British Occupation of New York City, 1776–1783

British forces captured New York City in September 1776 after the campaign around Long Island and Manhattan. The city became Britain’s principal North American military base, a destination for Loyalist refugees and a centre for administration, provisioning, intelligence and privateering.

Occupation brought overcrowding, shortages, military policing and extensive imprisonment. The Great Fire of September 1776 destroyed a large part of the city, while prisons and prison ships held thousands of captured or suspected Patriots under severe conditions.

Chains uses the occupation to transform Isabel’s domestic enslavement into a wider political and military danger. The Lockton household, Patriot intelligence, the fire and Curzon’s confinement in Bridewell place fictional lives inside a city governed by war.