to be the work of the negroes, many of whom were arrested;
and upon the sole evidence of a servant girl a number of the poor
wretches were convicted and hanged. Several whites were charged with
being the accomplices of the negroes. One of these, John Ury, a Roman
Catholic priest, and, as is now believed, an innocent man, was hanged, in
August. In the space of six months 154 negroes and twenty whites were
arrested, twenty negroes were hanged, thirteen were burned at the stake,
and seventy-eight were transported. The rest were released. In 1750 a
theatre was opened, and in 1755 St. Paul's Church was erected. In 1754
the "Walton House," in Pearl street (still standing), was built by
William Walton, a merchant. It was long known as the finest private
residence in the city. In 1755 the Staten Island ferry, served by means
of row boats, was established, and in the same year Peck Slip was opened
and paved. In 1756 the first lottery ever seen in the city was opened in
behalf of King's (now Columbia) College.

New York bore a prominent part in the resistance of the colonies to the
aggressions of the mother country, and in spite of the efforts of her
royalist Governor and the presence of a large number of Tories, responded
cordially to the call of the colonies for men and money during the war.
On the 14th of April, 1776, the city was occupied by the American army,
the British force stationed there being obliged to withdraw. On the 26th
of August, 1776, the battle of Long Island having been lost by the
Americans, New York was occupied by the British, who held it until the
close of the war. It suffered very much at their hands. Nearly all the
churches, except the Episcopal, were used by them as prisons, riding
schools, and stables; and the schools and colleges were closed. On the
21st of September, 1776, a fire destroyed 493 houses, including Trinity
Church--all the west side of Broadway from Whitehall to Barclay street,
or about one-eighth of the city; and on the 7th of August 1778, about 300
buildings on East River were burned. The winter of 1779-80 was very
severe; there was a beaten track for sleighs and wagons across the
Hudson; the ice in that river being strong enough to bear a horse and man
as late as the 17th of March; eighty sleighs, with provisions, and a
large body of troops, crossed on the ice from the city to Staten Island.
On the 25th of November, 1783, the British evacuated the city, which was
at once