and the crucial waterway, the Hudson. While General Washington and his staff were well aware of the difficulty of defending the city, they were also ill equipped and grossly inexperienced. The British, on the other hand, were advantaged. With their return to the colonies on June 29, the British brought a large naval force and, with it, 30,000+ troops. In rapid succession, the British occupied Staten Island, landed at Gravesend Bay, Long Island and proceeded to drive the rebels from Flatbush, Brooklyn, Bushwick, Kips Bay, Harlem Heights and White Plains. Then, Fort Washington, with 3000 American defenders, fell.

In a disastrous campaign for New York in which Washington's army had suffered one humiliating, costly reverse after another, this, the surrender of Fort Washington on Saturday, November 16, was the most devastating blow of all, an utter catastrophe.
[McCullough, 1776,  242]

With New York lost, the war's fighting shifted to New Jersey.

In this way, our nation's history shows just how much our City, County and State are worth fighting for. But, does our stewardship of these places reflect this worthiness?

Stay tuned for my next entry.

Related reading:
• Gerlach, Larry R., The Road to Revolution: New Jersey's Revolutionary Experience. Trenton: New Jersey Historical Society, 1975.
• Lefkowitz, Arthur S., The Long Retreat: The Calamitous American Defense of New Jersey, 1776. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1998.
• Lundin, Leonard. Cockpit of the Revolution: The War for Independence in New Jersey. New York: Octagon Books, 1972.
• McCullough, David. 1776. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2005.
• Pomfret, John E., Colonial New Jersey: a History. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1973.