THE EFFECTS OF WAR ON BED-STUY (1918)
Brownstone Detectives investigates the history of our clients’ homes.
The story you are about to read was composed from research conducted in the course of one of those investigations.
Do you know the history of YOUR house?
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During the brief period that the U.S. was engaged in WWI, the eastern section of Brooklyn’s Stuyvesant Heights section was decimated by its contribution of men to the war effort. Then, it was decimated a second time by the generous contribution it made of many of these mens’ lives.
According to the honor rolls of the “Victory & Peace” memorial in Saratoga Park, approximately 105 men (and one woman) from the neighborhood made the ultimate sacrifice. There was a death on nearly every block of the district – often more.
The MAP above shows with red pins the locations where some of these men lived – many of them who had left new wives, parents, and families waiting for them back home.
The servicemembers, represented on this map by these red dots, never made it back home, though. Most were buried in American Cemeteries in France; some were re-buried here in the U.S.
After the war, the Gold Star Mothers pilgrimages began to take place, as thousands of the mothers of these servicemembers made the government-sponsored trips to France in order to visit the last resting places of their children.
Today, the specific memories of these citizens who grew up together, went to school together, played, learned, and competed together here in Stuyvesant East are all but gone. A memorial erected to commemorate their contributions to winning the Great War, though, sits in the middle of old Saratoga Square Park.
Please join us in commemorating not just these servicemembers, but the values that they died for.
To see the map above on Google Maps – showing the addresses of the servicemembers and their names, click HERE.
To see a HISTORY of the Victory & Peace memorial in Saratoga Square Park and biogrphies of some of the servicemembers Bedford-Stuyvesant lost in WWI.
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Brownstone Detectives is an historic property research agency. Our mission is to document and save the histories of our clients’ homes. From our research, we produce our celebrated House History Books and House History Reports. Contact us today to begin discovering the history of your home.
