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Historical person
died 1776
Thomas Hickey was an Irish-born soldier who served in George Washington’s Commander-in-Chief’s Guard during the opening months of the American Revolutionary War. Arrested amid fears of mutiny and conspiracy in New York, he was convicted by court martial and hanged on 28 June 1776. The surviving evidence clearly establishes the military prosecution, although later retellings sometimes make the alleged assassination plot more extensive than contemporary documentation supports.
In Laurie Halse Anderson’s Chains, Isabel’s intelligence work brings her close to the Loyalist conspiracy and Hickey’s public execution. His fate gives the fictional espionage plot a documented historical anchor and shows how suspicion, military justice and political fear shaped New York before the British occupation.
Series
The Seeds of America trilogy follows Isabel and Curzon, two young people fighting enslavement while Britain’s North American colonies fight for independence. Beginning in New York in 1776, continuing through Saratoga and the Valley Forge encampment, and ending at Yorktown in 1781, the novels connect their search for…
All books in this series
