Historian, Architect to Present "More Revelations on the Battle of Princeton"

The Princeton Battlefield Society, the Princeton Public Library, and the National Trust
for Historic Preservation will sponsor a lecture at the Princeton Public Library, “More Revelations on the Battle of Princeton,”  on Thursday, May 16 beginning at 7 p.m.

The talk will take place in the library's Community Room. 

The lecture features Historian Dr. Robert Selig and Archaeologist Wade Catts, with an introduction by Kip Cherry, 1^st VP, Princeton Battlefield Society. Dr. Selig and Wade Catts were the authors of a major study on the Battle of Princeton financed by the American Battlefield Protection Program, U.S. Department of the Interior entitled: Battle of Princeton Mapping Project: Report of Military Terrain Analysis and Battle Narrative, Princeton, New Jersey.  The study developed a new interpretation of the sequence of the Battle of Princeton using GIS/GPS to map the physical evidence in 130 original accounts of the Battle. Dr. Selig and Mr. Catts will discuss not only the findings of that study but also subsequent revelations and questions that still remain.  Ms. Cherry will provide a quick review of Princeton as a British Garrison before the Battle and the months following the Battle, a critical turning point of the American Revolution, and will be giving a peek at the pension application of a soldier named Jebez Flint.

The Battle of Princeton was a seminal moment in history and a critical turning
point of the American Revolution.  The Princeton Battlefield, and particularly the Counterattack site, was named by the National Trust as one of the 11 Most Endangered Sites in the United States for 2012.

Robert Selig, PhD

Dr. Robert Selig was the Project Historian as a subconsultant to John Milner Associates for the Princeton Battlefield Study. He was responsible for reviewing existing documentation of the battle, for conducting limited additional historical research, identifying Defining Features, refining the extent of the Core Area, conducting the Military Terrain Analysis, and in assisting the GIS specialist in developing the overlay maps and final work products. Dr. Selig also participated in the public presentation for the PBS. Dr. Selig is a historical consultant who has taught at colleges and universities in the Mid-West, most recently at Hope College in Holland, MI. He is a specialist on the role of French forces under the comte de Rochambeau during the American Revolutionary War and currently serves as project historian to the National Park Service for the Washington-Rochambeau Revolutionary Route (W3R) National Historic Trail Project. As part of this project he has researched and written historical and architectural site surveys and resource inventories on the W3R for the States of Connecticut, New York, Delaware, Rhode Island, New Jersey and Pennsylvania and is currently conducting a revolutionary road and transportation survey in the Commonwealth of Virginia.  These reports either already are (CT, NY and DE) or will soon be available on the internet. He has published a number of books, most recently Hussars in Lebanon! A Connecticut Town and Lauzun's Legion during the American Revolution, 1780-1781 (Lebanon, 2004); 'En Avant' With Our French Allies: Sites, Markers, and Monuments in Connecticut Commemorating the Contributions of French Troops under the comte de Rochambeau to the Achievement of American Independence, 1780 to 1782 (Hartford, 2004) as well as a translation of A Treatise on Partisan Warfare by Johann von Ewald., Introduction and Annotation by Robert A. Selig and David Curtis Skaggs (Westport, 1991). He has also published about 75 articles in American and German scholarly and popular history magazines such as the William and Mary Quarterly, Eighteenth-Century Studies, Yearbook of the Society for German-American Studies, Journal of Caribbean History, American Heritage, Naval History, Military History Quarterly, Colonial Williamsburg, German Life, Damals, (in German) and the Journal of the Johannes Schwalm Historical Association. Dr. Selig received his PhD in history from the Universität Würzburg in Germany in 1988. 

Wade Catts, MA. RPA

Wade Catts is an Associate Director of Cultural Resources with John Milner Associates. He was the Project Manager for the Princeton Battlefield study. Coordinated with the Project Historian and GIS Specialist and was responsible for study components that included the Definition of Features, the KOCOA analysis, and refinement of the Core Area. In December, 2011, Mr. Catts presented a paper on the Battle of Princeton and his findings to The International Conference on Monuments and Sites in Paris.  It was entitled: “Archaeology, Computer Technology and The Battle of Princeton as a Crosscultural Trans-Atlantic Encounter.” Mr. Catts is a Registered Professional Archaeologist with over 28 years of experience in cultural resource management, archaeological investigations and historical research. Mr. Catts’ Revolutionary War historical and archeological experience spans several states. In Pennsylvania he has worked at Valley Forge National Historic Park on a variety of studies including historical research and field investigations of a Revolutionary War musketry range, as well as historical research and the development of historic commemorative contexts for seven national military parks: Valley Forge, Chickamauga/Chattanooga, Gettysburg, Shiloh, Vicksburg, Antietam, and Minute Man. He also researched the site of Camp Security, a British POW camp near York. His work also included researching Morris County’s Beverwyck Plantation – where Washington, his officers, and the French ambassadors were entertained – and at Raritan Landing, where British forces cantoned during the winter-spring of 1777. With the assistance of a McKinstry Award from the Delaware Heritage Commission, he is completing a book of the history and archeology of the Battle of Cooch’s Bridge, Delaware’s only Revolutionary War engagement. In 2007 he published a chapter in the 250th Anniversary volume Histories of Newark, 1758-2008, entitled “Newark and Newarkers in the Era of the American Revolution, 1775-1783.” Mr. Catts received a Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology/History in 1981 and a Master of Arts in American History in 1988, both from the University of Delaware. He is a member of Society for Historical Archeology, the Council for Northeast Historical
Archeology, the Company of Military Historians (US), and the Society for Army
Historical Research (UK).