Colonel Johann Gottlieb Rall

Johann Gottlieb Rall (c.1726-1776) was born into a military family and appears to have been commissioned into the Hesse-Kassel army at the age of 14. He steadily rose through the ranks: lieutenant in 1745, captain in 1753, major in 1760 and then lieutenant colonel of the Stein garrison regiment in 1763. He became chief of the Mansbach Regiment in 1771 or 1772, at which point it was presumably renamed the Rall Regiment. By the time he arrived in America, Rall had extensive campaigning experience - in the War of the Austrian Succession, in the Fourth Russo-Turkish War fighting for Catherine the Great, and even in the 1745 Jacobite rebellion in the UK. Despite not speaking a word of English, General Howe appointed Rall as commander of the entire brigade that was garrisoned at Trenton (either because Howe was impressed with Rall's conduct in the field or, probably more likely since Rall was junior to other colonels in seniority, due to a lack of alternatives as a result of illness).

I won't go into the details of the battle of Trenton on 26 December 1776. Suffice to say that it is now generally accepted that Rall was neither drunk nor particularly ill-prepared at the time. It is certainly the case that Rall failed to build any defensive fortifications around his position, despite being ordered to do so by Colonel von Donop, his superior officer; but that seems to have been because Rall wanted to go out and meet the Continentals in the event of an attack and didn't want his manoeuvrability compromised by fortifications. However, it's also clear that Rall was sufficiently concerned about sporadic American attacks on his sentries and outposts that he ordered his men to sleep in their uniforms and wrote to both von Donop and General James Grant, the British commander in New Jersey, that he was concerned about being exposed. There is an interesting analysis of Rall's conduct during the battle, and the subsequent court martial enquiry here. Rall died leading his troops from the front in a desperate counter-attack. He was visited by Washington as he lay dying and asked that his captured men be properly looked after, which Washington confirmed would be the case.

By all accounts, Rall was a brave, much-respected soldier who inspired loyalty from the men under his command. Colonel William Faucitt, the officer who had negotiated the supply of soldiers with the Hessian authorities, decsribed Rall as "one of the best officers of his rank in the Landgrave's army". Apparently Rall's aggressive performances at the battles of White Plains and Fort Washington earned him the nickname "der Lowe", i.e. "the lion". His adjutant, Lieutenant Jakob Piel, wrote in his diary that Rall was "generous, magnanimous, hospitable and polite to everyone". Piel also said that Rall sometimes struggled to settle on a firm decision and was "born to be a soldier, but not a general". In his book "The Hessians", Rodney Atwood notes that it was really only on the day of his death that it became clear that Rall wasn't suited to holding an independent brigade-level command.

In the "British Grenadier!"/Caliver scenario books, Rall appears as a brigade commander at White Plains and the C-in-C at Trenton. This figure is from the Foundry Seven Years War range. It works well for Rall as the coat does not have lapels, so being similar to the uniform of the Rall Grenadier Regiment. In fact, the uniform is not much removed from the Don Troiani painting of the death of Rall at Trenton (see here). I also like the pose - he looks as if he's leading from the front, which is what Rall was doing when he got shot. This was the first of these new Hessian command figures that I painted, and it was only after I'd finished that I read somewhere that the saddlecloths were the colour of the regimental facings of the relevant officer. But as all my existing Hessian commanders have dark blue horse furniture, I just decided to stick with that rather than follow the facings (which would have given bright yellow and orange on two of the others).

1 figure.  Painted August 2024.