THE HESSIANS IN AMERICA

The majority of Hessian battalions passed the war in dull garrison duty punctuated by moments of intense action or marches in the burning sun. Thus the Regiment von Mirbach during seven years was in action for only forty disastrous minutes at Redbank, losing its colonel and ninety-five others killed and wounded. Until the Regiment Erbprinz was besieged at Yorktown, it had sustained six wounded during the whole war. The Regiment Prinz Karl, doing little more than guard duties, had one man wounded in seven years. The Garrison Regiment von Stein (later von Seitz) passed most of the war in Halifax. The Regiments von Lossberg and von Knyphausen suffered all their battle losses in 1776. Even a regiment that served fairly actively had long periods of quiet: the LeibRegiment was at White Plains, the capture of Rhode Island, Brandywine and Germantown, the retreat from Philadelphia, and the Elizabethtown expedition, yet one of its company commanders, Dinklage, managed to spend most of the war searching for fossils and the remains of America's Stone Age inhabitants. He noted that the long periods of boredom made his comrades long for action, but he was quite content with a good book to read.2 Most officers, remarking on the abundance of game, used their firelocks more for hunting than battle.

Rail's old regiment was an exception. Aside from its role both glorious and shameful in the 1776 campaign, its men as part of the Combined Battalion took part in the expedition against Philadelphia and the withdrawal from it.