During the American Revolution German Soldiers who marched across New Jersey left behind many stories, tales legends and rumors about their time spent in the state. Two hundred and thirty years later rumors, ghost stories and impressions are still part of the oral and written history of New Jersey. This book will try to discover the truth behind the legends, using old maps, folk tales, and journals, and some newly discovered letters. Many of these German soldiers did not want to be in the colonies, never having been told of why they were there. Many stayed and because of the threat of death and execution blended into the background of the land in New Jersey.

The book reconstructs the journeys of the 5000 German troops, mistakenly grouped into the category “Hessians”, throughout the state from Princeton, Trenton all the way to the Northern tip in Sussex County. It will also consider the questions of “Hessian Legends”. Were the Hessians evil mercenary brutes that plundered and murdered innocent patriots? Do their ghosts still haunt houses in Millburn, Hohokus and Morristown New Jersey? Did prisoners transported to Rockaway New Jersey vanish after making munitions for the Continental Army, or are they now buried at Picatinny Arsenal?    Were the Germans really mercenaries?  Did the British Parliament prefer not to pay Germany for them, and then why did they? 

 This book will, therefore examine the “Hessian” question, and place the German armies including Braunschweigers, Hessians, Waldeckers, Anhalters, Hanoverians, into  their places and events in New Jersey.