The Boys of Bergen

Todd W. Braisted

                 April 19, 2025 will mark the 250th Anniversary of New England militiamen facing off against British regulars at Lexington and Concord, the start of the Revolutionary War.  Neither the “embattled farmers” or King George’s army could have foreseen an eight-year conflict ahead or the birth of a new nation when the smoke had cleared.

The Americans who fought the British that day were not regular soldiers in that it was their profession.  These were militia, a tradition of citizen-soldier that had been practiced in England and made its way over to the American colonies long before 1775.  These men, generally aged between 16-50, were not uniformed like standing armies, but were expected to arm and accouter themselves, drilled in the manual exercise and tactics of the time.  Organized generally by town, city or county within a province, these companies formed regiments which could fight on their own or augment the regular army on campaign.  Officers were typically commissioned by the governor, which gave them the legal authority to command the men beneath them.  While the regulars on both sides ranged over the continent in the great campaigns of the war, it was the local militia who most often fought in their own neighborhoods.  Militia served in one-month tours, then would be dismissed and sent home, replaced by a call up of another “class.”  The different classes ensured that the militia would serve three or four months a year.  Those who volunteered for service of three, six, nine or twelve continuous months were referred to as “state troops.”

Bergen County’s militia regiment in the summer of 1776 was in a state of turmoil.  While no British troops had yet entered the county, the residents were split in their loyalty: some wholeheartedly favored opposition to the British while others supported the Crown, both openly and clandestinely.  Theunis Dey, the colonel of the regiment, was the county’s leading Whig and a firm enemy of the British.  His second in command however, Lieutenant Colonel John Zabriskie of New Bridge, along with a number of officers, quietly resigned their commissions, not wanting to take up arms against their fellow countrymen.  Others, such as Franklin Township’s Captain Peter Ruttan or Hackensack Township’s Surgeon Abraham Van Buskirk quietly did their duty.  And what of Bergen County’s youth, those going to school?  Some of them no doubt continued  to take their studies at such places as Robert Timpany’s schoolhouse at New Bridge. 

For some however, the call of arms was too strong to continue with classes.  In June 1776, 15-year-old John C. Post of Slotterdam, Saddle River Township (the area around modern Fair Lawn) answered that call, enlisting under a nearby neighbor, Captain David Marinus of Colonel Philip Van Cortland’s Battalion of Brigadier General Nathaniel Heard’s Brigade of New Jersey State Troops.  This was a five-battalion corps raised throughout the state in June 1776 for five months service.  They no doubt had little idea what they would be in for.  Post, some 50+ years after the events, wrote down what he experienced those five months: “was marched to Powles hook when he received a Loan Office bill of three pounds paper money as Bounty, then crossed the north River and was landed in new York where he Joined the main army under Gen. Washington and the regiment of New Jersey troops under Col. [Philip Van] Courtland[;] the army Crossed over to Long Island and was stationed near flat Bush where the battle of Long Island was fought in which the deponent was personally engaged the americans were defeated and retreated to the post of Brooklyn and from thence in the night and through a very dense fog in the morning Crossed the east river to New York and from thence to fort Washington near Kings Bridge when some time was spent in building mud huts, from thence they retreated to the white plains where some entrenchments were thrown up for Defence here the Battle of white plains was fought.  The Deponent was stationed with a picket Guard about five or six miles from the main army where a Gen. or Col. (name unknown) with about three or four Hundred men, the Corps was Closely pressed and persued by the Brittish until it Joined the main army then under arms and the action Began, after it was over Gen. Washington with the main army, retreated to Kings ferry and then Crossed the Hudson river into new Jersey and marched down the river to Fort Lee, then to Hackensack and New Ark when his time of enlistment having Expired which he had faithfully served out, he was Honourably discharged…”  The teenager had participated in the first battle of the New York Campaign, where Washington’s troops were soundly defeated at Brooklyn, escaped to Manhattan in the miraculous evacuation of the troops across the East River, then spent time building huts near Fort Washington (site of the Cloisters today) before taking part in the defeat at the Battle of White Plains on October 28th, 1776.  From there he crossed with Washington to the west side of the Hudson, returning to Bergen County and encamping at Fort Lee.

