Battle of Bound Brook, 1777: Cornwallis surprises Lincoln's outpost

After Trenton and Princeton the two armies spent the winter of 1777 in New Jersey: Washington's around Morristown, the British in New York and a few posts in New Jersey, among them New Brunswick. Through the winter both sides sent out foraging and scouting parties, and the country between them became a no man's land of ambushes and skirmishes.²

Bound Brook was one of the American outposts used to strike at the British foragers. It stood on the Raritan about seven miles above New Brunswick, and was held by Major General Benjamin Lincoln. In March, when the militia's terms of service ran out, Washington sent Continental troops to relieve them; a return of 15 March shows 342 men of the 8th Pennsylvania Regiment at the post. American History Central puts Lincoln's strength at about 500, most of them from that regiment, with militia, a company of artillery and a small redoubt on the north bank of the river.³

Three columns in the dark

Lord Cornwallis, who commanded the British forces in New Jersey, decided to remove the irritant. In the night of 12 to 13 April he led out of New Brunswick a force that American History Central estimates at 4,000 British and Hessian soldiers, in three columns meant to close on Bound Brook from three sides at once.⁴

The editors of the Washington Papers reconstruct the plan from British and Hessian accounts. Colonel Carl von Donop, with fifty dragoons and four hundred Hessian grenadiers, marched up the south side of the Raritan and seized the bridge into the town. On the north side General James Grant, with Hessian jägers and a battalion of British Guards, came at the town from the east. The third column, light horse under Lieutenant Colonel William Harcourt, two battalions of light infantry and a battalion of grenadiers, swung south and west by way of Hillsborough and attacked from the west, crossing the river at a ford that the American militia guard seems to have left without warning.⁵

Washington put the near disaster down to the carelessness of a militia guard at one of the fords. American History Central notes a local story that a Loyalist farmer gave the British the password, and adds that the Raritan could be forded in many places, so the fault may not have been the militia's alone.⁶

Escape to the mountain

The attack fell in the early morning. Lincoln, Washington wrote the next day, got notice of the enemy's approach just in time to withdraw himself and most of his men to the mountain behind the town. Nathanael Greene told John Adams that Lincoln barely had time to draw his troops off between the heads of the two flanking columns, which kept up a warm fire as they passed. Hamilton wrote that the British got possession of Bound Brook but that the Americans eluded the design of surrounding and cutting off the whole party.⁷

The loss fell mainly on the artillery. A party of horse was pushed on them so fast that the gunners could not get away, and Washington reported two guns lost with Lieutenants Ferguson and Turnbull and about twenty men of Proctor's artillery regiment. Hamilton counted three field pieces lost and about thirty men killed and taken. Figures differ widely. Henry Knox later gave six killed and twenty five or thirty prisoners, while the British officer Stephen Kemble wrote that about eighty were taken and that the rebels ran off in their shirts.⁸

The British did not stay. Washington wrote that they remained about an hour and a half and went back to New Brunswick, plundering on the way, and that Lincoln returned to his post with reinforcements. American History Central adds that Lincoln left his papers behind in his hurry, and that Greene's men caught the rear of the British column at Raritan Landing on its way back.⁹

Lessons for the spring

Washington was angry with the militia. His aide wrote to General Nathaniel Heard that the commander in chief had heard that Heard's whole brigade ran from its post at the alarm, and demanded the names of any who had. Four days after the raid Washington told General William Maxwell that the campaign was about to open and that the number of posts must be reduced and the men drawn closer together, with scouts instead of fixed guards along the enemy's lines, so that the army would be less liable to surprise.¹⁰ › Washington vs Cornwallis

Bound Brook was a small affair, but it was one of the first moves of the 1777 campaign. American History Central counts it as the opening engagement of the Philadelphia campaign, which would bring Cornwallis and Washington face to face again at Brandywine in September.¹¹