4-minute read

• The 1st New Jersey Regiment, made up of local tradesmen and farmers, placed Franklin under house arrest after he refused to yield authority.
• Franklin later led Loyalist operations from Manhattan, using knowledge of New Jersey to target rebel homes and disrupt Patriot efforts.

On a bitter January morning in 1776, Patriot militia from the 1st New Jersey Regiment slogged through slush to the Proprietary House in Perth Amboy. Their target was William Franklin, the Crown’s highest-ranking civilian official between New York and Philadelphia.

Franklin was not a visiting British officer or a passing bureaucrat. He was the royal governor of New Jersey, and his arrest was a milestone that destroyed the bridge back to reconciliation.

His father, Benjamin Franklin, was already a figure of international renown. Printer, scientist, inventor and diplomat, he moved easily between Philadelphia and London. William had grown up in that orbit, trained in law and politics.

Unlike his father, who increasingly sympathized with the colonial cause, William sided with the Crown. He saw loyalty to Britain as vital to protect law, order and property.

Story continues below photo gallery.

In the months before militiamen arrived at his door, Franklin steadfastly refused to yield authority as governor. While local Committees of Observation enforced boycotts and intercepted mail, Franklin continued issuing proclamations, corresponding with British officials and loyalists and asserting that the government was still under control of the Crown.

By early January, patience had ended among members of the state’s revolutionary committees. Allowing Franklin to operate inside New Jersey was no longer seen as tolerable.

Shoemakers, tanners and farmers

The men sent to detain him were not professional soldiers in the British sense. In the 1872 “Official Register of the Officers and Men of New Jersey in the Revolutionary War,” historian William Stryker wrote that the 1st New Jersey Regiment was drawn largely from Essex, Bergen and Elizabethtown.

Stryker noted that shoemakers and tanners from Newark, men who had watched their businesses tighten under British currency and customs policies, made up a significant portion of the early volunteers.

Alongside them were Dutch-descended farmers from the Hackensack Valley, many of whom viewed Franklin’s land agents and surveyors as a threat to their claims, historian Adrian Leiby wrote in the 1962 work “The Revolutionary War in the Hackensack Valley.”

It also had members of the Elizabeth-Town Rifles, whose officers lived within sight of the British fleet in New York Harbor.

The group included men who had previously served during British campaigns during the French and Indian War, when Franklin held a captain’s commission. In her 1990 biography “William Franklin: Son of a Patriot, Servant of a King,” historian Sheila Skemp wrote that some had trained with him, while others had marched beside him.

Mission led by Lord Stirling from Basking Ridge

Primary source journals from the regiment describe the uncomfortable silence of the Jan. 8 mission, led by William Alexander, an aristocrat from Basking Ridge known as Lord Stirling. In the 1847 volume “The Life of William Alexander,” William Alexander Duer wrote that before the war, Stirling and Franklin had shared wine, discussed land deals and attended the same elite galas.

The group did not storm the Proprietary House. Contemporary journals describe a solemn encirclement. Guards were placed at the gates. According to the “New Jersey Archives” published in 1886, Franklin was informed by Stirling rather plainly that he “received orders… (and) to prevent your quitting the Province… I have therefore ordered a guard to be placed at your gates.”

Franklin objected immediately, calling the arrest a “high insult” and illegal.

The 1886 “New Jersey Archives” record that he argued that nobody in New Jersey possessed the right to restrain the king’s appointed governor, but it was no use. Authority had shifted.

Franklin signed a parole agreement restricting his movement. Within weeks, it nonetheless became clear that he had no intention of complying.

Seized and transported to Connecticut

He continued corresponding with loyalist figures and acting as governor in all but name. The Provincial Congress responded by ordering his removal from New Jersey. In June 1776, Franklin was seized again and transported under guard to Connecticut.

While Franklin remained imprisoned, events in New Jersey continued. Royal government collapsed. A new governor, William Livingston, assumed office. New Jersey moved formally into rebellion.

Franklin was released in a 1778 prisoner exchange and sent to British-occupied New York City. He did not return to New Jersey. Instead, he took up a new role as president of the Board of Associated Loyalists, an organization tasked with coordinating loyalist refugees and retaliatory actions against Patriot strongholds.

