January 3, 1777

On January 2, 1776, George Washington, who had been named commander-in- chief of American forces in July of 1775, raised the first flag of his army near Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he was training a 16,000-man force. It contained thirteen red and white stripes, as it now dose, plus the crosses of St. George and St. Andrew, where the fifty stars are today.

One year latter Washington won an important military victory at Princeton, N.J., on January 3, 1777. Following Washington’s surprise attraction and victory in the Battle of Trenton (December 26, 1776) Cornwallis, the British commander, had arrived in the vicinity with a large force.

Instead of waiting at Trenton to be attacked, Washington decided to attack himself, and leaving his campfire burning on the night of January 2, moved around the British left, where a detachment of his army collided with the British at the Stony Brook Bridge.

The Americans were driven back but Washington hurried to the scene with his main body and routed the British forces. Then he seized the military stores at Princeton, falling back on a strong position at Morristown. There the British refused to attack and this, in effect, left New Jersey in American hands as the main British force returned to New York.