You can be forgiven, if in all the hullabaloo surrounding Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and polka-dot Saturday if you completely forgot to celebrate Evacuation Day this year. Indeed, we almost completely let the matter slip our minds, belatedly remembering to commemorate November 25 with a frigid walk in Manhattan’s Battery Park with an attractive female companion of Forgotten Stories.
In short, November 25, 1783 at the close of the Revolutionary War, was the day marked by the British and the Americans for the British evacuation of New York, which had been held by the Redcoats since they’d wrested it from General Washington in 1776. As the British Army slunk out of town one of their last acts was to free the prisoners of war, one of whom, John Pintard, asked his jailor for a prediction, “Sergeant, what do you think will become of us?”
“You may all go to the devil together,” Sergeant Keefe replied.
“Thank you Sergeant,” came Pintard’s cutting reply, “but we have had too much of your company in this world, to wish to follow you into the next.” Keefe and the jailors departed with the Americans’ laughter ringing in their ears.
Read Full Article »