New York Almanack

History, Natural History & the Arts

George Washington

James Wilson & The US Constitution

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James Wilson: The Anxious FounderJames Wilson was a Scottish-born legal scholar, jurist, and statesman who served as an associate justice of the United States Supreme Court from 1789 to 1798.

Wilson attended two Continental Congresses, signed of the Declaration of Independence, and helped draft the U.S. Constitution. A leading legal theorist, he was one of the first four Associate Justices appointed to the Supreme Court by George Washington. In his capacity as the first professor of law at the College of Philadelphia (later to become the University of Pennsylvania), he taught the first course on the new Constitution to President Washington and his Cabinet in 1789 and 1790. [Read more…] about James Wilson & The US Constitution

The French and Indian War: A New York Perspective

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Miniature of Fort Prince George under attack by French troops (diorama in the Fort Pitt Museum, Pittsburgh)In the early 1750s, the French were establishing trading posts and building forts along western the frontiers of the British colonies. In the fall of 1753, in part to protect his own land claims, Virginia Lieutenant Governor Robert Dinwiddie had sent 22-year-old George Washington (then a militia leader and surveyor) to deliver a letter to Fort Le Boeuf at what is today Waterford in northwest Pennsylvania, demanding they stop.

When Washington returned without success, Dinwiddie sent a small force to build Fort Prince George at the confluence of the Allegheny  and Monongahela Rivers (today Pittsburgh). Soon a larger French force arrived, torn down the small British fort, and began and built Fort Duquesne, named for then Governor-General of New France, Marquis Duquesne. [Read more…] about The French and Indian War: A New York Perspective

The British Occupation of New York City, 1776-1783

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Patriots topple the Bowling Green statue of King George Ill on July 9, 1776Historians are fond of saying that the Revolutionary War in the city of New York began and ended in the same place.  On July 9, 1776, the Declaration of Independence was read to George Washington’s troops at City Hall. Within minutes, a mob of fired-up patriots stormed nearby Bowling Green where they pulled down its statue of King George III and sawed off the royal crown finials on the uprights of the surrounding fence. (The original fence still stands, you can see the saw marks.) [Read more…] about The British Occupation of New York City, 1776-1783

Marquis de Lafayette at Albany During the Revolution

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George Washington and Lafayette at Mount Vernon, 1784 by Rossiter and Mignot, 1859Just prior to victory of American colonists at the Battles of Saratoga, the Continental Congress replaced Major General Philip Schuyler as Commander of the Northern Army with General Horatio Gates. Many colonial military units from New England had been reluctant to assist at Saratoga to serve under a “Dutch commander” but readily reported to serve under the English-born Gates. [Read more…] about Marquis de Lafayette at Albany During the Revolution

Did George Washington Burn New York City?

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the great new york fireAugust 27, 1776, British troops under General William Howe attacked American forces commanded by George Washington in the Battle of Brooklyn. Assailed from three sides, Washington and the main body of the Americans escaped across the East River to Manhattan and then fled north, ultimately crossing the Hudson River, then known as the North River, to New Jersey.

If Washington and his troops had been captured either in Brooklyn or Manhattan, the American Revolution would likely have ended soon after it began. [Read more…] about Did George Washington Burn New York City?

Who Started The Great New York Fire of 1776?

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The Great New York Fire of 1776The book The Great New York Fire of 1776: A Lost Story of the American Revolution (Yale University Press, 2023) by Benjamin Carp explores the Great Fire of 1776 and why its origins remained a mystery even after the British investigated it in 1776 and 1783. [Read more…] about Who Started The Great New York Fire of 1776?

Major General William Alexander, Lord Stirling: A Short Biography

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Detail of Lord Stirling's last stand around the Old Courtelyou House (now known as the Old Stone House in Park Slope) during the battle of BrooklynWilliam Alexander was born on December 25, 1726 in the city of New York to well-known lawyer James Alexander and his wife Mary. Mary and James had emigrated from Scotland in 1716. When they married, Mary was already a widow with six children and she and James had seven more. William was the second son of Mary and James, but when his older brother died in 1731, William became the male heir to the Alexander clan. [Read more…] about Major General William Alexander, Lord Stirling: A Short Biography

Newburgh Conspiracy: Showdown at the New Windsor Cantonment

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George Washington Versus the Continental ArmyIn 1783, in the stronghold of the Hudson Highlands during the latter years of the American Revolution, General George Washington kept a wary eye on the British force in the city of New York, 60 miles away. His army, owed months of back pay, and his officers frustrated by the negotiations over their promised pension, chafed under martial authority.

A nationalist faction in Congress seized upon this discontent to instigate the Newburgh Conspiracy, a plot by Continental Army officers to menace civil officials who opposed the Impost, a 5% tax on imports to be collected by the central government, to satisfy the nation’s debts. The army – by this time a formidable force of seasoned veterans – was provoked into threatening the very liberties it had fought to defend. [Read more…] about Newburgh Conspiracy: Showdown at the New Windsor Cantonment

Liberty and Slavery in the Birth of a Nation, 1765-1795

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american inheritanceLeaders of the founding of the United States who called for American liberty are scrutinized for enslaving Black people themselves: George Washington consistently refused to recognize the freedom of those who escaped his Mount Vernon plantation. And we have long needed a history of the founding that fully includes Black Americans in the Revolutionary protests, the war, and the debates over slavery and freedom that followed. [Read more…] about Liberty and Slavery in the Birth of a Nation, 1765-1795

Field of Corpses: Arthur St. Clair & the Death of an American Army

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field of corpsesNovember 4th, 1791 was a black day in American history. General Arthur St. Clair’s army encountered an Indigenous military force in what is now western Ohio.

In just three hours at what is known as St. Clair’s defeat, the Battle of the Wabash, or the Battle of a Thousand Slain, St. Clair’s force sustained the greatest loss ever inflicted on the United States Army by Native Americans — a total nearly three times larger than that incurred in the more famous Custer fight of 1876. [Read more…] about Field of Corpses: Arthur St. Clair & the Death of an American Army