TEXT: RENÉ CHARTRAND
  ILLUSTRATED BY DONATO SPEDALIERE
  THE FORTS OF
  COLONIAL NORTH
  AMERICA
  British, Dutch and Swedish colonies
  
  FORTRESS • 101
  THE FORTS OF COLONIAL
  NORTH AMERICA
  British, Dutch and Swedish colonies
  RENÉ CHARTRAND
  ILLUSTRATED BY DONATO SPEDALIERE
  Series editor Marcus Cowper
  
  First published in 2010 by Osprey Publishing
  Midland House, West Way, Botley, Oxford OX2 0PH, UK
  44-02 23rd St, Suite 219, Long Island City, NY 11101, USA
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  A CIP catalog record for this book is available from the British Library.
  ISBN: 978 1 84908 197 9
  E-book ISBN: 978 1 84908 198 6
  Editorial by Ilios Publishing Ltd, Oxford, UK (www.iliospublishing.com)
  Cartography: Bounford
  Page layout by Ken Vail Graphic Design, Cambridge, UK (kvgd.com)
  Typset in Myriad and Sabon
  Index by Sandra Shotter
  Originated by PPS Grasmere Ltd, Leeds, UK
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  Many forts were attacked, some fell, and some were never challenged. While
  many individual or regional studies of the forts exist, this book presents, with
  a wealth of artwork and images, the overall view of the fortification systems
  of the British, Dutch, and Swedish colonies from the 1500s to the 1760s.
  EDITOR’S NOTE
  Unless otherwise indicated, all images in this book are from the author.
  ARTIST'S NOTE
  Readers may care to note that the original paintings from which the color
  plates in this book were prepared are available for private sale. All
  reproduction copyright whatsoever is retained by the Publishers. All
  enquiries should be addressed to:
  Alina Illustrazioni, C. S. Montecchio, San Lorenzo 234, 52044,
  Cortona Arezzo, Italy
  The Publishers regret that they can enter into no correspondence upon
  this matter.
  THE FORTRESS STUDY GROUP (FSG)
  The object of the FSG is to advance the education of the public in the
  study of all aspects of fortifications and their armaments, especially
  works constructed to mount or resist artillery. The FSG holds an annual
  conference in September over a long weekend with visits and evening
  lectures, an annual tour abroad lasting about eight days, and an annual
  Members' Day.
  The FSG journal FORT is published annually, and its newsletter Casemate
  is published three times a year. Membership is international. For further
  details, please contact:
  secretary@fsgfort.com
  Website: www.fsgfort.com
  THE HISTORY OF FORTIFICATION STUDY
  CENTER (HFSC)
  The History of Fortification Study Center (HFSC) is an international scientific
  research organization that aims to unite specialists in the history of military
  architecture from antiquity to the 20th century (including historians, art
  historians, archeologists, architects and those with a military background).
  The Center has its own scientific council, which is made up of authoritative
  experts who have made an important contribution to the study of
  fortification.
  The HFSC’s activities involve organizing conferences, launching research
  expeditions to study monuments of defensive architecture, contributing
  to the preservation of such monuments, arranging lectures and special
  courses in the history of fortification and producing published works such
  as the refereed academic journal Questions of the History of Fortification,
  monographs and books on the history of fortification. It also holds a
  competition for the best publication of the year devoted to the history
  of fortification.
  The headquarters of the HFSC is in Moscow, Russia, but the Center is
  active in the international arena and both scholars and amateurs from all
  countries are welcome to join. More detailed information about the HFSC
  and its activities can be found on the website: www.hfsc.3dn.ru
  E-mail: ciif-info@yandex.ru
  ACKNOWLEGEMENTS
  The author wishes to acknowledge the very kind assistance of Brian Leigh
  Dunnigan together with the staff (amongst whom are many former
  colleagues) at forts administered by the United States National Park Service,
  New York State historic sites, the State Museum of Pennsylvania, the National
  Historic Sites of Parks Canada, Library and Archives Canada (Ottawa), the
  Library of Congress (Washington, DC), the Research Centre of the Canadian
  War Museum (Ottawa), the Archives Nationales (France), the National
  Archives (UK), and the library of the University of Ottawa.
  AUTHOR’S NOTE
  This works examines a multitude of forts, large and small, that dotted the
  American colonies that became the United States and Canada (insofar as its
  British establishments are concerned). That there were far too many to list is
  obvious, but they all formed part of defense systems designed to protect
  settlers from aggression coming either from the wilderness or from the sea.
  
  CONTENTS
  INTRODUCTION
  4
  CHRONOLOGY
  6
  THE EARLY FORTS
  7
  NEW NETHERLANDS
  13
  NEW SWEDEN
  18
  MASSACHUSETTS, NEW HAMPSHIRE, RHODE ISLAND, 
  AND CONNECTICUT
  20
  Massachusetts 
  New Hampshire 
  Rhode Island 
  Connecticut
  NEW YORK
  30
  MARYLAND, NEW JERSEY, AND DELAWARE
  40
  Maryland 
  New Jersey 
  Delaware
  PENNSYLVANIA AND VIRGINIA
  41
  Pennsylvania 
  Virginia
  NORTH CAROLINA, SOUTH CAROLINA, AND GEORGIA
  49
  North Carolina 
  South Carolina 
  Georgia
  NOVA SCOTIA, NEWFOUNDLAND, CANADA, AND HUDSON’S BAY
  54
  Nova Scotia 
  Newfoundland 
  Canada 
  Hudson’s Bay
  LIFE IN THE FORTS
  59
  THE FORTS TODAY
  60
  GLOSSARY OF FORTIFICATION TERMS
  61
  SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
  63
  INDEX
  64 
  
  INTRODUCTION
  The European colonization of North America was the result of endeavors by
  several nations. Explorers flying the English flag appeared on the North
  American coast as early as 1497 and many others followed. Viable, permanent
  settlements, however, would not occur until the beginning of the 17th century
  when English colonists built fortified dwellings, first in Virginia and later
  in Massachusetts. They were soon joined by Dutch traders and colonists who
  settled on the Hudson River and Swedes who did the same along the Delaware
  River. The latter were conquered by the former in 1655 and all seaboard
  colonies came under the flag of England (later Great Britain) from 1674. The
  population of these colonies had already reached about 115,000 men, women,
  and children. The Indian population is unknown, but it had been ravaged
  by epidemics and was a shadow of what it had been. Still, the Indians of the
  Eastern Seaboard were often understandably hostile to newcomers who seized
  their lands. Many European settlers also made it known that Indians were
  much inferior in all manners and, in the minds of some Puritans, were acolytes
  of the devil himself.
  The forts built in the Thirteen Colonies were extremely varied in type 
  and were built in very large numbers. They differed fundamentally from
  fortifications erected in French or Spanish colonies; France and, especially,
  Spain, had fortification programs sponsored by metropolitan governments
  intended for their colonial empires, and they were supported by their
  professional military engineers posted permanently overseas. Thus,
  remarkable and mighty fortresses guarded New Spain and New France;
  secondary fort networks with regular garrisons guarded the frontiers of
  western Canada and Louisiana while an extensive network of garrisoned
  Spanish “presidios” went from Texas to California. Nothing as extensive
  existed to protect the English, Dutch, or Swedish colonies. These colonies
  were often settled by religious refugees whose home country was happy 
  to see them leave and was certainly not inclined to pay for their protection
  with soldiers and forts. They were also occupied by trading companies, who
  kept down military expenses as much as possible in order to satisfy
  shareholder expectations. Only from the second third of the 18th century
  were more substantial garrisons posted in the British colonies, but fortresses
  such as those seen in French or Spanish territories were never built in British
  North America. Even large masonry or brick forts were a rarity and were
  usually built by the colonists themselves, not by the home government. The
  THE FORTS OF COLONIAL
  NORTH AMERICA
  4
  
  N
  St John’s
  Ferryland
  Placentia
  Louisbourg
  Canso
  Halifax
  Annapolis
  Cumberland
  Frederick
  Québec
  Lawrence
  Montréal
  Trois-Rivières
  Île-aux-Noix
  Niagara
  Frontenac
  Presqu’île
  Le Boeuf
  Venango
  Fort Pitt
  St Augustine
  Savannah
  Charleston
  Augusta
  Beaufort
  Frederica
  Johnston
  Hyde
  Roanoke Island
  Jamestown
  Baltimore
  Philadelphia
  Nya Korsholm
  Christina
  Casimir
  New York
  New London
  Newport
  Boston
  Portsmouth
  William Henry
  Penebscot
  Albany
  Oswego
  Schenectady
  Stanwix
  Edward
  William-Henry
  Ticonderoga
  Crown Point
  Swedish
  Dutch
  French
  British
  Spanish
  Spanish Florida
  New France
  British colonies
  Congaree
  Dobbs
  Prince George
  Loudoun
  Loudoun
  Cumberland
  Necessity
  Ligonier
  Bedford
  Grenville
  Frederick
  Augusta
  No. 4
  Halifax
  Western
  Ohio
  0
  200 miles
  0
  200km
  Pownall
  A T L A N T I C  O C E A N
  Major forts of the American colonies
  5
  
  largest of these forts, Castle William in Boston, was mostly built and
  garrisoned at the expense of Massachusetts.
  So-called “frontier forts” were by far the most common forts in the
  American colonies. There were probably many thousands of them and they
  can be classified into three broad categories: residential fortified garrison
  houses or blockhouses, small stockade forts with one or several buildings
  within, and the larger “militia” forts that might be sizeable stockades
  or earth-and-timber structures with bastions or corner blockhouses.
  CHRONOLOGY
  1528
  English sailors build first permanent structures at St John’s,
  Newfoundland. 
  1583
  Sir Humphrey Gilbert officially takes possession of Newfoundland
  for Britain.
  1585
  Fort Raleigh built at Roanoke Island, North Carolina.
  1607
  Jamestown, Virginia, established and becomes first permanent
  English settlement. Fort George, Maine, established, but abandoned
  in 1609. 
  1610
  English colony established at Conception Bay, Newfoundland. It fails,
  but other small permanent settlements are made on the island in the
  following decades. 
  1614
  Following Henry Hudson’s 1609 explorations of the Hudson River,
  Dutch traders establish forts in the Hudson River Valley; colony
  becomes the New Netherlands.
  1620
  Plymouth Colony founded by Pilgrims in Massachusetts.
  1630
  Boston founded by Puritans who also settle much of Massachusetts,
  New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Maine in the following years. 
  1633
  Maryland colony founded under a charter granted to Lord Baltimore. 
  1638
  First Swedish settlers arrive in Delaware, who build Fort Christina
  and other posts.
  1655
  New Sweden falls to the Dutch.
  1664
  The New Netherlands falls to the English; it is retaken by the Dutch
  in 1673, but is returned to England in 1674. 
  1670
  First settlers in South Carolina found Charleston. Hudson’s Bay
  Company founded and builds forts on the bay’s southern shore.
  1675–76
  King Philip’s Indian War rages in Massachusetts, Connecticut,
  New Hampshire, and Rhode Island. Many small forts and garrison
  houses built.
  1681
  Pennsylvania chartered as a proprietary colony for the Society
  of Friends (the Quakers).
  1689–97
  War of the League of Augsburg, which involves many nations
  including England, France, and Spain. Many forts built in England’s
  American colonies.
  6
  
  1702–13
  War of the Austrian Succession (or Queen Anne’s war) between
  France, Britain, Austria, and most of Europe’s countries and their
  colonial empires. 
  1713
  French posts in Acadia (henceforth Nova Scotia, Newfoundland, and
  Hudson’s Bay) ceded to Great Britain by the Treaty of Utrecht.
  French retain Cape Breton Island and Prince Edward Island.
  1720s
  British traders establish a trading post and later a garrison at
  Oswego, New York, the first English fort on Lake Ontario.
  1733
  Colony of Georgia founded. Frederica, a fortified town, founded
  in 1734.
  1739
  “War of Jenkins’ Ear” between Britain and Spain.
  1744–48
  War of the Austrian Succession; many forts built including first
  fortifications built at Philadelphia in 1747–48.
  1749
  Halifax, founded in Nova Scotia, quickly becomes an important
  military and naval town.
  1753–56
  French and Anglo-Americans clash in Ohio Valley, warfare erupts
  and is officially declared by France and Britain in 1756. Many forts
  are built in Britain’s American colonies.
  1758
  Fort Louisbourg and Cape Breton Island fall to the British in July.
  Building of forts along Forbes Road, Pennsylvania. Fort Duquesne is
  evacuated and destroyed by the French in December; the British build
  Fort Pitt near its site. Fort Stanwix, New York, is built.
  1759
  Fort Crown Point, New York, occupied by British who build a huge
  fort there. Fort Niagara and Québec are taken and occupied by the
  British. 
  1760
  French army in Canada surrenders at Montréal on September 8.
  French garrisons in the Great Lakes replaced by British troops in the
  following months. 
  1763
  By the Treaty of Paris, France cedes Canada and land up to the east
  bank of the Mississippi River to Great Britain. Spain cedes Florida to
  Great Britain. Huge uprising against the British by western Indians
  under Chief Pontiac; many small forts are taken, but the revolt is
  crushed by troops at Bushy Run.
  THE EARLY FORTS
  Great Britain’s interest in North America dates back to the end of the
  15th century. Only five years after the Italian navigator Christopher Columbus
  had discovered America for the benefit of Spain in 1492, King Henry VII of
  England sponsored another Italian mariner then living in Bristol, John Cabot,
  on a voyage of discovery in northern latitudes. Accompanied by his son
  Sebastian, Cabot came upon the American continent in June 1497. The
  landfall he made is uncertain; it might have been Cape Breton Island (now
  part of Nova Scotia, Canada), while English seamen’s tradition suggests that
  on June 24, St John’s day, their ship, the Matthew, entered the harbor of what
  became the town of St John’s, Newfoundland. The next year, Sebastian Cabot
  7
  
  was back exploring the North American coast with two ships flying the
  English flag, looking for the elusive North West Passage to China and India,
  and he may have sailed as far south as Cape Hatteras. These explorations gave
  England a well-founded claim to the northern part of the American continent.
  There had actually been other Europeans sailing in these waters for 
  half a millennium. The Vikings had even made settlements on the coast of
  Greenland and Newfoundland that had by this point vanished, largely due to
  the 14th-century climate changes. Basque fishermen may have hunted whales
  on Labrador’s coast from the middle of the 15th century according to their
  mariner’s traditions. But no one realized that these northern lands formed part
  of a new continent.
  Portuguese, Spanish, and French as well as English mariners explored the
  North American coast over the next decades, while the fishing fleets of those
  nations regularly sailed to the Grand Banks for cod and to Labrador for
  whales. As early as the 1520s the harbor of St John’s was a gathering point
  for English sailors and, in 1528, an English merchant named Bute built the first
  8
  On August 5, 1583 Sir Humphrey
  Gilbert landed at St John’s,
  claimed the island of
  Newfoundland in the name of
  Queen Elizabeth I as an English
  possession, and cut the first sod.
  During the following month,
  Gilbert’s colonizing efforts were
  plagued by terrible storms,
  widespread illness, and a
  mutiny, and he perished in a
  shipwreck the following month.
  (Print after Beatrice Home’s 1924
  Peeps at the History of Canada)
  
