Save the Victory Trail & Jacobs Creek Bridge

Our country's might wealth grows on,
The millions mount apace,
Yet not a copper, not a flag,
To designate the place.
Oh, countrymen, this long neglect
Is dead, I hope for aye.
Buy up the land, lay out the walks,
Our country's own alway!

This poem, written by Thomas J. Walker of Lambertville, was printed in the Trenton Times on January 25, 1912.  The sentiment created by this rhyme was very instrumental in arousing interest from the State Legislature to eventually support the creation of Washington's Crossing Park.

"......The column advanced slowly on a track that meandered through the dark woods. John Greenwood remembered that "we began an apparently circuitous march, not advancing faster than a child ten years could walk, and stopping frequently, though for what purpose I know not." To walk their route today is to discover why. The track was (and is) rough and winding, as it climbs upward from the river to an elevation of about two hundred feet. Parts of the route were steep and icy. The track was bad enough for infantry in the dark. It was worse for artillery and horses that had not been roughshod for the winter.                                                                                                                The army marched about a mile and half on that road and came to a crossroads at the Bear Tavern. Here the guides turned right ninety degrees into the Bear Tavern Road, which ran across a high flat tract of tableland, directly towards Trenton. Now they were moving southeast, and the storm was no longer blowing in their faces. The marching became easier for the men and it was better for the guns too. For a mile beyond Bear Tavern the surface of the road was remembered as "sleety" and "slippery", but the terrain was straight and level. The army began to make better time.                                                                                                                                                         Then they came to a big stream called Jacob's Creek. Its tumbling waters had cut a deep ravine directly across their path. The road fell away in a steep decline, down the side of the ravine, toward a rocky creek bed a hundred feet below. The water was high and swift that night as it flowed toward the Delaware River. In a storm of snow and sleet and hail, the steep descent was difficult for marching men, and impossible for limbered guns and harnassed horses.  Lieutenant Elisha Bostwick remembered that the column halted, and "our horses were then unharness'd & the artillery prepared." That ardous process, which he summarized in a few words, consumed precious time. The artillery's long drag ropes had to be brought out, and trees used as mooring posts for mechanical advantage, so that the guns could be lowered slowly to the bottom of the ravine. On the other side of the creek, the guns had to be hauled up again by teams of men who were struggling to keep their own balance. Slowly the column inched its way down the slope to Jacob's Creek and up the other side, only to meet another deep ravine. It was a flooded tributary of Jacob's Creek, smaller but very steep.                                                                                                                            George Washington rode up and down the column urging his men forward. Suddenly the general's horse slipped and started to fall on a steep and icy slope. "While passing a Slanting Slippery bank," Lieutenant Bostwick remembered, "his excellency's horse['s] hind feet both slip'd from under him." The animal began to go down. Elisha Bostwick watched in fascination as Washington locked his fingers in the animal's mane and hauled up its heavy head by brute force. He shifted its balance backward just enough to allow the horse to regain its hind footing on the treacherous road. Bostwick wrote that the general "seiz'd hs horses Mane and the Horse recovered." It was an extraordinary feat of strength, skill, and timing; and another reason why his soldiers stood in awe of this man.                                         At last the army passed the deep ravines of Jacob's Creek and came to a high strech of road that rose gradually to an elevation of 250 feet. ................."