Prison Ship Martyrs Monument

Lunch Hour Trek - just a short distance form my office...

Prison Ship Martyrs Monument - Brooklyn, NY

The Prison Ship Martyrs' Monument is a memorial to the more than 11,500 American prisoners of war who died in captivity aboard sixteen British prison ships during the American Revolutionary War. When it was built, it was the world's tallest Doric column. (More details below...)

Manhattan in the distance

Details

During the Revolutionary War, the British maintained a series of prison ships in the New York Harbor and jails on the shore for captured prisoners of war. Due to brutal prison conditions, more Americans died in British jails and prison ships in New York Harbor than in all the battles of the American Revolutionary War.

Following the end of the American Revolutionary War in 1783, the remains of those who died on the 16 prison ships were neglected, left to lie along the Brooklyn shore on Wallabout Bay, a rural area little visited by New Yorkers.

The monument visited above was the third and final location, The dedication ceremony for this location occurred on November 15, 1908, and included a parade with 15,000 participants. A distinguished array of prominent politicians and dignitaries watched along with approximately twenty thousand spectators as "the enormous flag draping the Prison Ship Martyrs' Monument on the highest point of Fort Greene Park, Brooklyn, was allowed to slide slowly to the ground from its heigth of 198 feet in the air.
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Source: Wikipedia