American crisis number one

By mid-December of 1776, George Washington was despondent. The American War for Independence was not going well. His troops were undisciplined, often bootless, lacked firearms and ammunition, had little access to food and clothing, and faced two well-equipped substantial European armies: the British red-coats, plus their mercenaries from Germany, the hated Hessians.

William Howe, the British general, had chased Washington out of New York, had pursued him hotly across the state of New Jersey in the fall of 1776, and then forced the Virginian to hole up that winter on the west side of the Del...