Page:The Hessians and the other German auxiliaries of Great Britain in the revolutionary war.djvu/106

 90 already, and had been allowed to get away quietly, but now he (Rall) had taken measures. When they came again he would drive them back in good fashion. He hoped that Washington would come over, too, and then he could take him prisoner. So dangerous did Rall's carelessness seem to his subordinates, that the officers of the Lossberg regiment sent off a letter of remonstrance to General von Heister, but too late.

Rall's contempt for his enemy led him to neglect his most elementary duties. He seldom visited a post, he seldom consulted with an officer. He refused to name a place of safety for the baggage in case of an attack. “Nonsense,” said he, when asked to do so, “the rebels will not beat us.” Yet the men were constantly fatigued with unnecessary guard duty and countermarching. On the 22d of December, two dragoons, who had been sent to Princeton with a letter, were fired on in a wood. One of them was killed, the other rode back to Trenton and reported the attack. Rall, thereupon, sent three officers and one hundred men, with a cannon, to carry his letter, much to the amusement of the English. The detachment had to sleep on the ground, in bad weather, and march back the next morning. A sergeant and fifteen men would have been amply sufficient for the service.

On the 24th of December, 1776, a reconnoissance was sent out in the direction of Pennington, but was recalled after a march of a few miles. Towards dusk on the 25th an attack was made on the pickets north of the town, by a small reconnoitring party of Americans. The enemy were repulsed, with a loss to the Germans of six men wounded. A patrol of thirty men,