MARBLEHEAD — The turning point of the American Revolutionary War will be reenacted on Saturday.
Glover’s Marblehead Regiment will be commemorating Washington’s Crossing of the Delaware at 3 p.m. at the Town Landing, Front Street, with a ceremony that includes its annual row, using a 26-foot longboat, across Marblehead Harbor.
The Regiment is a nonprofit, historical reenactment group honoring the 14th Continental Regiment led by Gen. John Glover during the American Revolutionary War.
The ceremony and row are meant to remember the actual crossing, where Glover’s sailor-soldiers rowed Gen. George Washington, an army of 2,400 men, cannon and their horses across the fast-flowing, ice-packed Delaware River on Christmas night, 1776, in advance of the Battle of Trenton, according to information provided by Seamus Daly, captain of Glover’s Marblehead Regiment.
The Durham boats used in the crossing took off from McConkey’s Ferry, Pa. The army’s objective that night was to march nine miles to Trenton, which was done during a snowstorm, and surprise the Hessian Garrison there after successfully completing the crossing.
Daly said Washington’s troop had suffered a lot of defeats during the war until that point, and he needed to do something bold and unanticipated to retain his army and give hope, to make people believe in the revolution again.
“After having suffered a long string of defeats since the loss of the Battle of Brooklyn in August, Washington needed to do something unexpected and bold,” Daly said in a separate Glover’s Regiment press release.
“Faced with the prospect of the disintegration of his army due to expiring enlistments, he badly needed a winning action to convey to Congress, the members of his army and the people, both rebels and loyalists, that the revolution was not finished, but was indeed alive and ultimately capable of delivering freedom from British rule and occupation.”
Daly said the famed crossing was a turning point in the war, resulting in a decisive victory and the capture of 900 Hessians, German troops hired by the British to help fight during the war, at Trenton.
Two of the three commissioned crossing attempts had failed because of severe weather conditions, but the one that did succeed, led by Washington himself, did so because Washington asked Glover and his fishermen to man the boats. Daly said Washington had specifically asked Glover to provide the means to cross, because his men were seafarers who knew how to handle a boat in difficult circumstances.
The army, including Glover’s men, fought the following day at Assunpink Creek and then were rowed by the regiment, along with their captives, back across the Delaware to Pennsylvania. Glover’s men were rowing, marching and fighting for 36 hours straight, Daly said.
“It was a significant turning point because the British commanders thought they had won and they were soon disabused of that,” Daly said.
After that victory, Daly said a lot of men, whose enlistments were set to expire, signed up again because they had hope again.
The boat will be launched at Barnegat at around 9:30 a.m. Saturday and rowed by the Regiment to State Street landing. At approximately 11:45 a.m., the Regiment will take part in the Christmas Walk parade through town.
At 3 p.m., Glover’s Regiment will hold their ceremony at the Town Landing, remembering “its illustrious forebears” who rowed Christmas night and fought the following the day at Assunpink Creek.
The ceremony will include rendering honors and a roll call of the names of the original Glover’s Regiment, which will precede the symbolic recreation of the actual crossing, with a longboat row across Marblehead Harbor.
Daly said the longboat has been in use since the crossing was first commemorated by the regiment in 1976.
“This is one of our signature events primarily because of the original regiment taking part in the crossing,” Daly said. “The modern day Glover’s Regiment is primarily an educational organization … We also do it (the reenactment) because it’s a lot of fun. We enjoy doing it.”