Brooklyn war memorial destroyed in fiery crash The monument was located at Bartel-Pritchard Square at the southwest entrance to Prospect Park. (Elizabeth Keogh/New York Daily News/TNS)
A storied war memorial was destroyed in a fiery one-car crash in Brooklyn early Sunday.
The driver of a BMW sedan crashed into the World War I monument in the traffic circle of Bartel-Pritchard Square at the southwest entrance to Prospect Park about 4:10 a.m., cops said.
After the car plowed into the 57-year-old memorial, the vehicle erupted in flames, police said.
Medics transported a 23-year-old woman to Lutheran Hospital for pain and bruising. A man at the scene refused medical attention.
There were no other injuries and police are still investigating who was behind the wheel of the car.
The memorial, erected in 1965, was a tribute to two Brooklyn natives and friends, Emil Bartel and William Pritchard, who died in combat in France during World War I.
Bartel lived nearby the crash site on Windsor Pl. near 11 Ave. in Windsor Terrace. Pritchard lived on Linden St. near Central Ave. in Bushwick.
The close friends both enlisted in Brooklyn’s 13th Regiment of the National Guard. Overseas, they served together in the 59th Regiment, Coast Artillery before their deaths.
On Sunday afternoon, the polished black granite monument, dedicated to soldiers in the community who died in the line of duty and inscribed with “For Valor and Sacrifice,” was wrecked, as were nearby benches and flowerbeds.
Police have made no immediate arrests or issued any summonses for the crash.
According to recent city data, 2,209 people were injured in city-wide vehicle crashes this year as of Jan. 31. As of Thursday, 15 vehicle occupants have died in crashes across the five boroughs.
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