NJ, USA
Battle of Springfield
June 23, 1780
A British and Hessian force of approximately 6,000 troops under General Wilhelm von Knyphausen advanced from Elizabethtown toward Morristown in June 1780, seeking to destroy Continental Army supply depots and possibly the army itself. American forces, including Continental regulars and New Jersey militia, met them at Springfield, approximately 15 miles east of Morristown. The Americans repulsed the British advance in sharp fighting, and the British withdrew to Staten Island. The Battle of Springfield was the last significant British offensive in the northern theater and confirmed that the Continental Army, despite its suffering at Morristown, remained a viable fighting force.
People Involved
Virginia planter and Continental Army commander-in-chief who owned and managed Mount Vernon's enslaved workforce. Absent from his estate for most of the war, he directed Lund Washington's management by correspondence and returned to find the plantation's human community shaped by eight years of wartime disruption.
Continental Army major general (1742-1786) who served as quartermaster general during the Morristown winter encampments and later commanded the Southern Department.