Posted on 05/26/2025 9:06:06 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
6. Many of the Hessians opted to stay in AmericaOpportunities in America impressed these soldiers so much that thousands of them opted not to return to their native country. Johann Döhla, an enlisted man who kept a journal about his experiences, wrote upon seeing New York for the first time that, "The American land is good and incomparable land... It is rich and fruitful, well cultivated, and with much grain, especially a great deal of Indian corn; and it has many and beautiful forests of both soft and hardwood trees unknown to us." He went on to write about the diversity of religion in America and wanted to explore the many ways of life in the colonies much like his comrades. This is an attitude reflected in many journals, diaries, and letters that remain. Ultimately Hesse sent 19,000 of their sons to America. Between casualties rates and the sheer number of deserters little over half returned home...7. As the war went on, some of these men began to side with the Americans...Pamphlets were snuck into camps offering freedom and land to anyone willing to desert and sign up with the American troops. By the wars end Congress offered soldiers farm land, two pigs, and a cow to Hessian deserters along with citizenship, a much brighter future than the one those that returned would have had...8. The American Revolution was the downfall of Hesse-Cassel as a mercenary stateAt the start of the war sending men to America was very convenient for the overpopulated German duchies... However, the unprecedented length of the war had caught the British and the Hessian governments by surprise... After the American war, the Hessians would never be seen fighting as mercenaries again... The Revolution had seen an estimated loss of 5,000 casualties and 3,000 desertions.
(Excerpt) Read more at allthingsliberty.com ...
The original Connecticut Raggies.
They had cool boots.
The first Scottish ancestor in my family to come here fought in the Revolutionary War for the British as a mercenary (likely because of the highland clearances) but decided to stay, first in the Mohawk Valley and then Western NY. Of the English colonists, a great, great grandfather fought ion the American side.
Yes, the Hessians were brought over as complete units — regiments. The full title of Colonel Rall — the Hessian commander at Trenton — was “Colonel-Proprietor. That kind of says it all about his status of the unite as a franchise manager.
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