"The Battle of Red Bank was a crucial victory for the Continental Army"
In their promotional video on the find, Rowan University also describe the failed attack Fort Mifflin as "one of the greatest upset victories of the Revolutionary War." Yet as this article concedes, Forts Mifflin and Mercer were abandoned a fortnight or so later and the obstacle to traffic on the river was removed.
A bloody reverse to be sure but "crucial victory"? Futile though the enterprise ultimately proved to be, Philadelphia had been occupied by Crown forces and remained in British hands.
What is interesting is that as the altogether more sober Wade Catts lead archaologist points out in the Rowan University video, actual battlefield burials from the AWI period can be numbered "on two hands," and although he doesn't say so I am fairly sure to find burials of individuals numbering in double figures must be even more rare.
The search for the Marylanders' grave at Brooklyn has yet to turn up any remains. We know that over 50 men were buried at the Paoli Tavern site but obviously the grave has never been excavated since as the Red Bank site, as Wades Catts points out, is of course a military cemetery and it is only the chance discovery of the soldiers' remains that has led to a systematic archaological investigation.
A timely synchronicity given Robert Selig's current study of military burials.
