In the early stages of the Battle of Princeton, disciplined British soldiers forced the Americans into a chaotic retreat, but as Brigadier General Hugh Mercer’s and Colonel John Cadwalader’s forces regrouped beyond the Thomas Clarke House, two four-pounder cannons commanded by Captain Joseph Moulder of Philadelphia protected them and prevented the British from advancing. Moulder and his crew of 20 boys recruited from the Philadelphia dock area placed their artillery on a small hill near the Clarke House, where their position denied the British a clear shot while they fired grape shot into enemy ranks and kept British soldiers pinned behind fences 200 yards away until General George Washington arrived with reinforcements to organize the troops and lead a counterattack on January 3, 1777. After the battle, Moulder’s crew served as a rear guard to delay British soldiers arriving from Trenton, and instead of obeying orders to spike and abandon the guns, Moulder and his boys, aided by 40 men per cannon, hauled them after the army to the safety of Morristown, an action that nearly led to his court-martial. James Peale, a first lieutenant with the First Maryland Regiment at Princeton, later drew on his own experience and first-hand accounts for his painting The Battle of Princeton, created about 1782, combining several moments of the engagement into a single interpretation that includes Washington arriving on his chestnut charger Nelson, Mercer mortally wounded after a brutal bayonet attack, Moulder directing a five-man cannon crew, British soldiers held back by grapeshot with Nassau Hall on the horizon, and the no-longer-standing William Clarke house, barn, and orchard at the site of the initial fighting between Mercer’s force and Lieutenant Colonel Charles Mawhood.
