TERRIBLE SEVERITY OF THE WINTER.
Weather conditions when the army arrived at Morristown were but a foretaste of what was yet to come, and long before all the huts were up, the elements attacked Washington’s camp with terrible severity. As things turned out, 1779-80 proved to be the most bitter and prolonged winter, not only of the Revolutionary War, but of the whole eighteenth century.
One observer recorded 4 snows in November, 7 in December, 6 in January, 4 in February, 6 in March, and 1 in April—28 falls altogether, some of which lasted nearly all day and night. The great storm of January 2-4 was among the most memorable on record, with high winds which no man could endure many minutes without danger to his life. “Several marquees were torn asunder and blown down over the officers’ heads in the night,” wrote Dr. Thacher, “and some of the soldiers were actually covered while in their tents, and buried like sheep under the snow.” When this blizzard finally subsided, the snow lay full 4 feet deep on a level, drifted in places to 6 feet, filling up the roads, covering the tops of fences, and making it practically impossible to travel anywhere with heavy loads.
Reconstructions of typical log huts used by the officers (above) and by soldiers of the line (below) in the winter encampment of 1779-80.
What made things still worse was the intense, penetrating cold. General Greene noted that for 6 or 8 days early in January “there has been no living abroad.” Only on 1 day of that month, as far south as Philadelphia, did the mercury go above the freezing point. All the rivers froze solid, including both the Hudson and the Delaware, so that troops and even large cannon could pass over them. Ice in the Passaic River formed 3 feet thick, and, as late as February 26, the Hudson above New York was “full of fixed ice on the banks, and floating ice in the channel.” The Delaware remained wholly impassable to navigation for 3 months. “The oldest people now living in this country,” wrote Washington on March 18, “do not remember so hard a Winter as the one we are now emerging from.”
The Pennsylvania Line campground in 1779-80, with a hospital hut in the foreground. From a recent painting in the park collection.