George Washington crossed the Delaware River during his famous December 1776 military operation.
Washington led Continental Army troops across the river from Pennsylvania into New Jersey on the night of December 25–26, 1776. The hazardous crossing took place in icy conditions, and the army reached the New Jersey shore before dawn.
The operation targeted Hessian troops stationed at Trenton. The Continental forces attacked later that morning and won a strategically important victory, capturing prisoners and supplies while boosting Patriot morale after a difficult campaign.
The event is often remembered through Emanuel Leutze’s 1851 painting Washington Crossing the Delaware. The painting is dramatic and symbolic rather than a precise visual record: its boat, composition, and passengers do not accurately reproduce every practical detail of the actual crossing.