General Lee Avenue in Fort Hamilton finally renamed, honor Black Brooklyn war hero John Earl Warren

A Fort Hamilton street named after Confederate Civil War general Robert E. Lee is finally being renamed, with its new moniker honoring Brooklyn native and Medal of Honor recipient First Lieutenant John Earl Warren Jr.

Warren, an African-American Crown Heights native, was just 22 years old and leading his unit amid heavy gunfire in Tay Ninh Province, Vietnam in 1969, when he jumped on top of a grenade thrown in the middle of his advancing platoon, sacrificing his life to save his countrymen. The Army says his actions saved the lives of at least three people, and for his bravery, he was posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.

Warren’s name will displace that of Lee, who was stationed at the Bay Ridge fort before the Civil War. Advocates and elected officials had been trying for years to get the name changed, seeking to remove any honorifics in the Big Apple to such disgraceful figures of the past. But the Army, which held final authority over the street name, long refused to budge, even as hundreds of streets, buildings, statutes, and institutions honoring Confederate figures saw their names changed in recent years.

https://www.brooklynpaper.com/general-lee-ave-renaming-honors-john-earl-warren-jr/