Comments on Hessian Troops
Lieutenant W. Hale

Philadelphia, 23 March 1778

By the papers I find more Germans are to be hired, would to God England could raise an equal number of men, the behaviour of the Brunswickers is too recent to be forgotten; and the Hessians, who are allowed to be the best of the German troops, are by no means equal to the British in any respect. I believe them steady, but their slowness is of the greatest disadvantage in a country almost covered with woods, and against an Enemy whose chief qualification is agility in running from fence to fence and thence keeping up an irregular, but galling fire on troops who advance with the same pace as at their exercise. Light infantry accustomed to fight from tree to tree, or charge even in woods; and Grenadiers who after the first fire lose no time in loading again, but rush on, trusting entirely to that most decisive of weapons the bayonet, will ever be superior to any troops the Rebels can bring against them. Such are the British, and such the method of fighting which has been attended with constant success.... Hessians themselves make no scruple of owning our superiority over them, but palliate so mortifying a confession by saying 'Englishmen be the Divel for going on, but Hesse men be soldier.' They will not readily fight without being supported by their cannon which we think a useless encumbrance.

W.H. Wilkin. British Soldiers in America. (1914), p. 245.