deliberately inhumane conditions on rotting British prison ships in nearby Wallabout Bay on the East River between New York and Brooklyn (future Prison Ship Martyrs' Monument in Fort Greene Park) for much of the war. The policy of making prison conditions unbearable was ostensibly to encourage the soldiers to volunteer to join the British navy as an alternative. More American soldiers and sailors died on these ships from deliberate neglect than in every battle of the Revolution, combined. The anniversary of Evacuation Day, in which the last British troops and many Tory supporters and collaborators departed in November 1783, was long celebrated in New York. Social upheaval When the British left in 1783, they took along many loyalists including prominent businessmen, lawyers, financiers and clergymen. The Anglican Church had been especially powerful in the colonial era, and it began to lose much of its influence in the area as many prominent members departed. It lost its funding from the British Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, was soon after disestablished by the state in 1784, and therefore lost control of King's College (now Columbia University). The city was more democratic and much more open to ambitious entrepreneurs from middle-class and poor backgrounds. Notes References Further reading Archdeacon, Thomas J. New York City, 1664-1710: Conquest and Change (1976) Bridenbaugh, Carl. Cities in the Wilderness-The First Century of Urban Life in America 1625-1742 (1938) online edition Bridenbaugh, Carl. Cities in Revolt: Urban Life in America, 1743–1776 (1955) Burns, Ric, and James Sanders. New York: An Illustrated History (2003), large-scale book version of Burns PBS documentary, New York: A Documentary Film an eight part, 17½ hour documentary film directed by Ric Burns for PBS. It originally aired in 1999 with additional episodes airing in 2001 and 2003. Carp, Benjamin L. Rebels Rising: Cities and the American Revolution (2007); Focus on role of taverns Countryman, Edward. "The Uses of Capital in Revolutionary America: The Case of the New York Loyalist Merchants," William and Mary Quarterly, 49#1 (1992), pp. 3–28 in JSTOR Gellman, David N. "No Shelter from the Storm: Slavery and Freedom in Early New York City." New York History 103.1 (2022): 23-35. Goodfriend, Joyce D. Before the Melting Pot: Society and Culture in Colonial New York City, 1664-1730 (1994) Harris, Leslie M. In the Shadow of Slavery: African Americans in New York City, 1626-1863 (2004) Jackson, Kenneth and Roberts, Sam (eds.) The