Dressed for battle, real gunpowder: Re-enactors fire when ready at Green-Wood’s 241st Battle of Brooklyn
Revolutionary War Scholar Gene Procknow Presents Updated View of Battle
Fate vouchsafed a perfect, late summer day to backdrop Green-Wood Cemetery’s annual re-enactment of the Battle of Brooklyn, a pivotal 1776 engagement that took place just weeks after the colonies declared themselves an independent nation.
“Although the battle has been considered a tactical loss by historians,” explained Battle of Brooklyn Memorial Society President Eric Kramer at the event on Aug. 27. “It was more of a strategic victory for the patriots because the British, having been set back in Boston and Charleston, made an all-out effort here in New York, bringing 30,000 troops from all over the Empire, and spending a fortune on German mercenaries … Eventually they captured New York, but they failed to capture the American Army.”