This well-written account reads like a detective story. Carp (Brooklyn College; the Graduate Center, CUNY), the author of Defiance of the Patriots (CH, Jul'11, 48-6473) and Rebels Rising (CH, Jun'08, 45-5759), explores the origins of the mysterious fire of September 1776, which destroyed up to one-fifth of New York City and made 3,000 people homeless after the British had driven out George Washington's ragtag rebel army. Both sides used the disaster as war propaganda, accusing each other of setting the fire. Carp describes the city during this time as a chaos zone whose fractious population was sharply divided economically, racially, religiously, and socially. He points out that both sides used fire as a weapon during the war, intentionally setting towns ablaze. To him, this devastating fire disrupts the mythmaking about the Revolution, which portrays the rebels as heroic freedom fighters and ignores their less savory actions. After research on both sides of the Atlantic, Carp concludes that the conflagration was no accident, nor did it have British or Loyalist origins. Although General Washington denied complicity in ordering the fire, Carp clearly shows that the surviving evidence suggests the incendiaries were rebels. Summing Up: Highly recommended. General readers through faculty; professionals. --Laurence M. Hauptman, emeritus, State University of New York at New Paltz

Brooklyn College historian Carp (Defiance of the Patriots) delivers a detailed report on the fire that destroyed "more than a fifth" of New York City in September 1776, six days after it was taken by British forces in the Revolutionary War. Contending that the conflagration "reveals the mayhem and instability that accompanied the creation of the United States," Carp notes that when George Washington abandoned New York, some rebel troops--"undisciplined, dispirited, and vengeful"--remained behind. Spread by intense winds, the blaze was eventually brought under control by British forces and local firefighters, and "dozens of suspected incendiaries" were identified, including Amos Fellows, who, according to eyewitness testimony, was seen with "a burning torch in his hand... holding it up against the Roof of a Shed," and rebel spy Abraham Patten, who confessed to setting the fire just before he was hanged by the British in 1777. Carp contends that the blaze "appears to have been the intentional work of... the more radical elements of the rebel coalition," and relates how the patriot press, by "emphasiz British atrocities" and suggesting that the fire was an accident, "did their best to make the story disappear." Meticulously researched and richly documented, this is an intriguing look at a little-known aspect of the Revolutionary War. Illus. (Jan.)