  permanent residence there. The area was not yet officially English, and ships
  of other nations also used the harbor, notably the French explorer Jacques
  Cartier in 1542. That changed on August 5, 1583 when a fleet bearing a
  colonizing party landed at King’s Beach and Sir Humphrey Gilbert officially
  took possession of Newfoundland for Queen Elizabeth I of England. By then,
  according to Captain Hayes of the Golden Hind (one of Sir Humphrey’s ships)
  St John’s was much frequented by ships and had substantial houses for
  merchants doing business there.
  Newfoundland took on a definite military importance two years later
  when St John’s was used by Bernard Drake as a base for English ships to go
  after Spanish vessels; about 22 were taken and his efforts were rewarded 
  by a knighthood granted by the Queen in January 1586. There was plenty of
  shipping in the area at that time. Besides corsairs there were also pirates,
  including the famous Peter Easton who even had a fort built in the late 1500s
  at his base at Harbour Grace in Conception Bay.
  During the 1580s, Sir Walter Raleigh sponsored several attempts to settle
  “Virginia” (actually now in North Carolina). In July 1585 a fleet under the
  command of Sir Richard Grenville landed a party of 108 settlers on Roanoke
  Island. One of the officers, Ralph Lane, was put in command and built a
  “newe forte in Virginia” named Fort Raleigh that featured earth bastions and
  curtain walls. At least one, possibly two, small buildings were inside the fort.
  Lane was no diplomat with the Indians, who refused to trade any food with
  the colonists. Faced with starvation, the colonists all returned on Sir Francis
  Drake’s ships, which appeared at Fort Raleigh in June 1586.
  Sir Walter Raleigh did not give up and, in April 1587, dispatched another
  expedition to Roanoke, consisting of three ships carrying about 150 settlers and
  sailors. The Roanoke colony was founded in the summer of 1587 by Governor
  John White, who later came back to England to get supplies leaving 89 men,
  17 women, and two children in the settlement. By his own account, the
  settlement was “strongly enclosed with a high palisade of trees, with cortynes
  [curtain walls] and flankers [bastions] very fort-like.” The war with Spain
  delayed ships returning there until August 1590. When White and his men
  Reconstruction of Fort Raleigh,
  first built from July 1585 and
  abandoned in June 1586.
  The colonists were led by Ralph
  Lane and were sponsored by
  Sir Walter Raleigh, hence the
  fort’s name. It was reconstructed
  by the National Parks Service in
  1950 according to archeological
  evidence found in 1947–48.
  The fort’s plan consisted of an
  elongated square with pointed
  bastions on three corners and a
  round bastion on the south side.
  It contained at least one
  building. (Library of Congress,
  Washington)
  9
  
  landed, the colonists had vanished and all that remained were the remains of the
  fortifications and buildings. One of the trees or palisade posts bore the
  inscription “CROATAN.” the significance of which remains enigmatic. The fate of
  “The Lost Colony” is one of the great mysteries of American history.
  In late May 1607 English settlers landed in Virginia and built Fort James,
  which soon became known as Jamestown. The initial fort was a stockade
  laid out on a half-moon plan. Within weeks a larger and stronger structure
  was erected. It was laid on a triangular plan with three rounded bastions
  connected by a stockade about 14ft (4.2m) high, surrounded by marshes on
  the landward sides. The bastions had several pieces of artillery. Although
  destroyed by fire in January 1608, it was quickly rebuilt. Relations with the
  Indians soured and they blockaded the fort during the winter of 1609–10,
  causing many colonists to die of disease and hunger until a relief expedition
  arrived in June. In spite of the many hardships, the surviving settlers stayed
  on and were joined by others, so Jamestown became the first permanent
  English settlement in America. The increasing population, bolstered by
  African slaves from 1619, led to the expansion of the town that was the first
  capital of Virginia. Other communities appeared farther inland and along the
  Chesapeake Bay area, which had some 2,500 settlers by 1630. One of the
  earliest secondary forts was the strategically located Fort Algernon (spelling
  varies) built in 1609 at Point Comfort (near Hampton). Forts Henry and
  Charles were also built in 1610 on the east and west sides of the Hampton
  inlet, but later abandoned. The town of Henricus, founded in 1611, had
  a palisade with five watchtowers and a ditch outside. It was initially intended
  to replace Jamestown as Virginia’s capital, but it was destroyed during
  the great Indian uprising in 1622. Early relations between the settlers and the
  Indians were often uneasy. The more militant Indians wished to exterminate
  all settlers, which resulted in a ten-year war that claimed the lives of about
  400 settlers and probably far more Indians. Many small forts and fortified
  houses were built at this time and again during the 1642–44 Indian war.
  Eventually, Jamestown became less important, its fort was abandoned, and
  the government moved to Williamsburg in 1699.
  In 1607 the Plymouth Company sponsored another English settlement
  attempt, which was made on the coast of the present state of Maine under
  the command of Sir John Popham. The Indians were sullen. For their safety,
  10
  Fort Algernon, c.1611. Built in
  1609 at Point Comfort (near
  Hampton, Virginia), this coastal
  fort had four guns in 1611 and
  seven guns by 1614. It was built
  on a triangular plan, which was
  generally used for early colonial
  American forts. It had to be
  rebuilt after accidentally
  burning down in 1612. Also
  called Fort Point Comfort, it
  was eventually abandoned in
  1622 but restored in 1632; it
  was abandoned again in the
  1660s. (Model at the Casemate
  Museum, Fort Monroe, Virginia)
  
  the colonists built a substantial fort with dwellings at the mouth of the
  Kennebec River (Bath). About 55 emigrants stayed for the winter, which turned
  out to be very severe, and the hardship experienced was compounded by the
  accidental burning of the storehouse along with most of the provisions. Many
  perished of disease, including Popham, and the colony was abandoned in 1609.
  Thereafter, the Plymouth Company maintained fishing operations off the
  coast of “New England” and, on November 9, 1620, another Plymouth
  group of over a hundred settlers arrived in sight of Cape Cod (Massachusetts)
  on board the Mayflower. They explored the area until 21 December when
  they found a good site and began building a number of buildings enclosed by
  a palisade, which became “Plymouth Plantation.” Miles Standish, a military
  veteran, was elected commander and in the early months of 1621 a defensive
  perimeter was built on a high point, which included a small fort from which
  stockade walls with flankers ran to the shore. Six years later, the fort on
  the hill was described by Isaack de Rasieres as “a large square house, with
  a flat roof, made of thick sawn plank, stayed with oak beams, upon the top
  of which they have six cannon” that “command the surrounding country.”
  In the center of the town was a square stockade “upon which four patereros
  are mounted, so as to enfilade the streets.” These settlers were religious
  refugees from England: the Pilgrims. They were well armed and “constantly
  on their guard night and day.” Their colony survived, but by 1629 it still
  contained only around 300 settlers. However, the English were not the only
  ones setting up colonies on the Eastern Seaboard.
  11
  Fort George, Maine, c.1607–09.
  Built from August 1607 at the
  present town of Bath on the
  coast of Maine by English
  settlers under Sir John Popham,
  this establishment featured
  bastions mounted with 
  guns, but was abandoned
  in late 1609. (Print after a
  contemporary plan) 
  
  12
  
  NEW NETHERLANDS
  In September 1609 explorer Henry Hudson went 
  up the river that would bear his name as far as
  present-day Albany, the capital of the state of New
  York. Although English, he was exploring for the
  Dutch East India Company, seeking a northwest
  passage to Asia. There was no passage, but Hudson
  took possession of the areas he discovered for 
  the Netherlands. Dutch traders soon realized the
  commercial possibilities of the “New Netherlands”
  and by 1612–13 they had built a few rough 
  log cabins on the southern end of the island of
  Manhattan for shelter. In 1614 Dutch traders went
  up the Hudson River and built Fort Nassau, a small
  trading post garrisoned by a dozen men on Castle
  Island (now disappeared and somewhere under 
  the port of Albany). It consisted of a house that 
  was 26ft (7.9m) wide by 36ft (11m) long surrounded 
  by a stockade of 58ft2 (15.2m2) with an 18ft-wide
  (5.4m) moat outside. It was armed with two cannon
  and 11 swivel guns. The site proved problematic,
  with frequent floods occurring, and it was
  abandoned in 1617 or 1618. By then Dutch fur
  traders were active on a more-or-less seasonal basis
  with more huts being built on Manhattan Island. 
  The Dutch West India Company was formed in 1621. It was a monopoly
  trading “multinational” empire that had vast powers and was entitled by the
  Netherlands to operate from Newfoundland to Cape Horn in America as well
  as on the African coast. It had the means to carry out its ambitions; its fleet
  included 32 warships as well as many merchant vessels. The Hudson Valley
  territories, and others adjacent, were part of the company’s grants and, 
  in March 1624, it brought 30 families to establish settlements in the New
  Netherlands. These first settlers were mostly Walloons (French-speaking and
  Catholic) and they founded several posts such as Walloon’s Bay on the western
  end of Long Island (Brooklyn). In May some 18 families went up the Hudson
  River and built Fort Orange on the mainland (at the foot of present Madison
  Avenue, Albany) using logs. It was described in 1646 by Father Jogues, a
  French missionary, as “a miserable little fort called Fort Orange, built of logs,
  with four or five pieces of Breteuil cannon and as many swivels.” The fort’s
  walls were later described as being earth-filled palisades. It was built on a
  square plan with corner bastions. Archaeological excavations made in 1971
  revealed that the fort had a stone counterscarp and a moat around it. There
  were at least four buildings inside and one or more had large red tiles that
  JAMESTOWN, 160710
  Construction of “James Fort” began on 28 May 1607 and was
  ﬁnished on June 15. According to George Percy, one of the ﬁrst
  settlers in Virginia, it “was triangle-wise, having three bulwarks in
  every corner like a half moon, and four or ﬁve pieces of artillery
  mounted in them.” Three years later, William Strachey wrote
  that Jamestown was “cast almost in the form of a triangle and
  so palisaded… To every side, a proportioned distance from the
  palisade, is a settled street of houses… In the midst are a market
  place, a storehouse, and a corps de garde [guard house], as likewise
  a pretty chapel.” Thus was the ﬁrst permanent English settlement
  in America. Repaired and remodeled several times thereafter, the
  original fort probably existed until the middle of the 1620s.
  A
  Fort Still Water, 1757. A fort 
  was first built at this site in
  1709 on the east bank of the
  Hudson River in order to
  prevent surprise raids. By the
  late 1750s it was the location of
  an important supply depot for
  British forces moving towards
  Canada. It was strongly fortified
  with a blockhouse, palisades to
  protect the storehouses, and a
  fort on the nearby bluff. (Print
  after a plan by John Montresor)
  
  made their roofs fireproof. In 1626 Indians killed the fort’s commander and
  three of his men in nearby woods, following which most of the settlers were
  temporarily evacuated to safety in Manhattan.
  The Dutch West India Company decided to build its headquarters at the
  entrance to the Hudson River, which was recognized as being the most strategic
  location in the area. In 1624, some of the Walloon colonists temporarily settled
  on Noten Eyland (now Governor’s Island in New York City’s harbor) and built
  a small fort that appears to have consisted of a wooden blockhouse surrounded
  by pickets. The following year, the southern tip of Manhattan Island was
  selected for permanent settlement and the colonists moved there. Peter Minuit
  became “director” (governor) of the colony, bought Manhattan Island from
  the Indians, and, in June, construction started on Fort Amsterdam according
  to plans made by engineer and surveyor Cryn Frederycksz. This stone fort 
  was designed to resist a seaborne attack from a European enemy as well 
  as to provide an impressive headquarters for the government of the New
  Netherlands to awe visiting Indians, or anyone else. It was first intended that
  the settlers would live inside the fort, but this proved impractical when 
  more colonists arrived from the Netherlands. As it turned out, there were few
  available workmen to build this sizeable fort together with its annexes, and
  construction went on until 1635. The church in the fort was added in 1642.
  From 1633, the fort also had a sizeable garrison of over 100 men. Fort
  Amsterdam did not undergo great changes thereafter.
  The town that grew around the fort became known as New Amsterdam
  (New York City), incorporated as a city in 1653, and was the home of about
  half of the 1,000 Dutch men and women living in the New Netherlands
  by the middle of the 17th century. The colony’s population grew by leaps
  and bounds over the next 15 years, reaching about 9,000 souls in 1664 under
  the rule of Director-General Peter Stuyvesant, who had arrived in the New
  Netherlands in 1647. He was a crusty peg-legged fighting veteran, famous for
  Detail of a map of New
  Amsterdam, 1639. The
  bastioned Fort Amsterdam 
  can be seen at the center, on
  the tip of Manhattan Island,
  next to some windmills. 
  The nascent town is to the
  right. Little houses with red
  roofs indicate various small
  settlements and “plantations”
  in the area, some having 
  brown tower-like structures
  that were likely blockhouses 
  or fortified structures, notably
  across the Hudson River (top).
  These were likely amongst 
  the first fortifications built by
  Europeans in what is today 
  the state of New Jersey. 
  (Library of Congress,
  Washington)
  14
  
  his hot temper and autocratic ways, but also known as a shrewd and fair
  ruler. His predecessor, the undiplomatic and quarrelsome Director-General
  William Kieft, had become embroiled in a war against Mohawk Indians
  during 1643–45, which had led to his recall. Up until Stuyvesant’s
  administration the town was an open city with no fortifications at all, which
  left its landward side totally exposed to attack. There were hostilities with
  Indians in 1640–43 and 1653, but the town was not attacked. While
  promoting peaceful relations with the Indians, Stuyvesant felt New
  Amsterdam was too vulnerable to raids and, in 1653, had a palisade built
  right across the island of Manhattan from the Hudson River to the East River.
  This timber wall was said to have had its planks laid horizontally, but is
  shown as being made of vertically planted timber in early prints, about 6–12ft
  (1.8–3.6m) high. It had five small bastions. It was pierced by two gates, one
  in the middle of Broadway Avenue and one at the river’s edge on the east side
  called the Water Gate. It was not a formidable obstacle and had no ditch,
  but was sufficient to stop a small raiding party of Indians or pirates. A street
  was built along the length of the wall from Broadway to the Water Gate,
  which came to be known as Wall Street. Now renowned as the center of
  American financial activities, very few people suspect that Wall Street got its
  name because of the early fortifications of New Amsterdam.
  Up the Hudson River, more settlers also arrived at Fort Orange, and as the
  town grew houses were built farther away from the protection given by 
  its fort. The potential menace from nearby Indians worried the inhabitants. 
  In 1656, to give these outlying homes some protection, a blockhouse that
  doubled as a church was built featuring loopholes for muskets and three
  cannon on top. It was built farther west and up the incline of the hill that
  dominated the settlement. In September 1659 work started on a stockade
  that eventually enclosed the whole town by April 1660. The somewhat old
  and decrepit Fort Orange was not a very formidable defensive work since,
  The Water Gate of New
  Amsterdam’s palisade wall,
  c.1655. Wall Street – the 
  name of which would become
  famous in world finance and
  banking – starts at the gate 
  and borders the palisade. The
  water at the bottom is the East
  River. (Print in James Grant’s
  1892 Memorial History of 
  New York after period maps 
  and engravings)
  15
  
