Revolutionary War History of Union NJ | America Turns 250

On July 4, 2026, the United States turns 250 years old. The tall ships will gather in New York Harbor, the fireworks will light up the sky from coast to coast, and Americans everywhere will celebrate the founding of this nation. But if you really want to stand where the Revolution happened — where musket balls flew, where a woman’s death became a rallying cry for independence, and where the British invasion of New Jersey was stopped cold — you don’t need to go to Philadelphia or Boston. You need to drive to Union Township, New Jersey.

Most people know Union Township as an affordable, well-connected suburb — a place with good highway access, solid housing stock, and a short commute to Newark and New York City. What many don’t realize is that the ground beneath those split-levels and Colonials is some of the most significant Revolutionary War terrain in the country. This is where the British Army’s last major invasion of the northern colonies was turned back. This is where a minister’s wife was killed inside her own home and became a symbol of the Patriot cause. And this is a township where the street names themselves — Colonial Arms Road, Battle Hill Terrace, Caldwell Avenue, Liberty Avenue — tell the story of what happened here 246 years ago.

⚔️ Before It Was Union, It Was Connecticut Farms

The area we now call Union Township was settled in the 1660s and 1670s by families from Connecticut who established a farming community they named Connecticut Farms. It was a modest settlement centered around a Presbyterian meetinghouse on what is today Stuyvesant Avenue — farmland, orchards, and a small cluster of homes along the roads connecting Elizabethtown to the Watchung Mountains.

For more than a century, Connecticut Farms was a quiet agricultural community. But its geography made it strategically critical once the Revolution began. Sitting between the British garrison in New York City and George Washington’s Continental Army encamped at Morristown, Connecticut Farms was directly in the path of any British advance through the Hobart Gap in the Watchung Mountains. By 1780, this quiet farming village had become a battlefield.

The township was officially renamed Union in 1808, but the old name lives on in the Connecticut Farms Presbyterian Church at 888 Stuyvesant Avenue — the same congregation that witnessed the battle firsthand, and whose cemetery still holds a mass grave of British and Hessian soldiers killed in the fighting.

🔥 June 7, 1780: The Battle of Connecticut Farms

By the spring of 1780, the Revolutionary War had dragged on for four years. Washington’s army at Morristown had just survived the worst winter of the century — worse even than Valley Forge. Twenty-eight snowstorms hit that season. The waters around New York City froze solid. Soldiers were unpaid, undersupplied, and deserting. British intelligence reported that the Continental Army had been reduced to roughly 3,500 men and was plagued by mutinies.

Hessian Lieutenant General Wilhelm von Knyphausen, commanding the British garrison in New York while General Clinton was away capturing Charleston, saw an opportunity. On the night of June 6, he loaded roughly 6,000 British and Hessian troops onto boats on Staten Island. By midnight, they began landing at Elizabethtown Point. Their objective: push west through the Hobart Gap, reach Morristown, and destroy Washington’s weakened army.

It didn’t go as planned.

The retreating troops left a trail of destruction. They plundered the village and burned at least a dozen homes, the Presbyterian church, and the parsonage. But the damage they inflicted would pale in comparison to the political cost of what happened inside that parsonage.

🕯️ Hannah Caldwell: The Death That Changed a War

The Reverend James Caldwell was the pastor of the First Presbyterian Church in Elizabethtown and a fierce Patriot — so vocal in his opposition to British rule that the Crown placed a bounty on his head. Known as “The Fighting Parson,” Caldwell served as chaplain to the 3rd New Jersey Regiment under Colonel Elias Dayton while continuing to preach independence from the pulpit. After British troops burned his church and home in Elizabeth in January 1780, Caldwell moved his wife Hannah and their nine children to the parsonage at Connecticut Farms, believing they would be safer there.

When the alarm guns sounded on the morning of June 7, Caldwell urged Hannah to leave the parsonage and accompany him to safety in Springfield. According to the Union Township Historical Society, she refused, saying they must trust in Providence and that she would not be harmed.

She was wrong. As British and Hessian troops swept through Connecticut Farms, a soldier fired a musket shot through the bedroom window of the parsonage. Hannah Caldwell was struck and killed, reportedly while sitting on a bed with her children. Whether the shooting was a deliberate targeting of a known Patriot family or a tragic accident of war has been debated for 246 years, but the effect was immediate and profound.

The tragedies that followed the Caldwell family did not end with Hannah. In 1781, Reverend James Caldwell himself was shot and killed by an American sentry named James Morgan under disputed circumstances. Morgan was tried at the Presbyterian Church in Westfield, convicted of murder, and hanged at a site known as Gallows Hill — now marked by a plaque on East Broad Street in Westfield. James and Hannah Caldwell are buried together at the First Presbyterian Church Cemetery in Elizabeth. Their nine children were left orphaned.

