Thomas Paine, living with Washington's troops, had…

Thomas Paine, living with Washington's troops, had on December 23 begun publishing The American Crisis, containing the stirring phrase, "These are the times that try men's souls."

Washington had ordered the first issue of The Crisis read to his troops on Christmas Eve, then at 6 p.m. on Christmas Day, all twenty-six hundred of them march to McKonkey's Ferry, ...