  in 1661, it had only five cannon. In other instances Stuyvesant concentrated
  isolated settlers in a stockade village for their protection, such as Fort
  Wiltwyck which was built in 1658 at Esopus.
  Dutch settlements also spread to other areas outside of the Hudson River
  Valley and Long Island. The Delaware River Valley attracted Dutch traders
  as early as 1623 when they built Fort Nassau, which was relocated and
  renamed as Fort Casimir in 1651. Fort Beversreede was a small trading post
  existing at what is now Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, between 1648 and 1651.
  These forts came into conflict with the Swedes (see chapter on New Sweden
  below). Following the 1655 conquest by the Dutch, the Swedish Fort
  Christina was renamed Fort Altena, and Fort Casimir, which had been
  christened Fort Trinity by the Swedes, was renamed Fort New Amstel. There
  were also Dutch settlers and traders in Connecticut and, in 1633, they built
  Fort Huis de Goed Hoop (Hartford), which was a blockhouse armed with 
  a couple of cannon surrounded by a palisade. The influx of thousands of
  English Puritan settlers in the area doomed the small Dutch settlement, which
  eventually integrated with the English colony of Connecticut. In 1637 Dutch
  traders also built a fortified trading post farther east, which became known
  as Fort Ninigret (Charlestown, Rhode Island). It measured 152ft (46.3m)
  long by 137ft (41.7m) wide with its corner bastions. It appears to have been
  abandoned shortly thereafter and later occupied by Indians.
  In late August 1664 England and the Netherlands were at war when four
  British warships with 450 soldiers on board under the command of Colonel
  Richard Nicolls anchored off New Amsterdam. On September 8, 1664 the
  Dutch garrison marched out of Fort Amsterdam (renamed Fort James) and
  the town’s name was changed to New York in honor of the Duke of York,
  the King of England’s brother. Further north, Fort Orange’s name was
  changed to Albany when an English garrison replaced the Dutch on
  16
  Plan of New Amsterdam,
  c.1655–60. By the middle of
  the 17th century the town had
  grown to about 900 inhabitants.
  Fort Amsterdam is prominent
  at the upper left. The wide street
  starting at the fort is Broadway.
  Note the canals, like in old
  Amsterdam, in the middle of
  the streets below. The town’s
  landward side is enclosed by a
  stockade wall punctuated by
  small bastions crossing the
  length of Manhattan Island.
  Running alongside this palisade
  is a street: Wall Street. (New York
  State Museum, Albany)
  
  September 24 in order to commemorate the Duke’s Scottish dukedom of
  Albany, and the whole colony was now christened New York. It has often
  been stated that the 1667 Treaty of Breda handed the colony back to the
  Netherlands, but this was not clearly stated in its articles. What is clear is that
  the English were still there when a Dutch fleet of 27 ships with 600 troops
  on board appeared in front of New York in early August 1673. After having
  landed they were joined by about 400 Dutchmen from the city. After a token
  resistance, the English garrison surrendered on July 29. In the following days
  and weeks, other English garrisons were relieved by Dutch soldiers and place
  names were again changed. In May 1674 news arrived that peace had been
  signed in Europe and that the colony was ceded to England. Within a few
  months the names were restored.
  17
  The Dutch surrender New
  Amsterdam to an English force,
  September 8, 1664. Portly and
  peg-legged Governor Peter
  Stuyvesant leads the Dutch
  troops out of Fort Amsterdam
  between two files of British
  troops. Although the costumes
  shown have many inaccuracies,
  this plate by late 19th-century
  American historical artist Henry
  Ogden gives a good sense of
  the setting for this event.
  (Private collection)
  
  NEW SWEDEN
  From the 1620s the Swedes became interested in establishing trading posts 
  in North America. By the late 1630s heavy Swedish involvement in the 
  Thirty Years War had decreased and an expedition to set up trading posts and
  settlements proceeded to the shores of the Delaware River. On March 29, 1638
  the leader of the expedition, Peter Minuit, purchased land from five Iroquois
  Indian chiefs and then proceeded to build a fort, named Fort Christina, in honor
  of the queen of Sweden (at present-day Wilmington, Delaware). Minuit had
  been director of the Dutch New Netherlands between 1625 and 1633, and had
  since gone over to Swedish service. This first fort included two log houses within
  in order to lodge the garrison. It was the first permanent European settlement
  in the Delaware River Valley. The following year roughly 600 Swedes and Finns
  settled in the area.
  By 1642 the colony had a military establishment that numbered, besides
  its governor, a lieutenant, a sergeant, a corporal, a gunner, a drummer, a
  trumpeter, and 24 private soldiers. Some of these men were detached to new
  forts. In 1643 Fort Nya Elfsborg was built of earth and wooden palisades
  on the Delaware River’s eastern shore (between Salem and Alloway Creek,
  New Jersey) laid out in a triangular shape “after the English plan, with three
  angles” and was armed with eight brass 12-pdr guns. This fort was badly
  sited as it was near swamps, with the result that its garrison of a lieutenant
  and about a dozen men was constantly harassed by mosquitoes. It was
  strengthened in 1646, but this unhealthy place was eventually abandoned.
  Fort Nya Göteborg (Essington, Pennsylvania) was a log fort built the same
  year and armed with four brass cannon; it remained garrisoned until 1655.
  The settlement nearby was destroyed by fire in 1645 and later rebuilt. 
  In 1647 Fort Nya Korsholm went up (now southwestern Philadelphia),
  conceived mainly as a trading post designed to prevent the Dutch from
  trading on the west side of the Delaware River. It was described by Governor
  Prinz as “a fine little fort of logs, filled with sand and stones, and surrounded
  by palisades, with sharp points at the top.” Two fortified stronghouses were
  built nearby. In 1648 the Dutch built Fort Beversreede (a small trading post)
  nearby, but its access to the river was blocked by a Swedish trading post and
  it was finally abandoned in 1651. Fort Nya Korsholm was in turn abandoned
  by the Swedes in 1654 and later burned by Indians.
  New Sweden developed rapidly between 1643 and 1653 when Johan Prinz
  was its governor. He was a stern and unpopular ruler, but the colonists that
  were settled on both shores of the Delaware River lived peacefully, thanks
  in part to his shrewd diplomatic relations with New Sweden’s Dutch and Indian
  neighbors. During the mid-1640s he caused the colony’s fortifications to be
  improved; Fort Christina was, by then, quite “decayed” and was reconstructed.
  This fort was laid on a square plan with four large corner bastions. 
  There had always been some tensions between the Swedes and the Dutch
  over who should control trade in the Delaware River Valley. As early as 1623
  the Dutch had built Fort Nassau (Gloucester City, New Jersey), which became
  their main trading post on the Delaware River. In 1651 Governor Peter
  Stuyvesant of the New Netherlands had the fort dismantled, moved across
  the river (New Castle, Delaware), rebuilt, and renamed Fort Casimir. The fort
  was of earth and wood, each side being about 180ft (54.8m) in length and the
  walls about 12ft (3.8m) high. Each bastion had embrasures for four guns.
  Within was a quarters building and a structure with a conical roof that was
  used as a powder magazine.
  18
  
  This fort was only 5 miles (8km) south of Fort Christina, and was bad news
  for New Sweden. It proved to be too much for its new governor, Johan Risingh,
  who arrived in June 1654. He immediately decided to rid Delaware River
  of any Dutch presence, brought his warship in front of Fort Casimir and
  summoned it to surrender on June 21. The fort’s small garrison of a dozen
  soldiers was unprepared for such an attack, having hardly any ammunition,
  and surrendered to a party of Swedish soldiers. The fort was renamed
  Trefaldighet Fort (Fort Trinity) because the day it was taken was Trinity
  Sunday. The Dutch settlers were allowed to stay as long as they swore
  allegiance to Sweden. The Swedish flag now flew over the fort. The Swedes
  strengthened Fort Trinity by adding four 14-pdr cannon and a shore battery
  that could house six guns in front of the fort.
  When the news of the fort’s capture reached New Amsterdam, Peter
  Stuyvesant was enraged and considered the Swedish action a declaration of
  war. He bided his time and prepared a counterattack carefully. In early
  August 1655 the 36-gun frigate De Waag arrived at New Amsterdam from
  the Netherlands. There it joined the force gathered by Stuyvesant and, at the
  end of August, the Dutch fleet (consisting of the frigate with six smaller
  vessels carrying about 700 men, including over 300 soldiers) arrived in the
  Delaware River and came into view of Fort Trinity, the former Dutch Fort
  Casimir. At the sight of such a force, the Swedish garrison of 47 men knew
  they were beaten before the fighting started. About a dozen mutinied and
  the fort surrendered on September 1. The next step was to attack Fort
  Christina, which had only about 30 men to defend it. The Dutch appeared
  before the fort on September 2 and began siege operations. By September 14
  19
  Plan of the siege of Fort
  Christina by the Dutch in
  September 1655. The Swedish
  fort (A) is at the top. Above,
  across Christina Creek (B) is the
  Dutch “Snake” battery of four
  guns (F) with three infantry
  companies on Tennekong Land
  (D). At each side are flat
  lowlands covered with reeds
  (P). Below is the small harbor
  (N), a mine (O), and the town 
  of Christina (C). The Dutch
  forward position (M) consisted
  of the “Rat” battery (H) of 
  five guns with six infantry
  companies. At the lower right 
  is the Dutch “Gnat” battery 
  of six guns with four infantry
  companies (G). At the lower left
  is the “Fly” battery of four guns
  (I) with two infantry companies
  on Timber Island (K) and the
  Dutch force’s kitchen (L). 
  (Print after Johan Companius’
  1702 Kort Beskrifning em
  Provincien Nya Sverige)
  
  all the Dutch cannon were ready to bombard the
  fort and would do so if it did not surrender within
  24 hours. The following day, Governor Risingh
  having been granted the honors of war, the garrison
  capitulated. The Dutch flag thus rose over the
  formerly Swedish forts.
  In 1656 Sweden demanded the return of the
  colony or the payment of compensation by the Dutch,
  but wars in Poland and with Denmark soon diverted
  the Swedes’ attention and New Sweden became part
  of the New Netherlands. The Swedish colonists
  swore allegiance to the Netherlands and continued
  to use their own legal system, practice their own
  faith, organize their own militia, and trade with the
  Indians. This went on after England took over the
  area and the Swedish community on the Delaware
  remained distinct well into the 18th century. By then
  the original Swedish forts had vanished and the saga
  of New Sweden was largely forgotten.
  MASSACHUSETTS, NEW HAMPSHIRE, RHODE
  ISLAND, AND CONNECTICUT
  Massachusetts
  Following the Pilgrims’ founding at Plymouth in 1620, several other small
  English groups established small communities such as Gloucester (1623), a
  palisaded trading post at Chelsea (1624), and Salem (1626), which had a fort
  mounted with eight guns. From 1629–30 hundreds of Puritan settlers arrived
  in the “Bay” area of Massachusetts, founding Boston in September 1630. Like
  the Pilgrims in Plymouth, the Puritans were religious refugees from England
  who denounced the rites and regalia practiced by the Church of England. Ten
  years later Boston already had 1,200 inhabitants and Massachusetts some
  15,000. Indians were the perceived threat by the English settlers. Most early
  settlements probably had stockades and a militarized organization with
  well-armed and frequently trained militiamen. The early settlers built garrison
  houses, which were fortified buildings consisting of squared timber hewed from
  20
  Map of Boston harbor, c.1776.
  This detail shows the main
  coastal-defense features built
  to protect the town since the
  1630s. At left is the city’s harbor
  with the North Battery and the
  South Battery at the top and
  bottom respectively. Fort Hill is
  situated just behind the South
  Battery. At lower right is Castle
  Island with the bastioned
  outline of Castle William, the
  blockhouse, and, facing the
  channel, a long double line
  indicating the shore batteries.
  (Library of Congress,
  Washington)
  Fort Trinity, c.1654. The
  former Dutch Fort Casimir was
  captured by the Swedes in 1654
  and renamed Fort Trinity. The
  Swedish flag (blue with a yellow
  cross) is hoisted on its flagpole.
  This woodcut gives a view of the
  fort’s front facing the Delaware
  River. This bastioned fort also
  had a forward shore battery and
  a picket line in front. (Print after
  Johan Companius’ 1702 Kort
  Beskrifning em Provincien Nya
  Sverige)
  
  logs made to fit closely together and usually dove-tailed at the corners. Relations
  with the Boston-area Indians were peaceful. However, raids by the warlike
  Pequots on Puritan settlements during the mid-1630s caused the mobilization
  of the militia and the utter destruction of these hostile Indians in 1637; some
  Puritans believed they had been sent by the devil to test their resolve to build
  a “New Canaan” in America. There were no Indian wars for the next 40 years,
  so settlements were subsequently largely without fortifications. A major Indian
  uprising occurred in 1675 when, under chief King Philip, they suddenly attacked
  many settlements, killing about 500 colonists in Massachusetts, Connecticut,
  and Rhode Island. But these colonies were now home to about 50,000 souls,
  who mobilized and crushed the Indians in 1676.
  To the early Massachusetts settlers, another dangerous threat would come
  from seaborne enemies. In 1632–33 Boston’s “Hill Fort” was built of earth
  and wood on a height near the shore with parts covered with turf. It was
  armed with some sakers and demi-culverins and served also as the colony’s
  arms depot. It seems that a windmill was added in 1642. It was later built
  with bricks and, in 1676, had a dozen guns, but was considered “of little
  21
  Massachusetts Bay Militia,
  1680s. The dress, arms, and
  color of Connecticut, New
  Hampshire, and Rhode Island
  troops appears to have been
  essentially similar. The men
  wore their own clothing, and
  Cambridge probate records
  reveal that men’s suits 
  were usually grey, dull red,
  reddish-brown, or just “dark”
  while the coats could be olive,
  “sad green,” “sad purple,”
  brown, or clay-colored.
  Breeches and stockings were
  mostly grey or blue. Officers
  had sashes and better clothing.
  (Reconstruction by David
  Rickman. Directorate of History
  and Heritage, Department of
  National Defence, Ottawa)
  
  use” (Calendar of State Papers, or CSP) and rebuilt with four bastions in
  1687. Two years later it served as a refuge for Governor Andros when
  Bostonians rose in support of King William’s “Glorious Revolution.” In time,
  its military significance lessened; from 1713 a children’s school was installed
  there and the neglected fort was burned in 1760. The South Battery built
  on the waterfront below Fort Hill covered that part of the harbor. The North
  Battery built on the north side covered the Charles River. The town did not
  have walls and expanded rapidly, as indeed did the whole colony.
  Boston’s harbor was a maze of islands with low-lying sand bars that
  were often invisible at high tide. Ships would enter by a channel that passed
  22
  Castle Island in Boston harbor,
  1770. This view is taken looking
  east as one leaves the city’s
  harbor. At the center (a) is the
  island with Castle William built
  upon it; a large blockhouse is
  seen at the point, the bastioned
  fort farther back, and the
  batteries at the water’s edge.
  (Library of Congress,
  Washington)
  Plan of Castle William on 
  Castle Island at the entrance 
  to Boston harbor, c.1720.
  Originating in 1634 and built 
  at Massachusetts’ expense, 
  the initial earth-and-timber 
  fort was totally rebuilt between
  1701 and 1703 into a large
  brick fort with about 100 guns
  in the fort and on the extensive
  shore battery in front of it. The
  expansion of the shore battery
  from 1736 added an additional
  20 cannon of 42-pdr caliber,
  making it the most powerful
  coastal fort in the British North
  American colonies. This plan is
  oriented with the southeast at
  its top. 
  
