On the 15th of June 1775, George Washington was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the recently established Continental Army. He was heading to Boston from Philadelphia, when he entered New York on the 25th of June.
There was a procession through the streets of the city. People, Alexander Hamilton and Hercules Mulligan among them, were cheering the head of the American army.
Coincidently, William Tryon, the British governor of New York, arrived on the same day after almost a year of absence. But he had to wait till Washington ‘s procession would pass, and then he could have been cheered by the loyalist citizens of New York.
According to the book “The First Conspiracy: The Secret Plot to Kill George Washington and the Birth of American Counterintelligence” by Bran Meltzer and Josh Mensch, this was the moment, when Tryon decided to hatch a plot to kill Washington.
Only a fortunate series of events prevented him from succeeding.
📖 Further reading:
Bran Meltzer and Josh Mensch: The First Conspiracy: The Secret Plot to Kill George Washington and the Birth of American Counterintelligence (Flatrion Books)