New-York tribune., 1908-08-13
THE PRISON SHIP MARTYRs.

The announcement that the Prison Ship Mar
tyrs' Monument on the Fort Greene hill, Brook
lyn will be dedicated on November IA next,
and that Mr. Taft, who will then be President
elect Of the United States, will make the ad-
dress on that occasion, affords ground for hop
ing that at last, after more than a century of
dscreditable neglect marked and then
with some grotesque incidents, fitting and
final disposal will be made of the remains of
the chief participants in one of the most mel
ancholy passages Of American history. To the
present generation of Americans mention of
the Wallabout prison ships recalls chiefly his
toric records of dreadful cruelties and suffer
ings, and perhaps inspires some sentiment OF
gratitude for the fidelity of the thousands who
preferred TO rot to their death in those hideOus
hulks rather than TO deny their country. 1t
should also induce a flush of shame at the real
iZatfon Of the neglect with which this nation
has treated not only the memory of those mar
tyrs but even their actual physical remains.
For nearly a generation after the Revolution
all that was left of the 1900 victims of the
prison ships was almost utterly ignored. But
just hundred years ago last spring the Tam
many Society, or Columbian Order seeking to
establish itself in popular esteem by fam
boyant show Of patriotism, announced that 1t
would erect q worthy tomb for the bones of
the martyrs A site was secured on what
then Jackson street, Brooklyn, adjacent to the
navy yard, and there vault was constructed
of sufficient size to contain all that could be
found of the remains. On April 19, 1908, the
cornerstone Of the proposed monument was
laid. with what were regarded imposing
ceremonies, Joseph D. Fay. Of Tammany Hall,
making the Grafton. Then on May % following
the actual transfer Of the relics and the de
posting of them in the vault occurred. Thir
teen coffins sufficed to contain all that was
left of II 800 bodies, and these were borne to
the vault in one Of the most theatrical paradeS
that vanity and bad taste ever devised, led by
a Enthusiastically arrayed knight on horseback
bearing a banner whose inscription bade Nor
tails, Avaunt" and followed by a Genius Of
America''-to wit, Tammany sachem clad in
wondrous floating robes of light blue silk and
clouds of ostrich feathers!
After such mountebank performances it is
not surprising to remember that Tammany
presently abandoned the whole enterprise and
left the neglected remains in the unfinished
vault, until the vault broken into and
partly destroyed in the process of regarding
the street and the land on which 1t stood was
sold for taxes, Then private muniicence, or
charity erected a rude makeshift to cover the
coff1ns, and another long period of neglect en-
sued. At last, in 1855. a site for tomb and
monument on Fort Greene hill was secured and
an association was formed for the erection of a
suitable structure but more than half a century
will have passed before the realization of the
plans then made. It has been unworthy
chapter of history, which Americans might
well wish to forget and for which only tardy
and imperfect atonement can be made in the
work which is now approaching completion.