  close to islands at its entrance. The
  harbor was exposed until 1634 when an
  earthwork with two platforms and three
  cannon was constructed on Castle Island,
  the best site for such works. In 1644 this
  battery was rebuilt with timber and stone
  thanks to Boston and five nearby towns
  pooling their resources. After a small fort
  was added in 1653 the fortification then
  had six guns, but it was made mostly
  of timber and was accidentally destroyed
  by fire in March 1673. It was subsequently
  rebuilt and made larger with four bastions.
  In 1676 it had “38 guns and a battery
  of
  six, commanding the [harbor’s]
  entrance” (CSP). By 1701 it was obvious
  that Boston needed better protection and
  Colonel Wolfgang William Romer of the
  Royal Engineers designed a large fort on
  a square plan, made of brick and stone
  with ravelins, outside earthworks, glacis,
  and
  four bastions. Between the fort
  and the water’s edge was a long battery
  protected by walls and earthworks (see
  illustration on p. 22). The fort, which
  then had 72 guns, was completed in 1703
  and christened “Castle William” in honor
  of King William III. Its shore battery was extended from 1736. A few years
  later outlying redoubts, including the large Shirley Redoubt on the
  northeastern tip of the island, were added and barracks built, which made
  Castle Island somewhat like a citadel and certainly the strongest
  fortification in New England. It was never attacked, but was destroyed
  in 1776 by the British army when it evacuated Boston. In 1799 the
  US Corps of Engineers built the five-bastioned Fort Independence, which
  was rebuilt in 1851 into the present large fort enjoyed by visitors. Of the
  other coastal towns, only Marblehead’s Fort Sewall was mentioned in a
  1676 report. It was a battery built at the entrance to the harbor in 1644 and
  enlarged in 1742. Gloucester also had a coastal fort from 1635, as did
  Salem whose Fort Ann contained 20 guns in 1703.
  During the 17th century settlers founded communities westward,
  eventually reaching the upper Connecticut River and thus coming closer to
  the wilderness domain of the French and Indians. Following the August 1689
  raid on the village of Lachine near Montréal by English-allied Mohawk
  Indians, who slaughtered many inhabitants and tortured prisoners to death,
  Governor General Frontenac approved a series of daring winter expeditions
  into New England. In early 1690 Schenectady (New York), Casco, and Salmon
  Falls (both in Massachusetts, now Maine) were razed by raiding parties from
  Canada. It was the beginning of frontier warfare that would plague England’s
  American colonies until the fall of New France in 1760. Even Haverhill, 
  north of Boston, was raided in 1697 and destroyed in 1708 in spite of being
  surrounded “by four forts” according to French officers. Northwestern
  Massachusetts was especially vulnerable to French and Indian attacks.
  23
  Fort Anson, 1754–c.1759. 
  Built at Pontoosuck in western
  Massachusetts, it was one of
  many garrison houses and
  small forts built in that area.
  Also known as the Fort at
  Pontoosuck and Captain
  Williams’ Garrison, it had 
  an unusual design with an 
  8ft-wide (2.4m) platform that
  ran around the perimeter 
  of the structure, with a small
  blockhouse in one corner. 
  The ground plan shows the
  basic structure (A), which 
  was a sturdy blockhouse with
  projecting beams and columns
  to support the platform. The
  side view of the south prospect
  shows a palisade extending
  down a slope. 
  
  24
  
  Garrison houses, first built in this area at the time of King Philip’s War, were
  erected or rebuilt in nearly every community. They were of various sizes and
  designs, some being more like small forts. The deterrent effect of garrison
  houses might discourage small parties of raiding Indians, but would not stop
  a large expedition. Deerfield may have had up to a dozen garrison houses in
  its area, but these did not prevent its being taken in February 1704 by a large
  enemy raiding party. Massachusetts also sought to block hostile incursions
  farther north on the Connecticut River by building Fort Dummer (Bratleboro,
  Vermont) in 1724, a wooden stockade of 180ft2 (55m2) armed with a dozen
  cannon. Some of its buildings’ thick timber walls also formed part of the
  stockade, a common practice in American frontier forts. In 1740 Fort No. 4
  (Charlestown, New Hampshire) was also built along the river. It consisted 
  of timber-interconnected houses used as dwellings as well as for defense. 
  In April 1747 a large force of French and Indians besieged Fort No. 4, but
  withdrew after three days. From 1744 the western Massachusetts approaches
  were also guarded by the stockade forts Shirley (Heath), Pelham (Rowe),
  and Massachusetts (Adams). The latter fort was destroyed in August 1746 by
  a large French-and-Indian raiding party. As the frontier moved farther west
  due to settlement, the hostile threats lessened, but they were never entirely
  subdued until the end of the Seven Years War. Most of these defensive
  structures were then abandoned or taken down.
  Some English and Massachusetts settlers went north along the coast to the
  district of Maine (part of Massachusetts until 1820, when it became a state).
  This was closer to the French in Canada, who had established close links with
  the Abenakis Indians. As a consequence the area saw much fighting during
  th 17th and early 18th centuries and remained sparsely settled. The Maine
  settlements often had garrison houses for protection against Indian raids. The
  province of Massachusetts built Fort Charles at Pemaquid during 1677, near
  the mouth of the Kennebec River; it was described as a wooden redoubt “with
  two guns aloft and an outworke with two bastions in each of which [are] two
  great guns, and one at ye gate.” In September 1689 Indians attacked and
  destroyed the fort and the small town around it. It was a major blow to the
  New Englanders, causing the withdrawal of most settlers. To secure the area,
  Fort William Henry was built there in 1692, a somewhat medieval-looking
  large stone fort with high walls and a massive tower (see Plate C). Some
  thought it to be impregnable, but the fort had only 11 soldiers when, in early
  August 1696, a squadron led by Pierre Le Moyne d’Iberville consisting of four
  French warships, including a bomb ketch, appeared, accompanied by several
  hundred Indians. The tiny garrison rejected the summons to surrender,
  FORT AT NO. 4 NEW HAMPSHIRE, 174347
  This fort was built by the settlers at land grant (or “plantation”)
  No. 4 in 1743. The outer walls of the fort’s lodgings served as its
  curtain walls, a common feature in wilderness forts built by
  settlers or by provincial governments. Most of the information
  about its layout is known thanks to a plan made on July 4, 1746
  by John Maynard, a soldier in the garrison. The fort was built
  on a slightly rectangular plan that featured, besides the fortiﬁed
  lodgings, a “Great Chamber” two stories high, to which was
  adjoined a tall wooden tower that served as a lookout on the
  Connecticut River. The “Great Chamber” building had a large
  hall that served as a function room for church service, meetings,
  or as a barracks. In addition, a cannon was placed in the nearby
  Parker House, used to sound the alarm of danger in case of
  attack as well as for defending the fort. Outside the fort was
  a stockade made with 12ft-high (3.6m) logs set about 5in.
  (127mm) apart, enough to shoot out from but not wide enough
  for someone to pass through. As in all frontier settlements of
  the time, should danger appear and the alarm gun be ﬁred,
  the settlers would immediately run to take refuge inside the
  fort, leaving their ﬁelds, agricultural tools, and large animals.
  In April 1747 a large French-and-Indian force attacked Fort No.
  4, but withdrew after a three-day siege.
  B
  
  so d’Iberville had some mortar shells fired and the few Massachusetts soldiers
  now capitulated on the condition of being safely evacuated, which was done.
  The French then destroyed the fort and sailed away. It remained a pile of
  rubble until it was repaired in 1729, renamed Fort Frederick, and garrisoned.
  It was abandoned in 1759. There were other forts inland and farther south.
  Those at Salmon Falls and Saco were taken by the French and Indians in
  1690, but later rebuilt in stone. In 1703 many settlements in Maine were
  raided by the French and Indians, which provoked counterattacks on
  Pentagoet and Grand Pré. In 1722 warfare broke out with the Indians in
  Maine and New Hampshire and many settlements were attacked, but peace
  was concluded in 1725. Thereafter the Maine area became more peaceful,
  although there were some Indian raids in the mid-1750s. To cope with these
  surprise raids, stockades or timber forts and batteries were built, such as Fort
  Mary (1708) at Saco, Fort Larrabee (1735) at Kennebunk, Fort Pepperell
  (1680s) and the later six-gun battery of Fort William (1720) at Portsmouth,
  Fort Halifax (1754) at Winslow, Fort Western (1754) at Augusta, and Fort
  Pownall (1759) at the mouth of the Penobscot River.
  New Hampshire
  The first settlements were established in 1623 at the Piscataqua River 
  area and consisted mostly of English fishermen, soon joined by Puritans from
  Massachusetts. According to Samuel Maverick’s 1660 Description of New
  England, the first settlers built a “strong and large house, [and] enclosed
  it with a large and high palizado and mounted guns” at the mouth of the
  river (near Rye). In 1631 an earthwork fort with four guns was built on
  the island of New Castle at the mouth of the Piscataqua, which was the
  most important site to defend the colony from enemy ships (now Fort
  Constitution). From 1641 the settlements on the Piscataqua River passed
  under the jurisdiction of Massachusetts until 1679, when a royal order
  created the colony of New Hampshire. In terms of defense, this relatively
  small colony continued to depend on the policies and resources of
  Massachusetts. In 1666 a timber blockhouse was built on the island, but
  a stronger work was needed. During the 1690s ordnance arrived from
  26
  Fort Pownall plan, 1759.
  Named after Thomas Pownall,
  governor of Massachusetts, 
  this fort blocked any 
  French-and-Indian war party
  coming down the Penobscot
  River and was never attacked.
  Garrisoned until 1763, it was
  destroyed by American patriots
  in about 1775. (Library of
  Congress, Washington)
  
  England and was installed in Fort William and Mary, which was being
  constructed on the island. It was a large battery containing some 19 guns to
  protect the access to Portsmouth, the colony’s capital. In 1705 it was rebuilt
  and armed with 30 guns. This large fortification commanded access to the
  harbor of Portsmouth from a seaborne attack. It consisted of turf-covered
  ramparts 3ft (0.9m) high, upon which wooden platforms for batteries were
  installed, protected by 7ft-high (2.1m) curtain walls reveted with stone. It was
  New Hampshire’s largest fort, was never attacked, and was dismantled
  in 1774–75. From 1689 a battery was built on Kittery Point, eventually called
  Fort Pepperell, and, from the 1720s, Fort William (now Fort McClary). Its six
  guns provided crossfire with Fort William and Mary. Although there were
  many fortified garrison houses and stockades in New Hampshire villages
  (up to 50 in the Dover area), this fort was the most important in the colony.
  Battery Cumberland (now Fort Stark) was also built in 1746 at the southern
  end of New Castle Island to further secure the entrance to Portsmouth harbor.
  During the 18th century Massachusetts built several forts along the
  Connecticut River including Fort No. 4 in an area that eventually became
  the western border of New Hampshire.
  Rhode Island
  Once settled in Providence from 1636, the settlers built a number of garrison
  houses and palisades to protect their communities, notably from Indians
  during King Philip’s War. Thereafter, protection was sought against seaborne
  raiders that might attack Newport and Providence by entering Narragansett
  Bay. Newport was at the strategic entrance to the bay and Fort Anne was
  built there in 1702 and armed with a dozen guns. It was later called Fort
  George and its armament increased to about 50 cannon; it was the largest fort
  in the colony.
  27
  Woodcut of Fort Halifax. Built
  in 1754–55, this fort was at the
  confluence of the Kennebec
  and Sebasticook rivers in Maine
  and was meant to protect
  settlements in Maine from
  raids. The original plan by
  General Winslow called for a
  large four-pointed-star-shaped
  palisade with five blockhouses
  within. Once on the spot,
  however, Captain William
  Lightgow found the original
  plan impractical and, in the
  summer of 1755, changed it to
  a square stockade with large
  timber blockhouses at the
  southwest and northeast
  corners, the quarters and
  storehouse forming part of 
  the walls. A timber redoubt
  secured the nearby hill.
  
  28
  
  Connecticut
  The Dutch built trading forts from 1631 in Connecticut, but from 1633 English
  Pilgrim settlers from Massachusetts had arrived and by 1636 some 250 colonists
  had settled on the western shore the Connecticut River. In 1635 they built Fort
  Matianuck (or Windsor Blockhouse), Fort Saybrook, and Fort Hartford to
  counter the Dutch Fort Good Hope there. The Hartford settlement grew and
  tolerance prevailed since the Dutch continued trading there until they closed
  their post in 1654. There was also New Haven Colony set up by Puritan settlers
  as an independent entity in 1638, but, apart from a fort recorded in 1657, New
  Haven had no substantial fortifications. The stockade fort at Saybrook (now
  Old Saybrook) was rebuilt close to the entrance to the Connecticut River in
  1648; it successfully resisted a Dutch naval attack in 1675 but was afterwards
  abandoned. A small fort was built at New London in 1691, which was
  essentially a six-gun coastal battery with the powder magazine and guardhouse
  on higher ground. In October 1739 “ten good cannons” were added, although
  it contained only nine guns in 1774. There were many small villages, forts, and
  garrison houses in Connecticut, but no substantial fortifications during the
  colonial era.
  FORT WILLIAM HENRY, PEMAQUID, 169296
  Situated on New England’s contested northern seacoast,
  Pemaquid’s ﬁrst fort was destroyed by Indians allied with the
  French in 1689. The colony of Massachusetts Bay resolved to build
  another, stronger, fort, since the Maine area served as a defense
  buﬀer for communities farther south. In 1692 the new fort was
  built, costing some £20,000, which was two-thirds of
  Massachusetts’ budget that year. The new structure was built of
  stone, and instead of the usual Vauban-style low structure with
  bastions, ditches, and glacis, Fort William Henry at Pemaquid
  looked more like a small castle. Cotton Mather’s account
  published in 1702 mentioned that the south wall was 22ft (6.7m)
  high and “more than six foot thick at the [gun] ports, which were
  eight foot from the ground.” The east wall was 12ft (3.6m) high,
  the north wall 10ft high, and the west 18ft (5.4m) high. The walls
  were pierced for 28 gun ports and 14–18 cannon armed the fort,
  six of which were 18-pdrs. It was built on an almost-square plan,
  with internal dimensions of 142ft (northwest to southeast) and
  160ft (northeast to southwest). The southwest and northeast
  corners were constructed as reinforced internal bastions or turrets
  and the northwest corner had a sort of half turret. The most
  striking feature of the fort was its large, round tower that rose
  29ft (8.4m) high. 
  Our reconstruction is largely based on Robert L. Bradley and
  Helen B. Camp’s The Forts of Pemaquid, Maine: An Archaeological
  and Historical Study (Augusta, 1994), but there are some
  unknown features. The exact presence, number and location
  of cannon ports in the walls is speculative. The interior held
  several buildings whose function is uncertain; ﬁreplaces are in
  the structure on the eastern side, indicating a lodging. The
  others would have been storerooms and gun emplacements.
  There may have been a wooden inside walkway along the upper
  walls. The answers to many questions have vanished for ever,
  but enough remains to indicate that this ill-fated fort was, after
  Castle William in Boston, the most imposing fortiﬁcation built by
  English colonists on the Eastern Seaboard during the 17th
  century. It was nevertheless taken and destroyed in August 1696
  by a French naval squadron led by Canadian-born Captain
  Pierre Le Moyne d’Iberville.
  C
  Entrance to Narragansett Bay.
  This is an important waterway
  because it leads to Newport
  (at left on the peninsula seen in
  the center) and to Providence
  at the north end of the bay, the
  two most important cities in
  Rhode Island. From 1702 a fort
  was built on Goat Island,
  eventually armed with some
  50 guns. From the 1740s a
  watchtower stood on
  Brampton Point, most likely
  at the site of Fort Adams
  (distinguishable at center).
  From the 1770s, sizeable forts
  and batteries were also erected
  on Rose Island (bottom) and at
  The Dumplings (right). (Library
  of Congress, Washington)
  