Fort Lee.  Originally named Fort Constitution, it was built on the Palisades diagonally southwest of Fort Washington on the New York side of the Hudson Rover.  These twin forts, bristling with heavy cannons and aided by river obstructions were built to deny Britain’s Royal Navy the use of the river.  Work on the fort started in August 1776, primarily by troops from other states, aided by rotations of 100 Bergen County Militia per month.  Fort Lee was not the only fortification to pop up in the county.  Earlier works had been thrown up at Bergen Point (Bayonne) as well as a substantial fort at Paulus Hook (Jersey City).  Both these places were in Bergen County at the time, Hudson County not being established until 1840.  These posts would all have militia from Bergen working on and garrisoning them as the British forces gathered on Staten Island and later Manhattan.  Abraham D. Banta was just fourteen when he volunteered to serve as a substitute for his brother John. Abraham’s family lived a mile above Hackensack, making his two tours of duty that summer at Bergen Point and Fort Lee relatively local.  His brother Daniel would join him in the service a year later, a volunteer at fifteen years old.

Banta was far from being the only teenager at Fort Lee.  John S. Bertolf, a sixteen-year-old from the Ramapo area of Franklin Township, served a month there, “doing guard duty and other service” as a substitute for his father Stephen.  Hiring substitutes to serve in your place was not uncommon during the Revolution, but it may seem strange to us today, sending your son to risk himself in your place.  Bertolf had two years up on fourteen-year-old John Storms, who was likewise at Fort Lee, serving in place of his father, Frederick.  Eighteen-year-old William Van Voorhase, also of Franklin Township, was already a veteran of sorts, having been serving since April of 1776, marching to “Newark and Elizth. Town County of Essex, thence to Amboy where they was Stationed.  Was employed in building a Fort, in this Station, does not recollect the Name of the Commanding Officers but knows that a frenchman Superintended the construction of the fort – from thence was Marched back to Hackensack.”  Van Voorhase was doing duty in New York City that July before later being “Stationed at Horseimus, Fort Lee, at which place he worked on the Fort, doing guard duty, and other Services.”  Harsimus, the first place to which he was referring, is modern Jersey City, near the major fortifications of Paulus Hook, which fell to the British on September 23rd, 1776.

The heavy cannon of Fort Lee, manned by the regulars of Henry Knox’s Artillery, several times exchanged fire with British shipping coming up the Hudson River.  But neither these guns, the companion pieces at Fort Washington, or the river obstructions stopped the British, despite causing damage and casualties.  None of Bergen County’s men suffered any losses during this time, nor probably fired a shot in anger, the shipping being well out musket range.  They did witness casualties at the fort however, but from their own side.  In October a no-doubt inexperienced Connecticut soldier ill-advisedly attempted to clean his loaded musket when it discharged, sending buckshot into three of his fellow soldiers, including his sergeant.  More seriously a few weeks later, a young Massachusetts lieutenant named Hardy Peirce, one of Knox’s Artillery, made the fatal mistake of attempting to encourage his men by standing in front of a loaded cannon that had mis-fired.  The 32 Pound cannon ball that unexpectedly discharged during his exhortations sent his head into the Hudson.

Aside from John C. Post serving in Heard’s Brigade, along with the other twenty or so survivors of the two Bergen County companies of Heard’s Brigade, no militia were present at Fort Lee on the morning of November 20th, 1776 when 5,000 British and Hessian troops under Lord Cornwallis scaled the Palisades at the lower Closter landing, six or seven miles above the fort, sending the troops under General Nathanael Greene at Fort Lee scampering westward, joining Washington in the great retreat across New Jersey.  Young Mr. Post would be discharged when his enlistment expired a few days later, enabling him to return home, along with all the other members of Heard’s, as Washington’s army seemed on the point of melting away.  Hundreds of Bergen men did turn out when the British arrived, not to fight them but rather to join them.  Former militia surgeon Abraham Van Buskirk now showed his true colors by receiving a lieutenant colonel’s commission to command the 4th Battalion, New Jersey Volunteers, a Loyalist corps then raising to serve the British.  Van Buskirk’s sixteen-year-old son Jacob would become a lieutenant under his father in 1777.  If the young Van Buskirk was attending classes locally at Robert Timpany’s schoolhouse, those days were done, as Timpany himself raised over fifty men and was commissioned a major in the New Jersey Volunteers.  Peter Ruttan, the militia captain from the Ramapo area would raise sixty men to serve under Van Buskirk, including sixteen-year-old Private Jacob Wannamaker, whose family were near neighbors.  From Saddle River Township, Samuel Ryerson would likewise raise a company, his sixteen-year-old son Joseph enlisting as a drummer and ending the war as a lieutenant in another Loyalist corps, the Prince of Wales American Volunteers. Unlike the militia, all of those who served in the New Jersey Volunteers were just that: volunteers.  Loyalist records are not nearly as extensive as those who fought for the United States, so the number of teens among their ranks cannot even be guessed at.  One thing for certain is, the youth of Bergen County would now be fighting against each other.

