“The Night Patriots Burned New York City Down,” with Russell Shorto, Gotham Center for New York City History, CUNY Graduate Center, New York

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New York, the strategic center of the Revolutionary War, was the most important place in North America in 1776. That summer, an unruly rebel army under George Washington repeatedly threatened to burn the city rather than let the British take it. Shortly after the Crown’s forces took New York, much of it burned to the ground. Who set the blaze? In The Great New York Fire of 1776: A Lost Story of the American Revolution, Benjamin L. Carp delivers the “definitive account of this crucial but forgotten episode” in the first book to fully explore it, examining why its origins remained a mystery, even after two British investigations. Uncovering stories of espionage, terror, and radicalism, Carp paints a vivid picture of the chaos, passions, and unresolved tragedies that define a historical moment we usually associate with “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

Russell Shorto, prize-winning author of the bestseller Island at the Center of the World and Revolution Song: A Story of American Freedom, joins in conversation.