  NEW YORK
  The English initially merely changed flags and garrisons in the former Dutch
  forts of the New Netherlands. In 1670 New York City’s Fort James (formerly
  Fort Amsterdam) had “four bastions, forty pieces of cannon mounted; the
  walls of stone lined with a thick rampart of earth” according to John Ogilby.
  This fort remained basically the same as it was during the Dutch period well
  into the 18th century, although its name was changed again to Fort George
  when George I became king in 1714. After 1674 the English bolstered
  the weak defenses of New York’s harbor and a battery was built in front of
  the fort, eventually extending south to Whitehall Street; in 1702 this battery
  had 15 guns with 37 other cannon mostly installed in various places along the
  waterfront. Two other small batteries were at the harbor’s “narrows” at
  about that time. A 1706 report mentioned that the “old fort” in New York
  City had 21 guns “of which only 10 are serviceable” and that the battery in
  front needed six 24-pdrs. Three new blockhouses had four small guns each 
  (WO 55/343 and 344). The most notable improvement came in 1735 when
  the Whitehall Battery near the old fort was rebuilt featuring three waterfront
  bastions and inaugurated on July 21 as the George Augustus Royal Battery,
  also known as Capsey’s Battery. Regrettably, the festive event turned into 
  a tragedy when one of the guns blew up, killing three people including 
  the governor’s daughter. New York City’s land defenses were not deemed
  important and the palisade built by the Dutch on Wall Street had vanished
  by the 1720s as the city grew. By 1745, however, fear of French and Indian
  raids had reached New York City. A new wall was built across Manhattan
  from James and Cherry streets, which ran diagonally and irregularly west up 
  to north of Warren Street. The wall had a ditch in front and was of cedar 
  logs about 14ft (4.2m) long, apparently laid horizontally with loopholes
  for muskets. Along this wall were three blockhouses, 30ft2 (9.1m2) in area and
  10ft (3m) high, with six embrasures for cannon and four gates. It seems to
  have vanished following the Seven Years War.
  The area north of Albany was the most threatened in the colony. It was
  near the domains of the powerful Iroquois, who were on mostly friendly terms
  New Amsterdam in the 1660s.
  Print after H. Ogden, after a
  contemporary view of the city
  by Augustine Herrman found
  engraved on at least five
  different maps of the period.
  Fort Amsterdam with its large
  bastions is at the center and
  left. The flag of the Dutch West
  India Company is at left, and
  that used by Great Britain
  between 1606 and 1801 is
  at right. (Private collection)
  
  with the English, but relations with Indian nations could change very fast. Also
  of increasing concern was the growing power of the French in Canada. Thus,
  in March 1676, Governor Sir Edmund Andros ordered that a new fort made
  of earth and timber be constructed on the height overlooking the town, with
  each of its four bastions mounting six guns. In June the garrison moved from
  the old Dutch fort near the river to the new English Fort Frederick on the hill.
  Albany’s other major defensive work was its protective stockade, which now
  ran up to the new fort on the hill and had several gates corresponding to its
  streets. This wall was rebuilt during the summer of 1757 with, according
  to Royal Engineer John Montresor, the city government of Albany paying for
  and digging “the trench for the ditch to put in the stockades.”
  From the later part of the 17th century, just as the French and Indian
  menace grew, Albany was increasingly protected by Schenectady, about 
  20 miles (32km) to the northwest, and by a few small posts to the north in 
  the Saratoga area on the west bank of the Hudson River. Founded in 1662,
  Schenectady itself was admirably placed for its protection and safety, being
  surrounded by water and marsh on three sides and open only to the southeast.
  The settlement was protected by a rectangular stockade pierced by two gates
  and with two blockhouses at opposite angles. The north angle also had a small
  double-stockade fort. On the very cold night of February 8, 1690 there were
  no sentries on duty and one of the village gates was ajar when the Canadians,
  French, and Indians attacked. The surprise was total and Schenectady 
  was razed, although the survivors were spared. This was the first large-scale
  French-and-Indian raid on New England in reprisal for the horrific destruction
  of Lachine, near Montréal, by Mohawk warriors, who had been encouraged
  by the English in New York. From the 1690s the Canadian woodsmen with
  their Indian allies became the undisputed masters of raid warfare until the
  final phases of the Seven Years War in the later 1750s. In wartime between
  31
  New York City’s Fort George
  and the Battery seen from
  the southwest in 1736. Both
  of these works had up to
  120 cannon on their ramparts.
  Inside the fort, originally built
  by the Dutch over a century
  before, are the imposing
  structures of the chapel and
  the governor’s residence.
  Engraving by I. Carwitham.
  (Library of Congress,
  Washington)
  
  Britain and France they erupted from the wilderness and destroyed countless
  frontier settlements and forts. In so doing they provoked the construction 
  of a vast number of all sorts of fortifications, big and small, in the British
  colonies. Indeed, Schenectady’s stockade was ordered rebuilt in May 1690. It
  was armed with eight cannon and four swivel guns that actually belonged to
  local merchants, and featured tower-like blockhouses at each corner. In 1705
  the blockhouses were abandoned and a new fort was built at the eastern angle
  of the stockade. It was about 100ft2 (30.4m2) in area including its bastions.
  It was rebuilt in 1735, this time using timber laid on a stone foundation.
  A blockhouse named Fort Vrooman (near Schuylerville) was built during
  1689 in the Saratoga area north of Albany and later abandoned. Since it was
  in the path of French and Indian raiders, a more permanent Fort Saratoga was
  erected there in 1702, but its small garrison had “not a single” gun at that
  date (WO 55/344). Rebuilt in 1721, it was taken and destroyed in November
  1744 by a large force of French and Indians, which went on to the outskirts
  of Albany. Reconstructed in 1746 as Fort Clinton, it was again attacked by a
  force of French and Indians in June 1747, abandoned, and destroyed during
  the fall of that year. Fort Hardy (at Schuylerville) was built in August 1755 as
  a supply depot and appears to have been garrisoned until the end of the Seven
  Years War.
  32
  Plan of the town of Albany,
  1695. During the colonial era
  Albany was always protected
  by a stockade wall (10), which
  was punctuated at intervals
  by blockhouses (7). The fort
  (1) was on the north side and
  a “great gun” (9) covered the
  river on the south side. (Albany
  Institute of History and Art) 
  
  The most northerly of the early
  New York forts was Fort Anne, 
  east of Lake George at the junction of
  Halfway Creek and Wood Creek,
  situated on the most important land
  route from Albany to Fort Crown
  Point on Lake Champlain. In 1709
  Fort Schuyler was built there, 
  but dismantled when the troops
  withdrew before the end of the year.
  Two years later, General Nicholson’s
  army assembling to invade Canada
  built Queen’s Fort, which was
  renamed Fort Anne (or Ann) when it
  was completed. It was an earth-and-
  palisade work of 140ft2 (42.6m2) 
  in area with 20ft2 (6m2) bastions and
  had two large buildings within. It was
  later abandoned, but was restored 
  in 1757 with the addition of a stone
  magazine and arsenal.
  During the 1750s the most
  important fort on this route was Fort
  Edward, built in 1755 on the shore of the Hudson River at the southern end
  of the “Great Carrying Place,” an 11-mile (17.7km) portage road between
  that river and Fort Anne farther north. Another trail, stretching 14 miles
  (22.5km) to the northeast, led to the southern end of Lake George. The first
  fortification at that site was Fort Nicholson, which was erected in 1709 and
  abandoned at the end of the War of the Spanish Succession. In 1732–35, while
  the French were building Fort Saint-Frederic at the southern end of Lake
  Champlain (Crown Point, New York), the British built Fort Lydius together
  with a settlement, which was destroyed in 1745 by a French-and-Indian raid.
  Plan of Schenectady, 1695.
  1: corner blockhouses; 
  2: river running beside the fort;
  3: Indian wigwams; 
  4: the flagstaff; 5: sentry box; 
  6: the spy-loft; 7: sties for hogs;
  8: the blockhouse used as a
  church; 9: houses; 10: a great
  barn; 11: the treble stockade;
  12: the fort’s gates. (Plan after
  John Miller’s Description of 
  the Province and City of New
  York…, 1695)
  33
  Plan of Fort Frederick, Albany,
  c.1760. This fort was first built
  in 1676 on the hill that
  overlooks the city (now the site
  of the New York State Capitol
  building). It had essentially the
  same plan as shown except
  that the northeast bastion
  (upper right) was more
  rounded. Repairs were made
  in 1757 and this plan shows
  the fort as it was from that date.
  (From A set of plans and forts in
  America…, 1763)
  
  Ten years later, hostilities broke out again and Fort Lyman, quickly renamed
  Fort Edward in September, was built at this important strategic location. For
  further warning and protection against raiders, the “Royal” blockhouse was
  built about two miles (3.2km) farther up on the Hudson River’s eastern shore.
  Fort Edward was abandoned in 1766.
  Although war between France and Britain would not be declared officially
  until 1756, armies were already fighting in North America during 1755. The
  British and Americans had been defeated in Virginia and Pennsylvania, but they
  had taken forts Beauséjour and Gaspareau on the Nova Scotia border. At Lake
  George a large camp surrounded by an earth-and-log wall on a rectangular plan
  had been built by Sir John Johnson’s provincial army on a height. On September
  8 some 2,000 New England militiamen entrenched in their fortified camp
  at Lake George under Sir William Johnson defeated General Dieskau’s French
  Fort Edward, c.1758–60. This
  undated plan shows the fort
  during its peak period of use 
  as a military base. First called
  Fort Lyman, it was built in 1755
  of timber and earth. The walls
  were 16ft (4.8m) high and 22ft
  (6.7m) thick and the fort had six
  cannon on its ramparts. It had a
  deep ditch in front of the walls.
  (Print after W. H. Hill’s 1929 Old
  Fort Edward)
  Profiles of the fortifications
  around Fort Edward and Fort
  Saratoga (New York), 1757.
  Both feature exterior ditches
  with a berm within, making
  any surprise attack very
  difficult. (Print after a plan
  by John Montresor)
  34
  
  regulars marching towards Fort Edward.
  Following this victory, Fort William
  Henry (called Fort George by the French)
  was built there to secure Lake George
  while the French were erecting Fort
  Carillon at Ticonderoga to block the
  Anglo-Americans. This was insufficient
  for the large number of British and
  American troops who mustered on the
  southern end of Lake George during the
  summer. The fortified camp built by
  Sir John Johnson’s provincial army was
  about 350yds (320m) southeast of the
  new fort and it continued to be used.
  In July 1757 this camp was redesigned
  and strengthened by Engineer Montresor
  with the addition of a hornwork to the
  south covered by a battery of two guns,
  bastions to each side, and another
  two-gun battery in a bastion facing north.
  Since Fort William Henry was the first
  British post on the Richelieu River–Lake
  Champlain–Lake 
  George 
  watershed,
  hitherto controlled by the French from
  Canada, it became their primary target.
  There were many skirmishes in this area,
  but the first serious attack occurred in
  March 1757 when some 1,500 French
  and Indians failed to surprise the
  Anglo-American garrison of 475 men,
  who repulsed the raiders. However, on
  August 3, 1757 General Montcalm’s army
  of nearly 8,000 men (including some
  1,800 Indians) invested the fort with its
  nearby camp and began European-style
  siege operations. Lieutenant-Colonel
  George Monro’s doomed 2,300-strong
  garrison surrendered on August 9, and some of them were later slaughtered by
  rampaging Indians in spite of the French’s efforts to stop them. On August 15
  the fort was demolished, after which Montcalm’s army went back to Canada.
  Thereafter, the Anglo-Americans did not build another fortification at the
  southern end of Lake George until July 1759 when General Amherst’s 
  army assembled there before moving up against Fort Carillon and Fort
  Saint-Frédéric. Construction thereafter started on Fort George, on the site 
  of the former Fort William Henry. In early August 1759 the French blew up
  and evacuated both Fort Carillon and Fort Saint-Frédéric, making the new
  British fort under construction at Lake George redundant. It was abandoned
  with only its southern bastion completed.
  Following the French’s departure from the southern end of Lake
  Champlain, General Amherst was eager to secure the area to prepare for his
  army’s advance on Canada. Fort Carillon was renamed Fort Ticonderoga and
  work started on repairing it following its original plan of a square with large
  35
  The camp at Fort William
  Henry, 1757. Just to the 
  east of the fort was a large
  camp surrounded by field
  fortifications built since 1755.
  The thousands of troops that
  assembled at the southern
  end of Lake George during the
  summer could never all fit in
  the fort. Two years later, shortly
  before the siege of the fort
  by Montcalm’s army, Royal
  Engineer John Montresor
  redesigned the outline of
  the camp to make it more
  defensible. (Print after a plan
  by John Montresor)
  
  bastions revetted with stone. At Fort Crown Point, on the southern end of
  Lake Champlain, Fort Saint-Frédéric had been thoroughly destroyed and, in
  any event, Amherst needed a much larger fort. Some 3,000 men immediately
  started construction on Fort Crown Point, a large pentagon with five bastions,
  three outside redoubts, three blockhouses, and various fieldworks. A 77-mile
  (124km) road was also built through the wilderness between Fort Crown
  Point and Fort No. 4. In 1760 Fort Crown Point was the gathering point
  for one of the three Anglo-American armies that moved towards Montréal.
  After Canada’s capitulation in September work
  slowed down at Fort Crown Point, and in 1763
  one of the barrack buildings was left unfinished,
  but a small garrison remained posted there.
  On April 21, 1773 a chimney fire spread from
  the men’s barracks to the fort’s timber walls
  and from there to the powder magazine; the
  garrison was evacuated and the fort was partly
  destroyed by the massive explosion that
  followed. By then the site had little strategic
  value and was abandoned.
  The Great Lakes were an exclusively French
  domain until 1722 when New York traders
  appeared at Oswego, on the southeast shore 
  of Lake Ontario. The alarmed French built Fort
  Niagara in 1726 so as to deny Anglo-Americans
  penetration farther west. The New Yorkers
  therefore built their own masonry-fortified house
  in 1727. From 1741 it was surrounded by
  a 10.5ft-high crenellated stone wall with small
  towers on the southeast and northeast corners
  and featured three cannon facing the river.
  A detachment of troops was posted there and, 
  over the years, a small town was built. By 1755
  hostilities had broken out with the French and
  Fort Crown Point, 1759–73.
  Built as a pentagon with five
  bastions, this large fort had
  curtain walls of wood and
  timber laid on a substantial
  stone foundation. Inside was
  a wooden guardhouse near
  the gate, masonry officers’
  quarters and men’s barracks
  (at right), and a wooden
  armory/storehouse (bottom).
  Another men’s barracks (left)
  was not finished when the
  Seven Years War ended in 1763.
  (Crown Point State Historic Site,
  Crown Point, New York)
  Fort Herkimer, 1756. It was
  originally a fortified house
  built of wood by trader John
  Harkimer during the early
  1720s and rebuilt in stone from
  about 1737 at German Flats (or
  Little River). It also served as a
  store and trading post and was
  surrounded by a bastioned
  curtain wall on an elongated
  plan by the time the rendering
  for this print was taken in 1756.
  (Private collection)
  36
  
