On Christmas Eve, 1776, a young Hessian soldier named Johann Müller completes his final duty before dawn. What follows is a quiet, imagined encounter shaped by real 18th-century German Christmas traditions, and a traveling Moravian minister moving through enemy lines. As homesickness and faith briefly soften one soldier’s heart, Washington’s army moves across the Delaware under the cover of storm and darkness. By morning, Colonel Rall will be dead, and Johann will march away as a prisoner of war. Blending documented Revolutionary War history with intimate historical fiction, this episode reveals the human story hidden inside one of America’s most famous victories.

#BattleOfTrenton #AmericanRevolution #HessianHistory #NewJerseyHistory #HistoricalFiction

Email me: njhistorypodcast@gmail.com

Socials: https://linktr.ee/njhistorypodcast

Sources – The Night They Still Remembered Home

1. Johann Conrad Döhla, A Hessian Diary of the American Revolution

2. Johann Ewald, Diary of the American War: A Hessian Journal

3. George Washington, Letter to the Continental Congress, Dec. 27, 1776

4. David Hackett Fischer, Washington’s Crossing

5. Edward J. Lowell (ed.), The Hessians and Other German Auxiliaries of Great Britain in the Revolutionary War

6. Moravian Church Archives, Bethlehem, PA

7. William Woys Weaver, As American As Shoofly Pie

8. National Park Service, Battle of Trenton Resource Study