Huntington's Regiment Marker
7th Avenue, New York, New York, 11215, USA
New York, USA
HISTORIC PRESERVATION at Huntington's Regiment Marker.
On the morning of August 27, 1776, as the Battle of Brooklyn raged, 300 men – Huntington’s 17th Continental (Connecticut) Regiment, along with a few of Atlee’s Lutz’s, and Kiechlein’s Pennsylvanians and Haslet’s Delawares – stormed and captured this vital hill and held it against two British counterattacks by more than 2,000 soldiers. Colonel Joseph Reed reported that the 17th, though tremendously outnumbered, “behaved so as to command the admiration of all who beheld the engagement.” These brave Americans inflicted more damage to the British army on Battle Hill than the invader suffered in the rest of the Battle of Brooklyn. Many of these Americans were captured that day after they tried to rejoin their line below, only to learn that it had retreated without them. Upwards of 200 of them later died in captivity.
About Huntington's Regiment Marker
Continental troops of Jedediah Huntington’s Connecticut regiment fought in the New York campaign and served in Washington’s army. The marker identifies their position or service in Brooklyn, where American forces faced the major British invasion of 1776.
HISTORY HAPPENED HERE at Huntington's Regiment Marker
The Huntington's Regiment marker stands on Battle Hill in Green-Wood Cemetery, part of the terrain fought over during the Battle of Brooklyn on August 27, 1776. Colonel Jedediah Huntington's 17th Continental Regiment was raised in Connecticut and joined other American units defending the wooded heights. The site commemorates a fierce local stand within a much larger battle that ended in a serious defeat for Washington's army.
As British and Hessian columns advanced across Long Island, the Americans faced attacks at several passes. A force associated with Huntington's regiment, joined by Pennsylvanians and Delaware troops, seized or defended the high ground later called Battle Hill. The marker credits roughly three hundred Americans with holding against repeated attacks by a much larger enemy. Contemporary praise recorded their determination, though exact strengths and casualty totals differ among later accounts.
The tactical situation deteriorated when the main British flanking column passed through the unguarded Jamaica Pass and struck the American rear. Units on the heights risked encirclement and had to fight their way toward the Brooklyn lines. Some men escaped, while many were captured after learning that supporting troops had withdrawn. Prisoners then entered a brutal confinement system in occupied New York, where disease, hunger, overcrowding, and neglect killed many more than battlefield fire.
Huntington himself went on to long Continental service and eventually became a major general, but the marker centers the rank-and-file soldiers at the hill. Their action inflicted losses and delayed British progress without reversing the outcome. That distinction matters: courage at a particular position can be historically significant even when the army loses the field. The Americans' ultimate success in the Revolution did not erase the confusion and sacrifice of its early defeats.
Green-Wood Cemetery was established decades after the battle, reshaping the ground with roads, plantings, graves, and monuments. Battle Hill nonetheless preserves elevation and views that help explain why the position was valuable. Commemoration within a cemetery also links soldiers killed or captured in 1776 with later generations who chose to memorialize them. The landscape is both an active burial ground and one of the city's most legible fragments of battlefield terrain.
The marker gives a specific regiment and episode a place within the complicated Battle of Brooklyn. It draws attention to Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and Delaware soldiers whose resistance was overshadowed by the British flanking victory and Washington's later evacuation. It also extends the battle's human story into captivity, where many captured Americans died. Battle Hill therefore represents resolve, tactical vulnerability, and the long consequences of defeat, all embedded in a modern urban landscape that largely conceals the original field.
HISTORIC PLACES NEARBY
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