Conflict Bioarchaeology: Analysis of Probable Hessian Soldiers’ Remains from the Revolutionary War Battlefield at Red Bank, New Jersey

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "“A Little Grass and Earth Thrown in to fill up the Grave”: Archaeological studies of American War for Independence burial spaces", at the 2025 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

The first conference on “conflict archaeology” was held 25 years ago. Since then, the study of battlefields has provided unique but incomplete insights into the nature of large-scale violence and warfare technology. Bioarchaeology helps to complete that picture of brutal human behavior. The unexpected discovery of dismembered skeletal remains buried in the trench around Fort Mercer after the Battle of Red Bank in southern New Jersey provides the opportunity to document the physical trauma that soldiers faced during the Revolutionary War. Their irregular burial also reflects the treatment of body parts left on the battlefield, remains that most likely represent Hessian soldiers killed during their worst defeat of the entire war. This paper presents the results of the osteological and dental analyses of the remains excavated from the trench at Fort Mercer, the Delaware River post that General George Washington had written was “of the utmost importance to America.”

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for Historical Archaeology (SHA) - Revolutionary War Resources   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2025   •
• “A Little Grass and Earth Thrown in to fill up the Grave”: Archaeological studies of American War for Independence burial spaces

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Nicole Haddow