{"id":2033,"date":"2015-08-21T07:37:02","date_gmt":"2015-08-21T11:37:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newyorkcitygangs.com\/?page_id=2033"},"modified":"2020-05-16T08:12:21","modified_gmt":"2020-05-16T12:12:21","slug":"greene-avenue-stompers-the-memorial-day-rumble","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/newyorkcitygangs.com\/?page_id=2033","title":{"rendered":"Greene Avenue Stompers, Nits & Memorial Day Rumble"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Tuesday, May 30, 1950, New Yorkers were out celebrating festivities for Memorial Day.\u00a0 A swarm of people on Lincoln Place between Utica Ave and Schenectady Ave were returning from a parade, oblivious to the danger they would find themselves in.\u00a0 This was in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, and although they were about 9 blocks away from Bedford-Stuyvesant, a neighborhood notorious for gang activity, they had no idea that among them were 16 members of the Nits and Greene Avenue Stompers, two gangs who had their turf in Bed-Stuyvesant.<\/p>\n

For two weeks the Stompers and Nits had been planning a rumble in Prospect Park on Memorial Day, a favorite date for gang wars (only three weeks prior to this James Fortunato was shot dead in a gang fight in Prospect Park).\u00a0 The animosity between the gangs had erupted two weeks prior to that, on April 28, when a member of the Greene Avenue Stompers was stabbed and killed in a one-hour, 6-block fight.\u00a0 The reason for that fight was an argument over a girl that had been “stolen.”<\/p>\n

The police were aware of the planned Prospect Park fight on Memorial Day and had over 100 policemen waiting to intercept the fighters.\u00a0 So when the fight on Lincoln Place, about 2 miles from Prospect Park broke out, they were caught unawares.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"ap<\/a>

Map of Greene Avenue Stompers & Nits Fight 1950<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

With no police to stop the fight on Lincoln Place, the boys had a wild shoot out with\u00a0 zip guns, a notoriously unreliable weapon.\u00a0 Women screamed, people watched from their homes and those on the street hurled themselves to safety in doorways and gutters.\u00a0 The hail of fire between the two gangs managed to hit nobody, with one boy having his forehead grazed by a bullet.\u00a0 Thankfully for the neighborhood residents, an off-duty cop happened to be in the area.\u00a0 He was taking his 3-year-old daughter to church, and shielding her with his body and then shoving her into a doorway, he drew his badge and gun, breaking up the fight.\u00a0 He was able to arrest one boy and a nearby traffic patrolman, alerted to the gunfire, tackled another, but the other 14 got away.<\/p>\n

\"Prospect<\/a>

Prospect Park Aerial Shot<\/p><\/div>\n

But the Stompers and Nits weren’t done fighting.\u00a0 Later that day they continued the fight in Prospect Park, this time joined by two other gangs the “Gay Nineties,” and the “Chicos.”\u00a0\u00a0 The Gay Nineties were allies with the Nits, and presumably the Chicos with the Greene Avenue Stompers.\u00a0 There were 20 gang members fighting it out with their fists, zip guns, bayonets, knives and at least two .32 caliber revolvers.\u00a0 As the four gangs brawled, they knocked over strollers in the park in their attack.\u00a0 Between the two attacks at least 40 shots were fired and amazingly in the second attack nobody was seriously hurt, with one boy’s ear being nicked by a bullet. This time the attack was quickly broken up by the police and about a dozen members were captured and arrested.<\/p>\n

In the end, 8 of the arrested boys were sentenced to jail terms between 90 days and 6 months.\u00a0 Three of the boys sent to prison were Nits, two were Gay Nineties (two brothers) and the other three were Greene Avenue Stompers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Tuesday, May 30, 1950, New Yorkers were out celebrating festivities for Memorial Day.\u00a0 A swarm of people on Lincoln Place between Utica Ave and Schenectady Ave were returning from a parade, oblivious to the danger they would find themselves … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":2250,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/Pdrj3O-wN","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newyorkcitygangs.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2033"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newyorkcitygangs.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newyorkcitygangs.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newyorkcitygangs.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newyorkcitygangs.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2033"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/newyorkcitygangs.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2033\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3366,"href":"https:\/\/newyorkcitygangs.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2033\/revisions\/3366"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newyorkcitygangs.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2250"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newyorkcitygangs.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}