Fort Independence, Massachusetts
| Fort Independence | |||
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| National Register of Historic Places | |||
 The Fort Independence at Castle Iceland |
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| location | |||
| Coordinates | 42 ° 20 '17 " N , 71 ° 0' 42" W | ||
| surface | 15 acres (60,700 m 2 ) | ||
| Built | 1634 | ||
| NRHP number | [1] 70000921 | ||
| The NRHP added | October 15, 1970 | ||
The Fort Independence is one of granite built fortress to defend the port of Boston in the state of Massachusetts of the United States . Located on the Castle Island peninsula in the South Boston neighborhood, it is the oldest fortification of English origin in the United States.
The first primitive fortification was built on the same site in 1634 and replaced in 1701 by a structurally improved version called Castle William . After the American Revolution , it was left behind by the British, rebuilt and renamed first Fort Adams and later Fort Independence . The present fort was built between 1833 and 1851 and is now protected as a state park along with the island . It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1970 . On occasional occasions, gun salutes are fired from the fort.
history
Castle William
Fortifications were built on the site where Fort Independence is today since 1634. The first buildings were simply the Castle ( the castle called); only the larger facilities built in 1701 in honor of King Wilhelm III. the name Castle William .
The first fort on Castle Island consisted of a few earthworks in which cannons were stationed to defend the colonial settlement of Boston against attacks from the seaside. In the 1640s this first fortification was replaced by a wooden structure in which six Saker cannons and three smaller guns were stationed. One of the first commanders of the fort was Captain Richard Davenport , who supervised the fort from 1645 to 1665 until he was fatally struck by lightning inside the fort . His successor, Captain Roger Clap , was in command from 1665 to 1686. In 1701 the wooden structure was demolished and replaced by a new stone fort designed by Wolfgang William Romer, who was then chief engineer of the British troops stationed in the American colonies was.
In the years leading up to the American Revolution , Castle William was a much-used retreat for British servants during the riot and riot in Boston. In particular, the Stamp Act of 1765 and the Boston Massacre in 1770 forced provincial leaders and British soldiers to seek refuge in the fort.
Shortly after the outbreak of the revolution in 1775, Boston was besieged by American forces. At that time, Castle William became the main fortification of the British Army. It was not until the Continental Army led by George Washington succeeded in fortifying Dorchester Heights , which ultimately led to the end of the siege and forced the British to evacuate Boston in March 1776. However, before leaving the city, they set fire to the fort and burned it down completely.
Fort Adams
After its evacuation, the fort was rebuilt by American troops as Fort Adams in 1776 , even if it was still called Castle William from time to time. In 1785 the facility was officially designated as a prison by the Massachusetts General Court and was used as such until 1805.
On December 7, 1797, the fort was renamed Fort Independence . Acting US President John Adams was also present during the festivities . The following year, ownership of the building and island passed to the United States government . During the British-American War of 1812, units of the British Navy frequently hijacked trading and fishing boats in Massachusetts Bay , but never dared to attack the port itself, as they knew from their own experience the strength of Fort Independence .
Today's fort
Work on today's fort began in 1833 and was overseen by Sylvanus Thayer , one of the leading civil engineers in the United States at the time . The walls of the new facility were 30 ft (9.14 m ) high and 5.5 ft (1.68 m ) thick. Granite from Rockport was used almost exclusively as building material . In 1851 the work was completed after 18 years of construction. At the time of the American Revolutionary War , the fort had 96 cannons stationed, including many 15 in (381 mm ) rodman cannons that could fire a 450 pound projectile over 3 mi (4.83 km ).
At the beginning of the Civil War in 1861, the fourth battalion of the Massachusetts Volunteer Militia (now the Massachusetts State Defense Force ) was stationed at Fort Independence . At least two other infantry regiments were trained at the fort during the war.
After the end of the war, the complex was increasingly less used, as its importance had been reduced by the larger Fort Warren - also designed by Thayer . In the 1880s, landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted developed a series of parkways and parks in Boston known as the Emerald Necklace . An original part of this system was also the Dorchesterway , which was to connect Castle Island to the rest of the Emerald Necklace . In fact, the Dorchesterway was never built, but the city of Boston had a large park landscape built around Fort Independence in the 1890s . In 1890, the United States government ceded the island (excluding the fort) to the city of Boston, which then began to fill in the marshland between the island and South Boston in order to build green spaces and promenades . This process was completed in the 1920s, so Castle Island has not been an island in the true sense of the word since then. As early as 1908, the federal government ceded the fort to the city administration.
In 1898, the ownership of Castle Island passed briefly to the federal government of the United States during the Spanish-American War , but was returned to the city of Boston in 1899. The military regained control of the fort during WWI and WWII , where anti-aircraft guns were also stationed there. During the First World War, the fort served mainly as a storage facility for small-caliber ammunition , while during the Second World War the United States Navy maintained a facility for demagnetizing its ships with a degausser . After the end of both conflicts, the fort was immediately returned to the city of Boston.
In 1962, the United States federal government permanently transferred ownership of the island and fort to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts . Today it is jointly administered by the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation with the nonprofit Castle Island Association . In its entire history, the fort has never been attacked.
Edgar Allan Poe
A story about the fort, which on the one hand is very well known and on the other hand is classified as very unlikely, was, according to tradition, the inspiration for one of the most famous works by Edgar Allan Poe . A memorial outside the fort's western artillery battery marks the grave of Lieutenant Robert F. Massie , who was killed in a duel at the site on December 25, 1817. The folklorist Edward Rowe Snow reported that Massie was so popular among the other soldiers of the fort that this frustration to the winner of the duel Lieutenant Gustavus Drane left out by einmauerten him alive in a chamber in the catacombs of the fort. According to Snow, Edgar Allan Poe heard about this legend during his service in the military and wrote the short story Das Fass Amontillado on this basis .
However, the legend referred to does not fully correspond to historical facts. The duel actually took place, but Drane was not murdered by the fort's soldiers, on the contrary, he continued his military career and was later promoted to the rank of captain . After the Second World War, the remains of Lieutenant Massie were moved to the Fort Devens cemetery in Ayer .
Individual evidence
- ^ National Register Information System . In: National Register of Historic Places . National Park Service . Retrieved March 13, 2009.
- ↑ a b c d e f Susan Wilson: Boston Sites and Insights: An Essential Guide to Historic Landmarks in and around Boston . Beacon Press, Boston 2004, ISBN 0-8070-7135-8 .
- ^ A b c Nathaniel B. Shurtleff: A Topographical and Historical Description of Boston . Boston City Council, Boston 1871, OCLC 4422090 ( online in Google Book Search).
- ^ A b c d David Kales: The Boston Harbor Islands: a History of Urban Wilderness . The History Press, Charleston, SC 2007, ISBN 1-59629-290-3 ( online in Google Book Search).
- ↑ a b Nancy S. Seasholes: Gaining ground: a history of making country in Boston . MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. 2003, ISBN 0-262-19494-5 ( online in Google book search).
- ^ Francis B. Heitman: Historical register and dictionary of the United States Army, from its organization, September 29, 1789, to March 2, 1903. University of Illinois Press, Urbana 1965, OCLC 568724 .
Web links
- Castle Island Association website
- Castle Island, Pleasure Bay, M Street Beach and Carson Beach . Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation. Retrieved July 15, 2007.