Débarquement des Troupes Angloises à Nouvelle Yorck (Landing of English Troops at New York)
Engraver Anonymous, French, 18th century French
After Franz Xavier Habermann German
Probably published by Jacques François Chereau French
Not on view
This imaginary waterfront view of New York shows British troops being conveyed to shore from large ships. They took control of the city in September 1776 after General George Washington's evacuated north, following their defeated at the Battle of Long Island. The British retained control until the end of the war in 1783. Architectural details here are derived from European sources and the print is part a series first engraved in Augsburg then reissued in Paris. Sold across Europe, such prints were known as Perspective Prints, or Vues d'optique in French, and Guckkastenbilder or Perspektivansichten in German. They were intended to be viewed through an optical device called a perspective glass or zograscope that contains a concave lens and a mirror that reversed the image and enhanced its three-dimensionality. Specially designed peepboxes were also made to contain them.
