Leaving a sufficient force of British and Hessians, under Lord Percy, to guard the city, and others to man his lines toward Harlem, he embarked the remainder of his army upon ninety flat-boats, passed through the narrow and turbulent strait of Hell Gate, and landed upon Throck's Neck,Oct. 12, 1774a low peninsula jutting into the East River from the main of West Chester county, sixteen miles from the city. *** A few days afterwardOct. 17
* Mr. David Grim, a merchant of New York, who saw the conflagration, has left a record of the event. He says the fire broke out in a low groggery and brothel, a wooden building on the wharf, near Whitehall Slip. It was discovered between one and two o'clock in the morning of the twenty-first of September. The wind was from the southwest. There were but few inhabitants in the city, and the flames, for a while unchecked. spread rapidly. All the houses between Whitehall and Broad Streets, up to Beaver Street, were consumed, when the wind veered to the southeast and drove the fire toward Broadway. It consumed all on eaeh side of Beaver Street to the Bowling Green, a little above which it crossed Broadway, and swept all the buildings on both sides, as far as Exchange Street. On the west side it consumed almost every building from Morris Street to Partition (Fulton) Street, devouring Trinity church * in its way, and destroyed all the buildings toward the North River. For a long time the new (St. Paul's) church was in peril, for the fire crept in its rear to Mortkile (Barclay) Street, and extended west of King's (Columbia) College to Murray Street. The exact number of buildings consumed was four hundred and ninety-three. The city then contained about four thousand houses. "The ruins," says Dunlap (who wandered over the scene at the close of the war), "on the southeast side of the town were converted into dwelling places by using the chimneys and parts of walls which were firm, and adding pieces of spars with old canvas from the ships, forming hovels—part hut and part tent." This was called Canvas Town, and there the vilest of the army and Tory refugees congregated. The Tories, and British writers of the day attempted to fix the crime of incendiarism upon the Whigs, but could not. It was well known that the fire had an accidental origin, yet British historians continue to reproduce the libel.
** The officer who went out to Lexington with re-enforcements in April, 1775.—See page 528, vol. i.
*** This is spelled Throck's, Throg's, and Frog's, in different histories. It was originally owned by a man named Throckmorton, who was called Throck for the sake of brevity. On the extreme point of this peninsula, at the entrance to Long Island Sound, stands Fort Schuyler, a strong work completed in 1842.
* Trinity church was erected at the close of the seventeenth century. The first building was small and square. Queen Anne granted to the corporation in 1705 the land extending along the west side of Broadway to Christopher Street, known as the Queen's Farm. The edifice was enlarged in 1737 to one hundred and forty-eight feet in length, including the tower and chancel, and seventy-two feet in breadth. The steeple was one hundred and seventy-five feet in height. This was the edifice consumed by the great fire in 1776. The sketch of the ruins is from a picture made on the spot, and published in Dr. Berrian's History of Trinity Church. It was rebuilt in 1788, taken down in 1839, and on the twenty-first of May, 1846, the present edifice was consecrated to Christian worship.