General Hugh Mercer died on January 12, 1777, nine days after being mortally beaten and bayoneted near Stony Creek ten miles south of Princeton, New Jersey. He was riding in General Nathanael Greene’s division when British Colonel Charles Mawhood spotted them. Greene couldn’t see Mawhood but Washington could. He sent a message to Greene to stop them. Greene ordered Mercer and part of his brigade forward. Soon what began as a skirmish erupted into a full scale battle as Washington and Greene fed in more troops. Mercer was bayonetted seven times. He was taken to the field hospital at the Clarke House and tended to by Dr. Benjamin Rush. Mercer was in his fifties. He left behind a wife and five children in Virginia. General George S Patton is Mercer’s GGG grandson.