The battle for New York

About this book

"On September 15, 1776, the British army under General William Howe invaded Manhattan Island, landing at an open field on the banks of the East River, just south of where the United Nations sits today. George Washington's Continental Army, still in disarray after its miraculous escape following the disastrous Battle of Brooklyn some two weeks earlier, retreated north to Harlem Heights, leaving New York in British hands. Control of the city was Howe's primary objective; located at the mouth of the strategically vital Hudson River, it had become the centerpiece of England's plan for suppressing the American rebellion. However, as Barnet Schecter reveals in his stirring narrative, far from furnishing a key to the colonies, New York proved to be an albatross that helped strangle the British war effort." "The Battle for New York tells the story of how the city became the pivot on which the American Revolution turned: from the political and religious struggles of the 1760s and early 1770s that polarized its citizens and increasingly made New York a hotbed of radical thought and action; to the campaign of 1776 that turned today's five boroughs and Westchester County into a series of battlefields; to the seven years of British occupation and martial law, during which time George Washington and Congress were as intent on getting the city back as the British were on holding it."--Jacket.