  two new forts were built on the heights
  above Fort George, which was reported
  as crumbling. To the east was the
  pentagon-shaped earth-and-timber Fort
  Ontario with five bastions surrounded
  by an 8ft-deep ditch. To the west now
  stood Fort Oswego, a stockade with
  entrenchments outside its three walls,
  since it was unfinished. A guardhouse
  within an earthen entrenchment stood
  at the edge of the town.
  To 
  access 
  Lake 
  Ontario 
  the
  Anglo-Americans travelled along the
  Mohawk River to the Oneida Carrying
  Place and, by using Wood Creek,
  would eventually access the Oswego
  River. From the 1720s Fort Herkimer
  (Little River, later German Flats) and
  several other fortifications farther east
  were built and, in 1746, Fort Williams
  at Oneida Carrying Place. Fort Bull,
  a larger star-shaped stockade with four
  buildings within, was built there in
  late 1755. The French, who planned
  to march on Oswego, could not allow
  this and, on March 27, 1756, attacked and razed Fort Bull while Fort
  Williams was abandoned. In August 1756 General Montcalm’s army laid siege
  to Oswego. The Anglo-American defenders extended some fieldworks on
  37
  Fort Oswego, 1727. The 
  Anglo-American establishment
  on Lake Ontario worried the
  French, who made intelligence
  reports about this large stone
  blockhouse of about 58ft
  (17.5m) by 26ft (8m), named
  Fort George. It featured a
  machicolated upper story. 
  The place also had about
  70 trader’s shacks and a
  garrison of 60 soldiers.
  (Print after a drawing with a
  July 1727 report in France’s
  Archives Nationales, Colonies,
  C11A, vol. 126) 
  Plan and elevation of Fort
  Oswego, 1749. The large stone
  blockhouse built in 1727 was
  surrounded from 1741 by a
  curtain wall with two turrets
  facing the river, shown on the
  left. It stood on the western
  shore of the river’s mouth as it
  flowed into Lake Ontario (this
  map has the south at its top);
  its outline is visible at the lower
  right. (Archives Nationales,
  France, Dépot des Fortifications
  des Colonies, Amérique
  septentrionale) 
  
  38
  
  the southwest side, but these old or defective forts were no match for
  the French siege batteries; Oswego capitulated and its forts were destroyed
  by the French. Once the French left, the Anglo-Americans cautiously came
  back and built Fort Wood Creek. In the summer of 1758 the much larger Fort
  Stanwix was built there (now Rome) to fully secure the Oneida Carrying
  Place. The Royal Blockhouse was also built nearby at Wood Creek near Lake
  Oneida. Oswego needed to be fortified too and, in 1759, the British built
  a large new Fort Ontario, again on a pentagon plan with five bastions.
  Although much reconstructed by the US Army thereafter, Fort Ontario’s
  present outline still follows the 1759 plan.
  FORT WILLIAM HENRY, LAKE GEORGE, NEW YORK, 175557
  Following Sir William Johnson’s victory at Lake George
  over General Dieskau’s French army on September 8, 1755,
  construction of Fort William Henry began under the direction
  of Engineer Captain William Eyre and, by November, the fort
  was completed. Named after two members of Britain’s royal
  family, it was nevertheless known as ”Fort Georges” to its
  French rivals. Situated on a height of about 23ft (7m), built
  of earth and logs on a somewhat irregular square plan of
  about 390ft2 (120m2) including the corner bastions, it was
  armed with 24 cannon and 17 swivel guns. The two bastions
  facing the lake each had a powder magazine. The northwest
  curtain wall faced Lake George, the northeast and southeast
  walls had a ditch outside them, and the southwest wall faced
  a large marsh. Within was a hospital and storehouses that
  could contain up to 2,500 barrels of provisions while the
  barracks could lodge up to 500 men. Casemates that could
  accommodate 200 men were also built under the barracks. 
  It was a work that was, on the whole, fairly typical of many
  other frontier forts. Fort William Henry proved effective in
  repulsing a vigorous French-and-Indian raid in March 1757,
  but could not resist General Montcalm’s large French army
  that besieged it from August 3 to August 9, its cannon and
  mortar batteries concentrating their fire on the earth-and-
  timber fort. Following its surrender, the fort was destroyed
  by the French on August 15, 1757.
  D
  Forts at Oswego, 1756.
  This plan made by Captain de
  Courville, an officer in General
  Montcalm’s French army 
  that captured Oswego in
  August, gives an idea of the
  fortifications existing at the
  time of the four-day siege.
  (Print after de Courville.
  Private collection) 
  
  MARYLAND, NEW JERSEY, AND DELAWARE
  Maryland
  In 1634 the first permanent settlers in Maryland built St Mary’s Fort, a square
  stockade with corner blockhouses mounted with six small cannon to protect
  St Mary’s City, the first colonial capital. The Indians in that area posed no
  threat and, within a decade, the fort was abandoned. A few other small
  garrison houses, batteries, and fortified trading posts were built in eastern
  Maryland. In April 1650 the Maryland legislative assembly allowed a full-time
  garrison of six men under a captain to remain at the fort at St Inigo (or
  St Igniatius, now Beachville) harbor to defend against a possible naval threat,
  but it was soon abandoned. The town of Baltimore became the colonial capital
  in 1695 and, during the early 18th century, had a stockade wall with two gates
  facing inland as protection against an Indian attack. But, in time, the wall was
  considered useless and it gradually disappeared. From 1754 French and Indian
  raids intensified in western Maryland, driving settlers out. Virginians had
  built a trade fort at Wills Creek in 1749 and, five years later, it provided refuge
  to George Washington and his men after their capitulation at Fort Necessity.
  In 1755 it was rebuilt and renamed Fort Cumberland, a large work 120ft
  (36.5m) wide by 400ft (122m) long, and was a major military staging area
  for the campaigns towards the Ohio Valley. A few small stockade forts were
  built at that time in western Maryland, but Fort Frederick was the major work
  erected in 1756 by the colony: an impressive-looking structure built on
  a square plan with large bastions featuring stone walls. It provided a safe
  haven for settlers and was also an important rallying point for troops moving
  against the French in the Ohio Valley.
  New Jersey
  Initially part of the New Netherlands, the settlements in New Jersey became
  predominantly English as more colonists settled there from 1664. It was
  under no threat and its main military role in the colonial wars was to support
  the colony of New York. A few small stockade forts or blockhouses were
  built by militiamen, predominantly during 1756. The largest was Fort John’s
  (Walpack Center), which was built in 1756. It was a 120ft2 (36.5m2) palisade
  with a blockhouse, a house, and a log cabin within. That same year the
  Fort Frederick, Maryland, 1756–63.
  The province of Maryland had this
  fort built during 1756 to protect its
  western settlers. This large work
  consisted of stone curtain walls
  and bastions with three large
  buildings within. It remains today
  one of the best-preserved forts in
  the United States. 
  40
  
  smaller Fort Walpack (Flatbookville) was built featuring a 50ft2 (15.2m2)
  palisade surrounding a small blockhouse and a church. In 1758 barracks
  were built at Trenton, Princeton, New Brunswick, Perth Amboy, and
  Elizabeth to house British troops.
  Delaware
  Settled by the Swedes in 1638 and taken over by the Dutch in 1655 and by
  the English in 1664 (see above), the settlements of Delaware were included
  in the colony of New York until 1681 when they formed part of the
  Pennsylvania royal grant. The area of the “Three Lower Counties” that
  formed Delaware was allowed by William Penn to have its own legislative
  assembly, its Swedish, Finnish, and English settlers having different values
  and faiths than the Quakers. It thus became an autonomous colony. The main
  forts were those originally built by the Swedes and the Dutch. Fort Christina,
  renamed Altena (Wilmington), and Fort Casimir, renamed New Castle by the
  British (New Castle), were initially occupied by British troops from 1664 and
  eventually abandoned during the 1680s. Apart from a battery of ten guns
  built in 1748 by Philadelphia’s military association near Wilmington
  (Delaware) called Fort Christiana and another four-gun battery built near
  New Castle that fired at a Spanish privateer in May 1748, there were no other
  sizeable fortifications in Delaware.
  PENNSYLVANIA AND VIRGINIA
  Pennsylvania
  The area that became Pennsylvania in the royal grant to the Quakers in March
  1681 originally included parts of Delaware and had a few English settlements
  from the 1660s. William Penn, leader of the Society of Friends, obtained the
  charter and gave the colony its name. Renowned for their frugality, industry,
  and kindness, the Quakers were also pacifists and believed that no man should
  fight or kill another man. This was at variance with the laws of England
  and the Quakers were persecuted. To solve the problem, the Crown granted
  them Pennsylvania, where they could live according to their beliefs. This
  province thus assumed a unique position in the world with regard to defense
  matters in that there were no military laws. In 1747, during the War of the
  Austrian Succession , many concerned citizens of Philadelphia who were not
  Quakers pressed the province’s government to allow fortifications to be built
  41
  Fort Cumberland, Maryland,
  1754–55. Also called Fort
  Innes, it was built on a height 
  called Point Pleasant at the
  confluence of Wills Creek and
  a branch of the Potomac River.
  As seen on this plan drawn
  by George Washington, this
  stockade fort with four bastions
  mounted with cannon made it
  a very strong position. (Library
  of Congress, Washington)
  
  42
  
  as protection against hostile ships and to raise volunteer troops. The
  government agreed and a large military association was soon organized, and
  money was raised to pay for the construction of a battery and to purchase
  cannon. Several batteries were built in 1748. The “Association Battery at
  Wicaco” (Southbank area of Philadelphia) initially had 16 guns and, by 1753,
  mounted 27 guns. The Society Hill Battery contained 13 guns. Two smaller
  batteries were also built farther south in Delaware (see above).
  A few years later, western Pennsylvania was the scene of unprecedented
  fort construction caused by the Seven Years War, which had its roots in the
  area. Traders (mostly from Virginia) wandered into the Ohio Valley, which
  the French claimed as part of New France. To reinforce their claim, the French
  decided to build a string of forts from Lake Erie to the Ohio. The province of
  Pennsylvania was in no position to react, but Governor Robert Dinwiddie of
  Virginia did by sending young Major George Washington with a summons to
  the French at Fort Le Boeuf to evacuate in late 1753, which convinced them
  to reinforce their position instead. By April 1754 Virginian troops started to
  build Fort Prince George (or Trent’s Fort) at the strategic confluence where the
  Alleghany and Monongahela rivers form the Ohio River when, on April 16,
  a large French force arrived, convinced “with great civility” the 40 Virginians
  to leave, and built Fort Duquesne on the spot. In late May, Ensign
  FORT FREDERICK, MARYLAND
  Fort Frederick was built in 1756 in the Cumberland Valley to
  provide protection for the area’s settlers and to block French 
  and Indian war parties from going farther east. The province of
  Maryland resolved to construct a unusually robust structure with
  stone curtain walls 3ft wide (0.9m) at the base, which rose to a
  height of 18 feet (5.48m), the thickness tapering to 2ft (0.6m) at
  the top. The bastion walls were even thicker, being 4ft wide
  (1.2m) at the base. The fort was not intended to face an enemy
  armed with heavy artillery (most unlikely in that area) since it 
  had no glacis nor earthen reinforcements to the walls. The stone
  walls were obviously ﬁreproof against Indian ﬁre arrows, but the
  buildings inside were made of wood. A 1778 letter mentions that
  the oﬃcers’ quarters had two stories, but we have followed the
  original interpretation of the fort from the time of the French 
  and Indian War. The bastions are shown as being ﬁlled in, as each
  was said to contain a cannon. The fort contained three buildings
  to accommodate lodging and supplies. At times it must have
  been ﬁlled with tents, as up to 700 people might seek shelter
  within its walls. Lurking raiders never dared attack this imposing
  fort. Its garrison was withdrawn in about 1760. Its walls remained
  and Fort Frederick was restored by the state of Maryland during
  the 20th century.
  E
  Fort Ligonier, 1762. This rare
  view of the fort was made by
  Lieutenant Archibald Blane of
  the 60th (Royal Americans)
  Regiment on June 30, 1762. It
  shows the east wall’s gate and
  its horizontally laid logs, the
  location of the flagpole, and
  the hip roofs of the buildings
  within. (Fort Ligonier Museum,
  Ligonier, Pennsylvania)
  
  Jummonville and his party sent to deliver a summons were ambushed by
  Washington and his men with allied Indians; this “Jummonville Incident”
  started open warfare. Anxious about the French’s reaction, Washington built
  a “fort out of necessity” at Great Meadow. In early July, Fort Necessity was
  surrounded by up to 900 French and Indian attackers and, after losing a
  quarter of his 400 troops, Washington surrendered and evacuated on July 4,
  after signing a controversial capitulation. Fort Necessity was destroyed and,
  from then on and until the late 1750s, many French-allied Indian war parties
  attacked and devastated many frontier settlements and forts in Pennsylvania,
  Maryland, and Virginia (including the present state of West Virginia). For
  instance, Fort Granville built in 1755 by Pennsylvania provincial troops on the
  north shore of the Juanita River was destroyed by a French-and-Indian force
  in July 1756. This caused the evacuation of the stockade of Fort Shirley, also
  built in 1755, and the construction farther south of Forts Loudoun (also spelt
  Loudon) and Littleton; the latter was a bastioned stockade of a
  square shape, with each wall 100ft (30.5m) long. During those
  years, a multitude of small stockade or timber forts were built
  in an effort to protect communities that otherwise evacuated
  their homes to seek refuge farther east. In Pennsylvania,
  Benjamin Franklin and John Hamilton provided designs to put
  up simple-yet-effective curtain walls that would provide
  flanking and crossfire by adding angles. 
  In 
  1755 
  General 
  Edward 
  Braddock’s
  Anglo-American army assembled at Fort
  Cumberland and was utterly defeated at
  Monongahela on July 9 by a French-and-
  Indian force. Besides the many small forts
  and fortified houses that were then built,
  Fort Augusta appeared in 1756 on the south shore
  of the Susquehanna River to prevent raiders from using
  this waterway. Fort Halifax, a 160ft2 (48.7m2) bastioned
  stockade, was a satellite post of Fort Augusta located farther south
  on the river but abandoned in 1757 when its garrison was moved
  to Fort Hunter, a blockhouse surrounded by a stockade built in late
  1755 that was 6 miles (9.6km) north of Harris Ferry (Harrisburg). 
  44
  Plan of Fort Augusta, 1756. This
  fort (at Sunbury, Pennsylvania)
  guarded access to the
  Susquehanna River Valley. Built
  on a square plan with large
  bastions, the log curtain walls
  were 83ft (25.2m) long outside
  the bastions, each of which
  was 58 1/4ft (17.7m) along its
  long angle and 22ft (6.7m)
  along its short angle. Within
  were soldiers’ barracks of 1½
  stories high and officers’
  quarters. (Print after T. C.
  Montgomery’s 1916 Frontier
  Forts of Pennsylvania)
  Fort Necessity, 1754. Built by
  George Washington and his
  troops in June 1754 at Great
  Meadows, it consisted of a very
  simple round stockade with
  trenches outside where a few
  swivel guns were mounted
  on posts. Within was a small
  square log hut. The illustration
  shows the reconstructed fort
  at Fort Necessity National
  Battlefield near Farmington,
  Pennsylvania.
  