In research for the Online Institute for Advanced Loyalist Studies, Todd Braisted wrote that this organization operated as a paramilitary arm of the Loyalist cause.

From Manhattan, Franklin drew on his detailed knowledge of New Jersey’s geography and leadership. Raids authorized under the board targeted farms, barns and ironworks. Loyalist parties crossed the Hudson at night, seizing property and prisoners in Bergen and Essex counties.

Leiby documented that survivors later testified that attackers called out names as they approached, which provided evidence of the advanced knowledge Franklin had gathered as governor.

Franklin’s actions during these years ensured that he could never return. When the war ended, he relocated permanently to Britain, where he died in 1813.

New Jersey residents can expect quiet conditions Thursday night before a warm front lifts northward, bringing increasing clouds and a chance of rain showers by Friday afternoon.

Temperatures are forecast to rise 10 to 15 degrees above normal, reaching the mid-50s, as a precursor to a wet start to the weekend.

The first round of precipitation is expected to arrive late Friday afternoon into the early evening hours. While rainfall is generally expected to be light during this initial phase, there could be an isolated rumble of thunder, according to forecasters from the National Weather Service.

A cold front will pass through the region overnight, likely creating a lull in the rain showers before the next system arrives.

More widespread rainfall is forecast to return Saturday afternoon and evening as low pressure tracks across the area. During this time, rain could become heavy at times.

Rainfall totals between a half inch and 1.5 inches are predicted across New Jersey through Saturday night. Despite the anticipated volume of water, forecasters say flooding risks should be minimal to none.

Due to the recent stretch of mild temperatures, there is no concern regarding ice jams or river ice hindering runoff.

There is some uncertainty in the forecast regarding specific temperatures and wind speeds for Saturday, the weather service said.

Conditions will change significantly on Sunday as a secondary cold front moves through the region, forecasters said. As the rain clears, strong cold air advection will result in a breezy day, with west to northwest wind gusts peaking in the 30 to 40 mph range.

Temperatures will drop throughout the day, falling into the 20s for most of the area by Sunday night.

Looking ahead to the start of the work week, high pressure will build over the region, bringing dry conditions. Monday and Tuesday are expected to feature clear skies and temperatures near normal for January.

By Tuesday and Wednesday, return flow will develop as high pressure moves off the coast, helping temperatures moderate to about 5 degrees above normal.

No significant weather impacts are expected from Monday through next Thursday.

Current weather radar

Two people were killed and two others, including a toddler, were injured in a wrong-way crash in Totowa, New Jersey, earlier this week.

Officials confirm the wrong-way driver was off-duty Newark firefighter Albin Fermin, 30. According to Newark officials, Fermin had been with the Newark Fire Department since February 2024 and was assigned to Engine 10.

Wrong-way driver, mother of 2-year-old killed

The crash happened on I-80 just after 2 a.m. Monday.

New Jersey State Police said 60-year-old Joanne Furman was driving west on I-80 with her daughter Imani Furman, 24, and her 2-year-old grandson, when they were struck head-on by Fermin, who was driving the wrong way.

Fermin and Imani Furman were both killed in the crash.

Police said Joanne Furman was seriously injured and the 2-year-old suffered moderate injuries. Both were taken to a local hospital.

The crash remains under investigation.

“It wasn’t my daughter’s fault”

Janice Furman, Joanne Furman’s mother and Imani Furman’s grandmother, said her family is devastated.

“It wasn’t my daughter’s fault. It was not her fault,” she said. “They’re showing pictures of [Fermin], his family and the whole team of his fire department. ‘We’re going to miss you.’ Almost like a heroic thing. This isn’t heroic. He killed someone.”

Janice Furman said after undergoing several surgeries, Joanne Furman regained consciousness Wednesday. That’s when the family had to break the news about Imani Furman.

“That’s all she said to me, is, ‘Mommy, she’s gone,’” Janice Furman said.

She said the family is overwhelmed with grief.

“Imani was a very spirit-filled young lady. She loved life. She loved to sing. She loved to dance,” Janice Furman said.

She said Imani Furman’s only son, Messiah, was her world.

“She won’t see him graduate. She won’t see anything,” Janice Furman said. 

Joanne Furman will have to undergo weeks of physical therapy before she can walk again, her mother said. The family is asking for prayers as they navigate her recovery and plan a funeral.