Fort Hamilton is a United States Army installation in the southwestern corner of the New York City borough of Brooklyn, surrounded by the communities of Bay Ridge and Dyker Heights.

The War of 1812 underscored the importance of coastal defense (since the British burned parts of Washington, DC) and helped to promote a new round of fort building.

Six years and a half million dollars later, the fort was ready to receive its garrison, initially Battery F of the 4th US Artillery.

Fort Lafayette was offshore on Hendricks Reef, and was demolished in the 1960s to make room for the eastern tower of the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge.

A square redoubt with its own ditch was located behind the fort to provide an initial landward defense position.

[13] The 4.72-inch/45 caliber guns were transferred to Fort Kamehameha, Hawaii in 1913 to concentrate this type of weapon in one area.

Numerous temporary buildings were constructed to house the influx of new recruits, draftees, and units in training prior to deployment overseas.

Also, several of Fort Hamilton's guns were dismounted for potential service on the Western Front; however, very few Army Coast Artillery weapons were actually used in that war, due to shipping priorities and extensive training.

[14] A battery of four 120 mm M1 guns was at the fort 1952-54, part of the Cold War air defense system.

[10] In the late 1950s and early 1960s the now-disused gun batteries were demolished or buried for the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge and the Belt Parkway.

[15] At present, U.S. Army Fort Hamilton Garrison is the home of the New York City Recruiting Battalion, the Military Entrance Processing Station, the North Atlantic Division Headquarters of the United States Army Corps of Engineers, the 1179th Transportation Brigade and the 722nd Aeromedical Staging Squadron, the latter organization being a geographically separated unit (GSU) of the 439th Airlift Wing of the Air Force Reserve Command.

Part of the U.S. Army's contribution to preserving this heritage is in the Harbor Defense Museum at Fort Hamilton.

In the 2000s, the historic parade field that once lay behind the old New York Area Command (NYAC) Headquarters Building and the Military Personnel Office, former site of numerous ceremonies and festivities, was developed into swiftly built privatized housing.

The historic flag pole and cannon are still present at the site, near the old headquarters building and across from the Post Exchange barber shop.

In 2007, the historic brick barracks, located on the plot of land within Pershing Loop on the eastern portion of the base, which formerly housed the New York Area Command's Ceremonial Platoon and Military Police Company, was demolished.

The ceremonial platoon, consisting of only infantrymen, once performed funeral honors and ceremonial functions (such as deployment as color guards in New York City parades, or firing cannons to start the New York City Marathon), in the greater N.Y. area, including Long Island, New York City, as well as parts of New Jersey, along with the 26th Army Band unit[17] that was similar to the Old Guard in Washington, D.C. A Civil War-era experimental 20-inch Rodman gun, one of two remaining and the largest gun produced by either side in that period, is in John Paul Jones Park immediately north of the fort.

An ex-Navy 12"/45 caliber Mark V Mod 8 gun is also displayed on post, representative of the type of weapon the fort had in the Endicott era.

Joe (1982) has a primary character reporting that Cobra prisoners will be delivered to the stockade located on Fort Hamilton.

Fort Hamilton is featured prominently in Law and Order: Special Victims Unit season 19 episode 18, titled "Service".

[21] In The Lords of Flatbush, Jane Bradshaw's (Susan Blakely) father (Bill van Sleet) is an Army officer newly assigned to Fort Hamilton.