  In early 1758 some 7,000 British and American troops gathered in
  southeastern Pennsylvania under the command of Brigadier-General John
  Forbes. Their objective was to capture Fort Duquesne and drive the French
  out of the Ohio Valley. So as to avoid a disastrous ambush, such as had
  destroyed Braddock’s army, Forbes opted for building a road right across
  southern Pennsylvania to insure a safe approach to the French fort. “Forbes’s
  Road” was punctuated by several forts used as supply and rallying points by 
  the Anglo-American army. From the fortified camp of Harris Ferry, the road
  progressed west to Carlisle and Shippenburg, which became major supply
  depots. Forts Loudoun
  and Lyttleton were also
  used and reinforced. By
  July the Juanita River was
  reached and Fort Bedford
  (Rayston) was built to
  provide an assembly point
  before moving on to cross
  the Allegheny Mountains.
  In 
  August 
  the 
  army
  continued its progress
  and, after an advance
  party led by Major Grant
  had been wiped out by the
  Plan of Fort Bedford, 1758. 
  This fort was built at Raystown
  (Pennsylvania) because it was
  designated the main assembly
  point for the army led by
  General Forbes against Fort
  Duquesne during 1758. It 
  was an irregular pentagon 
  of picketed curtain walls with 
  five corner bastions and an 
  8ft-deep (2.4m) ditch outside.
  A couple of detached redoubts
  were built northwest (right)
  and southwest (top) of the fort.
  A branch of the Juanita River
  was nearby (bottom). The great
  majority of the 7,000 soldiers
  assembled at the fort camped
  outside the fort. Buildings such
  as the hospital and storehouses
  were built outside to
  accommodate these men.
  (Print after T. C. Montgomery’s
  Frontier Forts of 
  Pennsylvania, 1916)
  Fort Allen, 1756. This fort was
  one of those established on
  the frontier by the provincial
  government of Pennsylvania.
  Its plan is typical of those
  designed by Benjamin Franklin
  and John Hamilton; it features
  angles to provide crossfire,
  notably with swivel guns, and
  rectangular or square stockade
  curtain walls. (Print after T. C.
  Montgomery’s 1916 Frontier
  Forts of Pennsylvania)
  45
  
  46
  
  French, it reached Loyalhanna in mid-September where another supply
  and assembly point was built: Fort Ligonier (see Plate F). On 12 October a
  French-and-Indian war party under Captain Aubry successfully raided the
  fort’s outskirts, keeping at bay some 1,500 men. This humiliating experience
  was somewhat repeated on 12 November, but this time, Washington’s
  Virginians – in spite of shooting at each other – managed a relief-and-pursuit
  operation. The three prisoners taken divulged that the French were evacuating
  Fort Duquesne. A 2,500-man column now marched unopposed towards the
  forks of the Ohio River. By November 24 it was a few miles from the fort
  when huge explosions were heard. The next day, Forbes and his men gazed at
  the charred remains of Fort Duquesne, which the French had destroyed as they
  departed from the Ohio. To secure the area, Fort Mercer, a square-bastioned
  earth-and-timber structure, was built near the site of the destroyed French fort
  while plans were drafted for a much larger pentagon fort with five bastions
  called Fort Pitt, which was built from 1759 to 1761. It was the largest and
  also one of the last forts to be built in Pennsylvania during this war; the fighting
  occurred mostly in Canada until its capitulation in September 1760. Thereafter,
  Fort Pitt, 1761–72. This very
  large fort consisted of an
  earth-and-timber pentagon
  with five large bastions. The
  bastions and curtain walls on
  the landward side were faced
  with bricks. Outside were
  ditches, glacis, a ravelin, and
  a small village also protected
  by earthworks. (Fort Pitt
  Museum, Pittsburgh)
  FORT LIGONIER
  In mid-September 1758 General Forbes’ army was cautiously
  approaching its objective, the French Fort Duquesne. It needed 
  a ﬁnal supply and regrouping base before moving on. The spot
  chosen was Loyalhanna, and Fort Ligonier was built. It was named
  in honor of Sir John Ligonier, commander-in-chief of the British
  army. It consisted of a 200ft2 (70m2) stockade with bastions, and 
  a hornwork with a fascine artillery battery facing west. The curtain
  walls on the eastern side of the fort were thicker and built with
  earth and timber laid horizontally, while the other walls were
  palisades of logs planted in the ground. This depiction follows the
  interpretation of Charles M. Stotz, the historic-restoration architect
  who rebuilt the fort, but its walls may have had additional fraises
  and chevaux de frise, especially outside the battery. The fraises,
  however, had been removed from the top of the walls by 1762.
  The fort contained storehouses, oﬃcers’ quarters, and a small
  house for General Forbes. There was a forge in the southeast
  bastion and an underground magazine in the northeast bastion.
  The troops had their tents around the fort, which were surrounded
  by extensive wooden outworks. Corrals for cattle and horses 
  with more tents for troops were farther out. In spite of all these
  defenses, on October 12, 1758 the Anglo-American garrison of
  1,500 men was chased out of the surroundings and had to take
  refuge in or near the fort from Captain Aubry’s daring French and
  Indian raiders. In 1763 Fort Ligonier was attacked by Pontiac’s
  Indians, but was not taken. Three years later its garrison was
  withdrawn and it was abandoned.
  F
  
  British and American garrisons were posted at the former French forts of
  Venango, Le Boeuf, Presqu’île, and Sandusky. In May and June 1763 they were
  all taken by Pontiac’s Indians. Fort Pitt and Fort Ligonier were not taken and,
  in August, Colonel Bouquet’s British and American relief troops crushed
  Pontiac’s Indians at Bushy Run.
  Virginia
  Although they encountered many difficulties from 1607, the settlers of Virginia
  had succeeded in establishing a large, prosperous, and powerful colony by the
  end of the 17th century. While its coastal Indian population was practically
  annihilated, its English and African populations kept rising and numbered up to
  300,000 souls (including 120,000 African-Americans) in the middle of the
  Virginia frontier fort plan by
  George Washington, 1756.
  This plan for a fort with
  earth-and-timber curtain walls
  with a ditch is part of several
  “diagrams” drawn up by
  Washington for his officers
  sent out to build a line of
  forts across western Virginia.
  According to Washington, if
  “due attention is given to this
  plan, it will be impossible to err,
  tho’ you otherwise may be
  unacquainted with the rules
  of fortifications.” (Library of
  Congress, Washington) 
  48
  Fort Prince George, also called
  Captain [William] Trent’s Fort,
  was built by Virginia provincial
  soldiers in April 1754. It was at
  the strategic confluence of the
  Alleghany and Monongahela
  rivers to form the mighty Ohio
  River, now the site of Point
  State Park in Pittsburgh. As
  seen by this model, it was a
  simple round structure that
  was unfinished when a large
  French force arrived, chased
  out the Virginians, razed the
  fort, and built Fort Duquesne
  on the spot. (Fort Pitt Museum,
  Pittsburgh)
  
  18th century. In terms of defense, threats from either
  seaborne or Indian enemies were relatively few from
  the second half of the 17th century so large forts
  were not built. With the growth of Hampton, Fort
  George, a 20-gun battery was built there in 1727, but
  destroyed by a hurricane in 1749. In January 1755
  Governor Dinwiddie reported “we have no forts 
  in ye dominion” apart from “two small batteries on
  [the] York River” that were “no defense” against 
  a powerful enemy fleet, and he proposed repairing 
  Fort George and building a battery at Cape Henry.
  However, the most pressing threats now came from
  the frontier rather than by the sea.
  The outbreak of warfare in the Ohio in 1754–55
  left many settlements in western Virginia vulnerable
  to attack by the French and Indians. In March 1754
  Governor Dinwiddie favored building “three or four
  forts” to secure the area and prevent the French from
  establishing posts on the Ohio. Soon thereafter, outlying forts such as Fort
  Cumberland (Maryland) and the short-lived Forts Prince George and Necessity
  were built by Virginians. Following Braddock’s disaster on the Monongahela in
  July 1755 the frontier became almost defenseless against enemy raids. Colonel
  George Washington of the Virginia Militia was tasked with setting up a network
  of forts to provide some protection. He immediately went to work and, thanks
  to his many-faceted curiosity, was able to come up with remarkably good fort
  designs, generally square with bastions, which were adapted to particular
  features. In October 1755 Washington ordered Forts Ashby and Cocke built on
  Patterson’s Creek to be “a quadrangular fort of ninety feet with bastions,” with
  the same plan used for Forts Pleasant and Defiance on the south branch of the
  Potomac River early in 1756. Virginia’s Fort Loudoun was built at Winchester
  and was the headquarters of the Virginia Militia. It consisted of earth walls faced
  with timber on a stone foundation laid in a square plan with bastions, and had
  18 guns. By November 1756 some 17 forts had been built, garrisoned by about
  2,000 militiamen and provincial soldiers. They were abandoned in the months
  and years following the 1758 expulsion of the French and their Indian 
  allies from the Ohio Valley. The frontier area also had many settler’s forts,
  blockhouses, and fortified houses built in the 1750s for local protection.
  NORTH CAROLINA, SOUTH CAROLINA, AND
  GEORGIA
  North Carolina
  English colonists settled the area south of Virginia from the later part of the 
  17th century. In 1710 the colony of Carolina was divided into North and South
  Carolina. The following year North Carolina was embroiled in a conflict with
  Tuscarora Indians, who killed some 120 settlers in a bid to drive the colonists
  out along the Pamlico River. Other settlers quickly built several small stockade
  forts and a larger one, Fort Hyde, to protect the town of Bath. Volunteers from
  South Carolina came to reinforce local militiamen and, by March 1712, the
  Indians were driven into Chief Hancock’s fort, which turned out to be a
  remarkable European-style work featuring ditches, log-and-earth curtain walls,
  and outworks designed by an escaped slave named Harry. After building Fort
  Plan for a small Virginia frontier
  stockade fort by George
  Washington, 1756. This plan
  gave Washington’s instructions
  for building a simple stockade
  fort with bastions. The timber
  quarters within also doubled as
  part of the curtain walls, a very
  common feature in American
  frontier forts. 
  (Library of Congress,
  Washington)
  49
  
  Barnwell on a triangular plan to act as headquarters, the volunteers began siege
  operations. By April a battery started to bombard the Indian’s fort, which
  fell on 17 April. The Indians withdrew to Fort Nohoroco, a stronghold that
  was also Harry’s work. In March 1713 volunteers from both Carolinas invested
  and bombarded the fort, tried unsuccessfully to mine it, and finally stormed the
  place. The Indians resisted for three days with great bravery in one of the most
  desperate close-quarter battles fought in colonial America, which left some
  900 Indians and 151 volunteers as casualties. The frontier was relatively quiet
  until 1756 when Fort Dobbs (Statesville) was built to provide protection from
  French and Indian raids. It consisted of a large timber loopholed and bastioned
  three-story “substantial building” measuring 40ft (12.1m) by 53ft (16.1m).
  Outside was a star-shaped perimeter consisting of a palisade and ditch. A band
  of Cherokee Indians attacked the fort on 27 February 1760 but were repulsed
  by its garrison of 46 men. The fort was abandoned in 1764.
  North Carolina’s coast was often raided by pirates as well as by Spanish
  and French privateers, but there was no major fortification until 1748 when
  Fort Johnston (Southport) was built at the mouth of Cape Fear. The fort was
  square with four bastions. It was destroyed by Patriots in 1775.
  South Carolina
  The first settlement in South Carolina was Charleston (called Charlestown or
  Charles Towne until 1783), founded in 1670. Then situated at Albemare Point
  on the west bank of the Ashley River, the town was quickly surrounded by a
  moat and a palisade for protection. In 1680 the colonists moved Charlestown
  to its present Oyster Point location at the confluence of the Cooper and Ashley
  rivers and surrounded it with earthworks and palisades. Over the years these
  fortifications were greatly improved with the addition of bastions and other
  features that were fairly complete by the 1690s. It made Charleston one 
  of the best-fortified cities in colonial America. In August 1706 its garrison of
  militiamen and allied Indians repulsed a Spanish attack on the city. Two years
  later Fort Johnson was built on a triangular plan at the entrance to the harbor.
  Its walls were made of earth, timber, and oyster shells and its base facing the
  water featured a large battery of heavy cannon. Its landward curtain walls had
  bastions, palisades, and moats. It was the most formidable coastal fortification
  in the province, but it needed constant repairs due to its low-lying location near
  the sea. Charleston’s fortifications remained until 1746–47 when a new line of
  curtain walls punctuated by five bastions was constructed to accommodate the
  city’s growth. This wall went almost as far as the Ashley River. Eventually,
  it was not an enemy force but a horrific hurricane that destroyed part of the
  fortifications in September 1752. Repairs were made in 1757 but the city’s
  defenses deteriorated due to urban expansion following the end of the Seven
  Years War. By then, Charleston was the fourth largest seaport in the Thirteen
  Colonies with a population of 11,000 souls. Fort Johnson, however, continued
  to be kept up and garrisoned.
  As the settlers moved westward in the early 18th century they came into
  conflict with Indian nations, notably in 1715. The southwestern part of the
  province was especially exposed and the South Carolina legislature, in spite 
  of budget problems, moved to establish a line of defense the following year 
  by building three forts: Fort Moore (now Augusta, Georgia), Fort Congaree
  (Columbia), and Beaufort Fort (Beaufort). These forts were too distant from
  each other to permit coordinated actions against the Indians and also proved
  to be of little use against the Spanish or the French. Fort Congaree (Cayce) was
  50
  
