Revolutionary War Myth: A Hessian Soldier and a Secret Room (The Hermitage)

Now this one is going to lose you. I don’t understand this myself, but I am giving this a shot. In the year 1923, Mary Elizabeth had just written a manuscript, “a Hessian Soldier was murdered [in the Hermitage] during the time of the Revolutionary War.

This may have been true, there were strange noises heard at different times. There is a secret room in the Hermitage during the War and also the War of 1812. Mary Elizabeth likely heard this from family members which were read into print, when the Tea room opened:

The Rosencrantz homestead at Hohokus N.J. which has an authenticated history and ghost was opened yesterday as a tea house.
     Miss Elizabeth Rosencrantz, the last of the family which have owned the house since 1807, is the proprietor.
     The ghost that of a Hessian officer was who was found murdered, the story goes, in an upper chamber of the house, presumably for a store of gold which he is said to have possessed.
—“Hohokus’ Ghost House Becomes Tea Resort,” May 28, 1917

There is actually a “secret room” in the Hermitage. It is above the dairy room off the kitchen. It would be a squeeze to start crawling there (in opinion). It however, never existed in the time of the Revolutionary War. It wasn’t added to about 1847-1848, by Elijah II and William Ranlett. There was another that existed during the War, and it is much older. It was when Theodosia Prevost’s mother, Ann De Visme was in the home, but no evidence proves Hessian soldiers were near the home.