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Few things in Bergen County Revolutionary War History draw more debate than who it was that warned the garrison of Fort Lee that the British had crossed the Hudson and were on their way to attack them.  Legend and lore have often been brought to the front as facts, often because the stories have been told so many times they have simply been accepted as such.  This aspect of the story was indeed just one more controversy of the invasion, added to: where did the British actually land? who were the three guides for Cornwallis? and was the Kearney house really “Cornwallis’ Headquarters.” 

You may have seen a statue of him in Hackensack across the street from the Bergen County Courthouse and the Hackensack Green.  You may have stumbled across his burial stone at the First Reformed Dutch Church in Hackensack, but who is this American Revolution figure and why is he recognized in Bergen County?

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 Revolutionary War, like most every war, produced thousands of casualties on both sides during the course of eight years of conflict.  While the losses were nothing like the American Civil War of the Nineteenth Century, or the bloody conflicts of the 20th Century into today, they were still highly personal to those unfortunate enough to be wounded, mortally or otherwise, in battle.  The armies of the day were small, and casualties were usually keenly felt.

We are Starving, and unless something very efficacious for the supply of the Army is done, very speedily, we must disband, or turn free Booters – an evil of almost as much Magnitude as the first.”  So wrote Continental Army Major General Arthur St, Clair on September 5th 1780.  He was sending a less than subtle warning to Pennsylvania President Joseph Reed, stating in no uncertain terms that if Congress did not take steps to immediately supply Washington’s troops, the army would take matters into its own hands.

Little is known of Lawrence Ferguson at the start of the American Revolution until his appearance as a private soldier in Lt. Col. Abraham Van Buskirk’s 4th Battalion, New Jersey Volunteers in 1777.  Raised in late 1776 primarily from Bergen and Morris County Loyalists, the battalion had fought in numerous skirmishes and battles, taking some 133 prisoners along the way.

At 4:00 AM on 23 March 1780, some 300 British and German troops suddenly appeared in in Hackensack. Their principal target was the courthouse, where Captain Abraham Haring and some twenty-three of his men lay dozing, guarding the just collected tax-receipts of Harrington Township. This was stop one on the expedition, as it would continue on, joiningother British forces attacking a Continental Army post at Paramus. While in Hackensack, the troops plundered a number of items, burned two houses, and most notably, torched the courthouse itself. It became a legitimate military target due to housing Haring’s militiamen, in effect