When the Declaration of Independence was proclaimed, the War for Independence was already well underway: Washington had triumphed in Boston, and now he was facing disaster in New York. On the very day the Congress had voted independence, General Howe landed ten thousand redcoats on Staten Island. A few days later his brother, Admiral Howe, sailed into the harbor with one hundred fifty transports, crowded with troops and supplies. It was at this dark hour that a copy of the Declaration reached Washington. He promptly ordered “that the several brigades are to be drawn up this evening on their respective Parades, at six o'clock, when the Declaration of Congress. . . is to be read in an audible voice.” At that hour soldiers and officers took their place on the parade ground - what is now, in all likelihood, City Hall Park in lower Manhattan - and the commander of each brigade read out the historic phrases:

When, in the course of human events…, We hold these truths to be self-evident…