The British troops almost succeeded in surrounding Washington’s force north of Harlem.  Washington retreated to White Plains, where, on October 28th, the British, after a severe loss, took an outpost and won what is called the “Battle of White Plains.”  Henceforward Washington’s movements resembled too painfully those of the proverbial toad under the harrow; and yet in spite of Lord Howe’s efforts to crush him, he succeeded in escaping into New Jersey with a small remnant—­some six thousand men—­of his original army.  The year 1776 thus closed in disaster which seemed to be irremediable.  It showed that the British, having awakened to the magnitude of their task, were able to cope with it.  Having a comparatively unlimited sea-power, they needed only to embark their regiments, with the necessary provisions and ammunition, on their ships and send them across the Atlantic, where they were more than a match for the nondescript, undisciplined, ill-equipped, and often badly nourished Americans.  The fact that at the highest reckoning hardly a half of the American people were actively in favor of Independence, is too often forgotten.  But from this fact there followed much lukewarmness and inertia in certain sections.  Many persons had too little imagination or were too sordidly bound by their daily ties to care.  As one planter put it:  “My business is to raise tobacco, the rest doesn’t concern me.”

Over the generally level plains of New Jersey, George Washington pushed the remnant of the army that remained to him.  He had now hardly five thousand men, but they were the best, most seasoned, and in many respects the hardiest fighters.  In addition to the usual responsibility of warfare, of feeding his troops, finding quarters for them, and of directing the line of march, he had to cope with wholesale desertions and to make desperate efforts to raise money and to persuade some of those troops, whose term was expiring, to stay on.  His general plan now was to come near enough to the British centre and to watch its movements.  The British had fully twenty-five thousand men who could be centred at a given point.  This centre was now Trenton, and the objective of the British was so plainly Philadelphia that the Continental Congress, after voting to remain in permanence there, fled as quietly as possible to Baltimore.  On December 18th Washington wrote from the camp near the Falls of Trenton to John Augustine Washington: 

If every nerve is not strained to recruit the new army with all possible expedition, I think the game is pretty near up, owing, in great measure, to the insidious acts of the Enemy, and disaffection of the Colonies before mentioned, but principally to the accursed policy of short enlistments, and placing too great a dependence on the militia, the evil consequences of which were foretold fifteen months ago, with a spirit almost Prophetic. ...  You can form no idea of the perplexity of my situation.  No man, I believe, ever had a greater choice of difficulties, and less means to extricate himself from them.  However, under a full persuasion of the justice of our cause, I cannot entertain an idea that it will finally sink, though it may remain for some time under a cloud.[1]

[Footnote 1:  Ford, V, 111.]