Through the end of hostilities in 1783, no fewer than seventy “men” between the ages of twelve and eighteen would serve under Colonel Theunis Dey in the Bergen County Militia, an age today when boys would be attending classes, not standing guard duty.  But serve they did. 

Bergen County was the scene of numerous skirmishes and battles between 1776-1782.  Places such as Paramus, New Bridge, Little Ferry, Closter, Moonachie, Hackensack, Liberty Pole, Hopperstown, Haring Town, Schraalenburgh and English Neighbourhood would all become synonymous with fighting during that period.  When action was not happening, the constant guard duty and patrolling made for tedious service, all performed by militia young and old alike.

There is perhaps no better example of the conflicting loyalties of the conflict like that of the family of David G. Demarest of New Bridge.  The Demarest family, like many, had relatives serving on both sides of the war.  What made their situation somewhat unique was that these opponents would actually live under the same room.  When the British arrived at New Bridge in November 1776, David G. Demarest immediately enlisted under Abraham Van Buskirk in the New Jersey Volunteers, throwing in his lot with the British.  His wife Jane however, as well as his three sons, all became avowed rebels, with the boys all being enrolled in the Bergen County Militia: Gilliam starting at age fifteen in 1777, Philip in the same year, aged sixteen, and John, starting at sixteen in 1780.  Their mother could not have been prouder, despite having “incurred the Reproaches and Hatred of her Husband and many of her family Connections by means of her attatchment to the interests of America and her Zeal in instilling those principles in her Children.”  In July 1781, their father David, now serving in a Loyalist corps under Major Thomas Ward, stationed at Bergen Point, would come face to face with his sons.  Twenty cavalry from Ward’s corps raided New Bridge and captured all three of the young militiamen at their home.  John and Philip were prisoners in New York City for six months before being paroled home and later exchanged.  Fellow militiaman Benjamin Romaine related Gilliam’s story: “Gilliam Demarests father David Demarest deserted his countrys cause, and eloped to the enemy services to the City of New York, and [continued] there during the war…  The said father repeatedly requested, and demanded his said Son Gilliam to join him in New York, but the son held to his integrity to the end of the war.”  Gilliam would be exchanged, only to be severely wounded in the hand in action against his father’s corps.  David G. Demarest would leave with the British when they evacuated New York in 1783, starting a new life, with a new wife, in what is now Canada.  As far as the State of New Jersey was concerned, Jane Demarest lived in the three-room stone house owned by a Loyalist, despite her sons service, and therefore it was confiscated.

In the end, Bergen’s young men put duty first, sacrificing their teenage years for the service of their new country (or the King).  The story of Benjamin Romaine probably sums it up best.  Romaine was born in Poughkeepsie, Dutchess County, New York in September 1762.  At the time the British landed on Manhattan, he was a fourteen-year-old living with his parents in New York City.  Desperate to escape, the family fled to the area of Fort Washington and then made the decision to cross over to Bergen County and join family members already settled there.  Their decision came not a moment too soon, as “On the approach of the enemy, we crossed the Hudson to Fort Lee, on the opposite shore, while the cannon balls were flying over our heads, from Fort Lee, directed at the enemy’s ships, which were endeavouring to ascend the river in aid of the storming Fort Washington” which came on November 16th, 1776.  Settling in Hackensack Township, he reunited with his brother Elias Romaine (also spelled Romeyn), who was then a captain in the Bergen County Militia.  If young Benjamin thought he would settle into a life of ease, he was mistaken, at least as far as his father was concerned.  As he wrote some fifty years later… “I had pleaded excuse from going to school, as my Father had requested, (we then lived on the lines where both the belligerant parties had alternate possession.)  One evening my Father came into the house with a large english musket, and its appendages, with a catouch box filled with 24 rounds of ball catriges.  He sat the musket in the closet; mother asked his meaning, he answered not.  In the early morning he bid me rise, and buckled on me the armour, and said, ‘you have refused to make effort with me to perfect your education, now go to your Brother and defend your country!’”  Romaine would go on to take part in no fewer than seven skirmishes or battles, finally being captured in Closter with five other militiamen, including eighteen-year-old Benjamin P. Westervelt.  He would be held a prisoner in New York City for seven weeks before being exchanged and returning home.  Since November 1777, he had served a total of one year, 3 months in the various tours of monthly service.  As for his brother Elias, he was court-martialed in 1782 and found guilty of taking bribes and robbing the inhabitants of their property, for which the court sentenced him to be cashiered and dismissed from the service.  Benjamin, however, would receive the thanks of his country in the form of an annual pension of $75, for faithfully serving as a teenage sergeant during the war.