you have division commanders, general nathanael greene and general john sullivan. they are going to be leading to several marches to trenton. you have outstanding hamilton with the new york artillery. he will be an aide for washington later on in the war. you have a young, 18, lieutenant james monroe. you have quite a few of the founding fathers in the army at this point. once the army is across, they had to wait, the artillery took some time. it is about 4:00 in the morning on december 26. the army has a nine mile march ahead of them. it is john greenwood who wrote about the march. he says we marched no faster than a 10-year-old could walk, and stopping frequently. there was a line of march, numerous halts and starts. it took about four hours to go the nine miles. there was a crossroads. the army divided into two columns. they had about a four mile march from there. washington accompanied general green's volunteered general sullivan came in a long river road. within minutes of each other, they encountered the guard posts on the edge of town and forced them into to

accompanied nathanael greene column that would come from the northeastern end of town. within minutes of each other, they encountered the hessians guard post and force them into town. this event is the pivotal moment of the revolution, the crossing of the delaware followed by the victory at trenton. many, including washington, they thought the war was practically over and they were about ready to wrap this up and we needed a victory. trenton is a small battle. 900 hessians are captured but huge.rale effect is it is almost viewed by the population at the time as a miracle event. >> are cities tour staff traveled to trenton, new jersey to learn about its rich history. otherabout trenton and stops on our tour on the c-span cities tour. >> in the spring of 1790, the first u.s. congress meeting in a debate about slavery and race while considering a number of anti-slavery petitions they had received. professor history talks about the first congressional debate on slavery and resend argues this discussion which focused on congress'ability to interfere with slavery that the ton

nathanael greene said these are so many spies in our camp. that's how he referred to them. when the first battles, especially, and i point this out as brandy wanted, things changed. the congress, washington, other offices did not know what to do with these people. they were coming in, some of in terms ofest where they wanted to be placed. there was no political way to insert them into the american military system, which was as much political because generals were chosen based off state, --e than they were based on there were not that many battles that they fought prior to this. it was hard to see them do better in battle. that really made things difficult for congress. a few subsequent battles were fought and they had to throw them into these mix and the french volunteers did quite well. i point out that one of them, , butay not know his name he was an engineer. his army corps of engineers now medal for -- for courage and boldness. it was the first acceptance that were french volunteers equal to the americans in terms of how they could fight. eventually, they showed that th