Battle Pass, formerly known as Flatbush Pass or Valley Grove or The Porte, is a historic
hill pass that played a significant part in the 1776
Battle of Long Island, and that is currently part of
Prospect Park in Brooklyn.
Flatbush Pass went through
Heights of Guan along the
Native American trailMechawanienck that preceded
Kings Highway (later this section became
Flatbush Road), and was at the border between the Towns of Brooklyn and Flatbush in Kings County under the
Dongan Charter of November 12, 1685. Earlier, Governor
Lovelace mentioned the pass in documents from 1670.[1][2]
Battle of Long Island
Battle Pass was the site of a skirmish between Americans under
John Sullivan and
Hessians under
Leopold Philip de Heister during the
Battle of Long Island on August 27, 1776. The Hessians had 5,000 troops and the Americans had 1,300, and had two cannon on the eastern Redoubt Hill.[3][4] One account says that the Dongan Oak was felled by local farmer Simon
Voorhis.[5] The skirmish was over by late morning, and Sullivan was captured.[6] The Hessian killed a number of Americans in a devastating
bayonet charge. Many of the American dead were buried at the
Flatbush Reformed Dutch Church Complex, although occasionally remains were discovered in the area for years afterward.[7][8] Some of the Hessians who participated in the battle appear to have etched their names at the
Wyckoff-Bennett Homestead.
Prospect Park
Map of notable buildings and structures at Prospect Park (note: not all entrances shown). Click on points for more details.
Preservation of the battlefield was one of the reasons given for the creation of
Prospect Park, with the pass currently running for about 150 feet (45 m) along the
car-free East Drive inside the park. It is marked by the small
Dongan Oak Monument, which commemorates the
boundary tree felled and used as a
barricade by the American defenders against the northward invasion. The stump of the Donegan Oak was still recorded in the 1840s, and it may have actually been destroyed in the landscaping that created Prospect Park, when parts of the hills were also leveled.
Battle Pass was the site of a vineyard planted with
Isabella grapes in the early 19th century.[9][10][11]
An emphasis on naturalistic
landscape architecture in the park's original design discouraged a large memorial,[7] and the site is little-noticed today.[12]
Raymond Ingersoll put up some temporary markers in the 1910s for Battle Pass and other Revolutionary sites in the park that have since been lost,[21] several written by
Charles M. Higgins,[22] who also proposed a more elaborate series of Battle of Long Island monuments, including the placing of Revolutionary era cannon or
captured cannon from Imperial Germany on Redoubt Hill .[21][23]Cleveland Moffett also wrote a fantasy piece of
invasion literature at this time set partially set in Prospect Park and recreating the battle.
^"Old Brooklyn". Brooklyn Daily Eagle. August 22, 1870. p. 2.
Archived from the original on July 17, 2019. Retrieved July 3, 2019 – via Brooklyn Public Library; newspapers.com .
^Sargent, Charles Sprague (1893).
Garden and Forest. Garden and Forest Publishing Company.
Archived from the original on July 30, 2023. Retrieved July 3, 2019.
^"To Train Trees". Brooklyn Daily Eagle. May 3, 1890. p. 1.
Archived from the original on July 17, 2019. Retrieved July 3, 2019 – via Brooklyn Public Library; newspapers.com .
^Instruction, New York (State) Department of Public (1891).
Report of the State Superintendent. State Printer.
Archived from the original on July 30, 2023. Retrieved July 3, 2019.