Patriots: We are heading towards a fight. And if we think we are not. And that we can solve this with ballots. With a court. We are kidding ourselves. On this road towards liberty, If we win. It will be God’s providence that brings us victory. As is no more perfectly illustrated by the Victories that this nation was founded upon. Victories that shouldn’t have been. When time and again your path is laid out towards success you can make no other conclusion that Providence was the cause.
Providence:
Thru the Bible
Dr. J. Vernon McGee
What is providence? Here’s a theological definition: Providence is the means by which God directs all things — both animate and inanimate, seen and unseen, good and evil — toward a worthy purpose, which means His will must finally prevail. Or as the psalmist said, “his kingdom ruleth over all” (Psalm 103:19). In Ephesians 1:11 Paul tells us that God “worketh all things after the counsel of his own will.” Our God is running the universe today, friends, even though there are some who think that it has slipped out from under Him.
Psalm 144 says “HE trains my fingers for battle and my hands for war”
December – Christmas 1776?
Crossing Delaware to attack the Hessian army at Trenton NJ. Crossing a frozen river. Over 20 miles of marching in the snow,sleet,rain, and more.
From: Washington A Life by Ron Chernow:
at the start of the year Lord Rawdon Asher the Earl of Huntington that ” we shall soon have done with these scoundrels, for one only dirties one’s fingers by meddling with them, I do not imagine they can possibly last out beyond this campaign.”
the arrogance we see today on the left regarding people like us is very similar of the way the British were in the lead-up and during the revolutionary war.
It was that arrogance, that pride that led to their downfall.
Page 273.
The crossing. Christmas day 1776 dawned cold but Sunny, then grew overcast by late afternoon as the soldiers, ignorant of their destination, begin to file towards the river they paced more slowly than Washington had reckoned, their bare feet tracing bloody streaks in the snow. Delays threatened the demanding timetable for the crossing, which had commence right after sundown. Once the men got across the Delaware they needed to tramp 9 miles to Trenton in pitch darkness and arrive by 5 am. Everything hinged on secrecy and faultless precision and in his general orders Washington demanded profound silence during the operation, warning the no soldier was to ” quit his ranks on pain of death. “
the night was darkened by a moon sheathed in clouds. As 2400 men boarded the Durham boats to begin their eight hundred foot journey across the river they were tightly wedged in, 40 Men standing we’re sometimes squeezed into a single Kraft. The task of transporting skittish horses and 18 field guns nearly 400 tons of cumbersome artillery on the Delaware fairies was a prodigious undertaking. The elements delivered a bone-chilling mixture of rain sleet and wind that soaked everything. Around 11 p.m. a Grimm northeaster begin to turn up the waters, snow and hail pelted the men exposed in their boats “a perfect hurricane” in the words of Pfeiffer John Greenwood. Since most of the soldiers couldn’t swim they must have experienced sheer terror at the thought of their boats capsizing along the shores the river froze into such thick chunks that Washington said the greatest fatigue came from breaking The passage through them
even though the army was supposed to scoot across by midnight the last boat didn’t cross the river until 3 a.m. not a single soldier died on the Jersey shore Washington remained a study and quiet resolve and concentrated force. not until 4 a.m. was the assembled army ready to initiate its nine Mile march to Trenton. Washington didn’t know the other two sections of his invading Force slated to traverse the river downstream at Trenton and Bristol have been canceled due to an inability to pierce icy masses in the river, Colonel Cadwalader, who couldn’t get his artillery across, simply assumed that Washington had also Aborted his plan on this miserable night.
Despite this, the maneuver was a success.
A year later and many failures, deserters, death and deasease, the army was still fighting. And they wintered starting in December 1777 at Valley Forge.
The soldiers who marched to Valley Forge on December 19, 1777 were not downtrodden or desperate. Though they had been defeated in two key battles, and had lost Philadelphia to the British, Continental troops had often put themselves on the offensive, and proved themselves as skilled fighters against professional soldiers with superior numbers. They were certainly tired, and lacking in supplies, but these were not unusual circumstances in the life of a Continental soldier. Once the troops arrived at their winter camp site, military engineers directed the construction of some 2,000 huts laid out in parallel lines, forming a kind of city, along with miles of trenches, five earthen redoubts and a bridge over the Schuylkill River.
Raw winter weather made things difficult for the tired troops, while a mismanaged commissary and Congress’ failure to provide the army with sufficient funds for fresh supplies led to widespread hunger and lack of clothing, shoes and other supplies among the men. Yet cold and starvation were not the most dangerous threats to soldiers at Valley Forge: Diseases like influenza, dysentery, typhoid and typhus killed two-thirds of the nearly 2,000 soldiers who died during the encampment.
To keep his battered army together, Washington instituted policies of lashing as punishment and threatened to shoot deserters on sight. Taking rumors of his imminent replacement in stride, he decided to regroup rather than give up. In February 1778, Washington welcomed to camp Baron Friedrich von Steuben, a Prussian officer who put Continental troops through a new training regimen, including the precision marching that was so important to Revolutionary-era warfare. Von Steuben also instituted new hygiene standards in the slovenly American camp, introducing the first latrines (and ensuring they were placed far from the kitchens). In thanks, a grateful Washington had Congress appoint Von Steuben inspector general of the Continental Army. Another officer, Nathanael Greene, took charge of procuring supplies through the commissary in March, leaving Washington free to concentrate on developing strategies to confront the British. By April, the general’s critics in Congress were silenced, and news of France’s commitment to the Revolutionary cause in May brought celebration to Valley Forge.
On June 19, 1778, exactly six months after they arrived, a revitalized Continental Army left Valley Forge and headed towards New Jersey. Barely a week later, they forced the British from the field in the Battle of Monmouth. The Valley Forge encampment proved to be a turning point in the Revolutionary War, testing the mettle of George Washington and his troops and paving the way for their ultimate victory in the war for American independence.
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