🏛️ Liberty Hall: A Governor’s Estate in the Line of Fire

When the 6,000 British troops marched west from Elizabethtown on June 7, 1780, one of the first significant properties they passed was Liberty Hall — the home of William Livingston, New Jersey’s first elected governor, a member of the Continental Congress, and eventually a signer of the United States Constitution. Livingston had built the 14-room Georgian manor in 1772 on 120 acres of what was then quiet farmland. The peace didn’t last.

The British raided Liberty Hall multiple times during the war, looking for the governor himself. Livingston was frequently on the run, sometimes staying at a leased house in Parsippany when British troop positions made his home too dangerous. By the time he could safely return after the war in 1783, the estate had been heavily damaged by both British and American forces.

Livingston served as governor for 14 consecutive years until his death in 1790 — reelected 14 times. His daughter married John Jay, the first Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, at Liberty Hall. A Livingston granddaughter eloped from the estate with William Henry Harrison, who would become the ninth President of the United States. You can see Liberty Hall from the Garden State Parkway. Most commuters drive past it every day without knowing the history they’re passing.

🗺️ The Street Names That Tell the Story

One of the most remarkable things about Union Township is how the Revolutionary War is woven into the everyday geography of the town. You don’t need a museum visit or a guided tour to encounter the history — the street signs do the work. Many of Union’s roads, neighborhoods, and landmarks carry names that trace directly back to June 1780 and the colonial era. Here are some of the most significant:

There’s something remarkable about buying a home on Colonial Arms Road or raising your kids on Battle Hill Terrace — living your daily life on streets named for the people and events that helped create this country. It’s a kind of history you don’t find in a textbook. It’s on your mailbox.

📍 Where to See Revolutionary War History in Union Today

You don’t need to be a history buff to appreciate these sites. They’re scattered across just a few square miles of Union Township, and most are free and open to the public.

🇺🇸 Union County’s Revolutionary War Legacy

Union Township’s history doesn’t exist in isolation — it’s part of a broader Revolutionary War landscape that stretches across Union County and the entire state. New Jersey saw more battles and skirmishes than any other colony during the war, earning it the nickname “The Crossroads of the American Revolution.” Union County was at the center of that crossroads.

Neighboring Springfield has its own cannonball-scarred house and Battle Ground Cemetery from the June 23 follow-up attack. Westfield has the site of Gallows Hill where James Morgan was hanged for killing Reverend Caldwell. Scotch Plains marks the 1777 Battle of the Short Hills and the Frazee House, where legend says Betty Frazee gave bread to General Cornwallis with the famous declaration, “I give you this in fear, not in love.” Elizabeth has Boxwood Hall, home of Elias Boudinot, president of the Continental Congress who signed the treaty of peace with Britain — and the spot where the body of the murdered Reverend Caldwell was displayed to rally the troops.

This is the county where the county seal itself depicts a killing from the Revolution. That tells you everything about how deeply this history runs.

🏡 Living Where History Happened

For homebuyers, especially families relocating from New York City, there’s something uniquely appealing about the idea of living on historically significant ground — and being able to afford it. Union Township offers that combination. The Battle Hill neighborhood gets its name from the elevated terrain that made it strategically important in 1780; today it’s defined by three- and four-bedroom Colonials on tree-lined streets with solid schools and good park access. Putnam Manor, tucked between Colonial Avenue and Salem Road, is one of Union’s most sought-after pockets — quieter streets, slightly larger lots, and well-updated homes that consistently command premiums.

The Connecticut Farms neighborhood around Stuyvesant Avenue is the historic heart of town, with well-maintained single-family homes, mature street trees, and Revolutionary War markers you can walk past on an evening stroll. And throughout the township, those history-laden street names — Colonial Arms Road, Battle Hill Terrace, Caldwell Avenue — are the addresses on real homes where real families live today.

Union doesn’t market itself as a historic destination the way Morristown or Princeton does. But the history is there, written into the streets, preserved in the church cemetery, displayed on the county seal, and waiting to be appreciated by a new generation of residents who can call this ground home.

❓ Frequently Asked Questions

For families exploring Union County’s towns, our town guide series covers Union Township, Westfield, Scotch Plains, Clark, and Summit — with commute times, school data, and real estate pricing for each. Our NJ commute times to NYC guide covers the Raritan Valley Line and express bus routes that serve Union Township, and our best NJ towns close to NYC guide puts Union in context with neighboring communities.

For more on NJ’s Revolutionary War heritage and America250 events across the state, visit RevolutionNJ.org (the official NJ Semiquincentennial initiative), the Union County 250th Anniversary page, and the Union Township Historical Society.

The Michael Martinetti Group | Keller Williams Premier Properties · 1 Elm Street, Westfield, NJ 07090 · 1716 E 2nd Street, Scotch Plains, NJ 07076 · 1-855-I-SELL-NJ · Members of GSMLS, NJMLS, MoreMLS, ALLJersey MLS, Hudson MLS, Bright MLS · All information deemed reliable but not guaranteed. Historical details sourced from the Union Township Historical Society, the American Battlefield Trust, Crossroads of the American Revolution, Union County government, and the National Park Service. This post is for informational purposes and does not constitute legal or historical advice.