| He volunteered to enter New York after the British
occupation as a spy to gather information for George Washington. He
was captured with valuable intelligence stored in his boots. Hale
was waiting on the north shore of Long Island just east of Huntington
for a boat to take him back to American-held territory north of the
sound when he was taken by British soldiers. As an American officer
behind enemy lines in civilian clothes carrying spy reports, he was
hanged without trial. His bravery as he approached his execution awed
the British and has ever since served as an inspiration to American
patriots.
The Prisons and Prison Ships
The greatest suffering in the cause of American liberty was endured
in the New York prisons and prison ships in Wallabout Bay. Estimates
of the dead from the prison ships exceed 11,000 -- nearly triple
the 4,400 Americans who died in all the battles of the revolution.
The Americans were taken prisoner during the Battle of Long Island,
the retreat from New York, and especially at the fall of Fort Washington.
Others were captured on ships. With the available buildings on land
overflowing with prisoners, the British anchored old ships in the
bay to serve as prisons. The Jersey, the most notorious ship, housed
as many as 1,000 men. The starving and freezing men suffered from
small pox and many other diseases.
The Americans could obtain their freedom by pledging loyalty to
the king. Few did. Each morning, the bodies were carried from the
ship and buried in shallow trenches on the Brooklyn shore. The martyrs
are honored by a monument in nearby Fort Greene park.
Some of the most notorious British prisons were in what is now
City Hall Park. The jail, poorhouse and another building known as
the new Bridewell were used by the British to house American prisoners
of war. The Bridewell, named for a London jail, was the most deadly.
It had no windows, only bars. The winter winds took the lives of
hundreds of ill-fed patriots. There were other prisons in New York.
Churches were used along with a sugar warehouse south of what is
now Liberty Street. William Cunningham was the provost marshal of
the British jails. He is reported to have made a deathbed confession
to starving 2,000 prisoners in the city as he sold their allotted
rations for personal profit. He confessed to executing outright
275 American prisoners and "other obnoxious persons."
Women who visited the jails to speak to their husbands through the
windows were beaten with canes and ramrods. The 300 to 400 American
prisoners in the French Church, now the site of Chase Plaza, were
too crowded to all lie down at the same time.
The British Occupation
Having captured New York, the British found it costly to occupy
the city and the islands surrounding the magnificent harbor. Time
and again, the patriots would strike along the extensive English
perimeter. There were battles at Kings Bridge and Paulus Hook. Holding
New York, in fact, took so many men that the British could have
little success elsewhere during the war. English commanders in New
York decided not to go north to meet General Burgoyne coming down
from Canada, leaving his army to be surrounded and captured in the
woods by determined patriots. The British also found they did not
have enough men to hold both Philadelphia and New York, giving up
Philadelphia and taking a beating in the battle of Monmouth on the
way back to the city. Finally, as Cornwallis faced encirclement
at Yorktown, British General Clinton was fearful that New York would
be captured by the Americans, begging Cornwallis to send badly needed
men north as his own situation deteriorated. Cornwallis soon surrendered
and the fighting eased but peace negotiations dragged on into 1783
with the British still holding New York.
Next:
Washington Entered New York In Triumph
Learn More:
Hessian Huts
Fort Greene
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