  built in 1718 on the east bank of Congaree Creek. It appears to have had
  earthen walls edged by a moat with a palisade in its center on the landward
  side, and a simple palisade facing the water. It served as both a military and
  trading post, probably with little success as it was abandoned in 1722. Beaufort
  Fort was a small work, probably made of earth surrounded by a palisade,
  built in 1716 and rebuilt in 1724. It was garrisoned by provincial soldiers with
  some allied Indians and detachments of the South Carolina Independent
  Company in 1721–22 and 1727–34. When war broke out with the Yamassee
  Indians in 1726 the fort was in bad repair and needed to be replaced. However,
  it was only in 1734 that Fort Prince Frederick was built about 3 miles (4.8km)
  south of the town of Beaufort on the shore of the Beaufort River (then called
  Port Royal River). It was built of tabby on a rectangular plan with curtain walls
  125ft (38m) and 75ft (22.8m) long, about 5ft (1.5m) high, and 5ft wide. It may
  have been surrounded by a moat. The side facing the river featured a gun
  battery and there were at least two buildings inside. It was garrisoned by
  provincial soldiers or British regulars until 1758. By then it had been considered
  useless for at least ten years.
  Fort Littleton was finally built from 1758 at Spanish Point, an excellent
  position about a mile and a half (2.4km) from Beaufort. It was a much larger
  fort than its predecessors, being built of tabby on a triangular plan
  375ft (114.3m) long at its base, which faced the Beaufort River. That wall 
  had 19 embrasures for guns, which rested on a plank platform 18ft (5.4m)
  wide and dominated naval access on the river. The side curtain walls were
  400ft (121.9m) long, coming to a bastion where they formed a point. A moat
  was outside the walls. Inside was a large barrack building for soldiers, officers’
  lodgings, the powder magazine, and an oven for heated shot. The fort’s
  construction went on for four years. Beaufort was never attacked and the
  garrison was withdrawn from the fort in about 1766.
  Further west, Anglo-American settlers came into contact with the mostly
  hostile Cherokee Indians. To provide protection and a military base, the
  province built Fort Prince George at Keowe in 1753 on a square plan with
  bastions, its walls made of earth and wood. It was besieged by the Cherokee
  51
  Plan of Charleston, South
  Carolina, 1704. These were the
  fortifications in place when the
  Spanish were repulsed in 1706.
  Access was very difficult, the
  city being built on high ground
  surrounded by marshes and
  brooks on the landward side
  and the river on the other.
  (Private collection) 
  
  from January 1760 until June when a relief column arrived. This fort had
  a regular garrison until 1766. Fort Loudoun was built in 1756–57 on a
  elongated diamond plan with two small and two large bastions sited on the
  south bank of the Little Tennessee River (near Vonore, Tennessee). Its walls
  were made of earth packed against a palisade, and a ditch surrounded the fort.
  Relations with the Cherokee worsened and, in January 1760, they besieged
  the fort until its starved garrison capitulated in August. The garrison was
  slaughtered and the fort destroyed. A number of smaller stockade forts and
  fortified houses were built throughout the province during conflicts with
  the Indians; the French and the Spanish ones were mostly abandoned after
  the Seven Years War.
  Georgia
  Prior to its establishment as a separate colony in 1733 the territory that became
  known as Georgia was considered part of South Carolina. Further south was
  the Spanish colony of Florida. The Spanish claimed that the border was 
  north of Savannah, about halfway between that town and Charleston, South
  Carolina, while the British said it was south of the St John River. The British
  built Fort King George on the Altamaha River (1 mile, or 1.6 km, southwest
  of Darien) in 1721 to uphold Britain’s claim. It consisted of an earthen curtain
  wall facing landward, and, in the area facing the river, a palisade, with the 
  fort laid out in a irregular triangle with a moat that had a berm. Within 
  was a three-story timber blockhouse, a guardhouse, officers’ quarters, soldiers’
  barracks, and huts. In January 1726 a fire destroyed the blockhouse and the
  barracks. The garrison was withdrawn and the fort abandoned in September
  1727 when hostile Yamassee Indians threatened it.
  In January 1734 Governor Oglethorpe decided to establish settlements
  south of Savannah to act as a buffer against the Spanish. On February 19 work
  started on the new town of Frederica on St Simons Island near the shore of the
  Frederica River. Frederica was primarily a military establishment and was laid
  out as a fortress (see illustration at top of previous page). To guard the entrance
  Plan of Fort St Simons, near
  Frederica, Georgia, c.1738. This
  fort was built by English troops
  in 1738 to guard the entrance
  to the Frederica River, through
  which shipping had to pass
  to reach the town of Frederica.
  Its main feature was a battery
  that could accommodate up
  to 17 cannon facing the river.
  (Fort Frederica National
  Monument, US National
  Park Service)
  52
  
  to Frederica’s harbor, Delegal’s Fort was built in April 1736 by a party of
  soldiers of the South Carolina Independent Company on the southern end of
  St Simons Island. The detachment being under the command of Lieutenant
  Philip Delegal, the fort, which was really a battery, became known by his name.
  Two years later the larger Fort St Simons was built on the site, the former
  Delegal’s Fort being incorporated in the new structure. It was designed on a
  square plan with bastions, curtain walls, ditches, and glacis, but its main feature
  was the large battery facing the water. Further south, several fortified posts
  were built, including Fort St Andrew, a star-shaped work of 65 by 130ft (20 by
  40m) plus its bastions and an outside battery, sited on Cumberland Island and
  Fort Prince William on the island’s southern tip and consisting of a small
  stockade mounted with eight guns.
  Governor Oglethorpe’s foreboding regarding the Spanish proved to be
  correct. Great Britain declared war on Spain in 1739. In June 1740, Oglethorpe
  Fort Frederica barracks, c.1742.
  At the time of the Spanish
  attack Frederica had about
  200 troops in garrison. Some
  lived in town, others in nearby
  clapboard huts or shacks, and
  up to about 100 men could
  lodge in the fort’s barracks,
  which were made of tabby.
  (Fort Frederica National
  Monument, US National
  Park Service)
  53
  Frederica, Georgia, 1736–48.
  The fortress settlement of
  Frederica was established three
  years after the foundation of
  the colony of Georgia to secure
  the contested southern frontier
  with the Spanish in Florida. The
  town was protected by curtain
  walls made of earth and cedar
  posts that were about 10ft
  (3.04m) high, the landward side
  being surrounded by a moat.
  The adjoining Fort Frederica
  (top) acted as its citadel,
  featuring three bastions and 
  a projecting spur battery of 
  18-pdr guns to engage enemy
  ships. There was also a fortified
  military barracks in the town
  (right of picture). (Painting by
  L. Kenneth Townsend. Fort
  Frederica National Monument,
  US National Park Service)
  
  unsuccessfully besieged St Augustine. The Spanish response came in early 
  July 1742 when a Spanish fleet of 36 vessels with 2,000 men on board under the
  command of Florida Governor Manuel de Montiano appeared off St Simons
  Island. An artillery duel between Fort St Simons and the ships did not cause
  much damage to either side, but the Spanish managed to land their troops on
  the island thus outflanking the British position. The fort’s garrison retreated 
  to Fort Frederica. Montiano now marched his army to attack Frederica, but
  Oglethorpe posted his troops outside and, on July 7, defeated the Spanish at
  Bloody Marsh. However, the isolated Fort St Andrew and Fort Prince William
  were abandoned in June and July 1742, the latter after repulsing a Spanish
  attack. Flushed with his success, Oglethorpe tried again to capture St Augustine,
  but was foiled in September 1742 and again in April 1743. Except for the
  accidental explosion of Fort Frederica’s powder magazine on March 22, 1743,
  the Georgia–Florida frontier was relatively quiet thereafter. Following the 
  end of the war in 1748, Oglethorpe’s Regiment was ordered disbanded. The
  withdrawal of Frederica’s garrison in 1749 sealed the fate of a town that thrived
  largely because of military budgets. Within a few years most of its population
  had departed and its neglected fortifications had decayed.
  NOVA SCOTIA, NEWFOUNDLAND, CANADA,
  AND HUDSON’S BAY
  Nova Scotia
  In 1621 James I of England and VI of Scotland granted substantial parts of
  North America’s northeastern coast to the Scottish Earl of Stirling for the
  purpose of setting up colonies in “Nova Scotia” – New Scotland. The first
  settlement was a small Scots colony established in 1629 at Port Royal, which
  included a small wooden fort named Fort Charles. After a harsh winter, the
  colony was abandoned. Meanwhile, Sir William Alexander and, in July 1629,
  a party of Scots built a small settlement protected by Fort Rosemar at
  Port-aux-Baleines on Cape Breton Island. This colony, known as Lord
  54
  The founding of the city of
  Halifax in Nova Scotia in 1749.
  The new town was initially
  protected by a wooden
  palisade, which featured five
  small forts with small corner
  bastions. One of these forts was
  built on a hill and evolved into
  the present Halifax Citadel.
  Shore batteries built at the
  harbor and on George’s Island
  could deliver deadly crossfire
  into any hostile ship that
  ventured close to the city.
  Thanks to its strategic location
  and superb harbor, Halifax
  quickly became the “Warden
  of the North” — the most
  important Royal Navy base in
  America. (Print after 
  C. W. Jefferys)
  
  Ochiltree’s settlement, did not last for long. On September 8 two French
  ships out of Dieppe under Captain Daniel arrived and, after having prepared
  “ladders and other things necessary to besiege and escalade the [walls of the]
  fort” his men attacked. After exchanging a few shots, the 15-man garrison,
  said to have been well armed with muskets and armor, put up the white
  French standard and surrendered. Captain Daniel had the “Standards of
  the King of England replaced by those of the King [of France] my master.”
  The French thereafter asserted their presence and colonized the area.
  Permanent British presence dates from the surrender of the French at Port
  Royal in 1710 and the subsequent cession of Acadia, which became Nova
  Scotia following the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht. Port Royal was renamed
  Annapolis Royal in honor of Queen Anne and its French fort was christened
  Fort Anne. Apart for minor repairs and improvements it remained basically
  the same for the next half century. Most of the regular garrison was posted
  there with the rest at Canso where the earth-and-timber Fort William
  Plan of Halifax, 1749. A: parade;
  B: courthouse and prison; 
  C: church; D: governor’s house;
  E and L: storehouses; F: harbor;
  G: barracks for soldiers (two
  companies each); H: forts of
  palisades; I: walls of palisades;
  K: public houses (outside the
  town’s walls). (Library and
  Archives Canada, Ottawa)
  Fort Edward, Nova Scotia, 1753.
  The blockhouse surmounted
  by the flag was the redoubt
  of this stockade fort and is still
  standing today in the town of
  Windsor. (Detail from a print
  after Captain John Hamilton,
  40th Foot. Library and Archives
  Canada, C2708)
  55
  
  Augustus was built on Grassy Island. On May 24, 1744 the French from
  Louisbourg easily took Canso, which was basically indefensible due to neglect
  of its fortifications. Grand Pré and the outskirts of Annapolis were also raided
  by the French and Indians in the 1740s. Louisbourg was taken by the New
  Englanders in 1745 and returned to France by the peace treaty of 1748, much
  to the disgust of the American colonies. The British now decided to establish
  a strong presence in Nova Scotia. In 1749 some 1,300 colonists accompanied
  by British troops landed at Halifax and started building the town together
  with its palisade walls and outlying forts. The palisade wall was punctuated
  by five small forts, which seem to have remained standing until the end of the
  Seven Years War. Batteries were also built to protect the harbor, as well as
  secondary forts in various locations.
  In the fall of 1749 a blockhouse surrounded by a stockade was built at
  Minas. The following year a similar work, Fort Edward, was built at Windsor.
  Fort Lawrence was built on the British side of the isthmus of Chignecto on
  a square plan with bastions. It had earth-and-palisade curtain walls with a ditch
  and two blockhouses in opposite bastions. This was where the British troops
  assembled in 1755 before besieging and capturing the nearby French Fort
  Beauséjour, which was renamed Fort Cumberland. In an effort to stem
  guerrilla-style raids from Acadians in what is now New Brunswick, British
  troops built the star-shaped earth-and-timber Fort Frederick in 1758, at the
  site of what is now the city of St John.
  Newfoundland
  During the 1500s a predominantly English presence that centered at St John’s
  harbor on the eastern shore was established. There were merchant’s houses
  and stores on the harbor, but due to the seasonal schedules of fishing fleets
  no permanent settlement was established there.
  The earliest colonizing attempt was made in 1610 at Cupids in Conception
  Bay. Other attempts at Trepassey Bay in 1616 and Trinity Bay three years later
  also failed. In August 1621 a dozen colonists led by Captain Edward Wynne,
  “Governor of the Colony of Ferryland, within the Province of Avalon,” arrived
  to establish a settlement sponsored by Henry Calvert, Lord Baltimore, who
  was looking for a haven for English Roman Catholics. Earthworks were built
  on the water’s edge. In early 1622 a palisade “with post and rail seven foot
  high, sharpened at the top” was added. More settlers came in the following
  years and, in 1628–29, Lord Baltimore himself spent the winter in Ferryland,
  an experience he found much harsher than expected. As a result, he sought 
  and obtained a land grant farther south in what became Maryland from 1634.
  Ferryland’s fortifications were allowed to decay thereafter. When four Dutch
  warships arrived to raid Ferryland in September 1673 they found the “fort” in
  shambles; they looted and burned what remained. Ferryland was rebuilt,
  but attacked and looted again in September 1696, this time by a French fleet
  that had just been repulsed from Bay Bulls’ five small forts, probably shore
  batteries, aided by an English frigate.
  St John’s harbor remained the island’s main English settlement. In 1665
  it was easily taken and looted by a Dutch fleet led by Admiral De Ruyter.
  There appears to have been no substantial fortifications until 1673 when
  Christopher Martin, an English merchant captain, landed six cannon from his
  ship and installed them in an earthen battery at Chain Rock commanding
  the narrow entrance leading into the harbor. Later that year three Dutch
  ships attacked but were repulsed by Martin and 23 men serving the guns.
  56
  
  Thereafter, more batteries were built, including one on the opposite side of
  “the Narrows” to provide a crossfire. In 1689, a large fort named Fort
  William was built overlooking the town, and a second fort, known as Fort
  George, was at the east end of the harbor. In 1696 the French took St John’s,
  destroying much of the town and its forts. The following summer Gibson’s
  Regiment with a detachment of gunners and Engineer Michael Richards
  arrived and, by September, had rebuilt Fort William. A regular garrison was
  henceforth posted there. During the summer of 1704 the French raided
  Bonavista and, in December of that year, attacked St John’s. The premature
  fire of a French attacker warned the English garrison, which managed to close
  the gates of Fort William. The French took the town, but not the fort. French
  batteries silenced the English artillery there, but the garrison gave a spirited
  defense and the French left without having captured the fort.
  At the end of December 1708 a larger French force again attacked St John’s.
  In January 1709 Fort William was stormed and its garrison surrendered after
  some spirited fighting. French Commander St Ovide de Brouillan described
  Fort William as a work with sturdy ramparts 18ft (5.4m) high and armed 
  with 18 cannon, four large bomb mortars, and 20 grenade mortars. It featured
  elaborate outworks including a ditch, glacis, and a covered way. A smaller
  adjoining fort armed with five 36-pdr guns, four 24-pdr guns, a bomb mortar,
  and six grenade mortars on a height at the harbor’s entrance also surrendered.
  The French abandoned St John’s in April and the British came back to a ruined
  city and fort.
  The 1713 Treaty of Utrecht ceded all of Newfoundland to Britain. The forts
  at St John’s were repaired and a British garrison now stood guard at the former
  French settlement of Placentia, on the southeastern shore. There, the British
  repaired the fort on Castle Hill and, finding the old Fort Louis much
  deteriorated, built a new work called Fort Frederick at the entrance to the
  harbor. A battery was also placed on the opposite side of the entrance. Placentia
  was never attacked, but St John’s was raided and taken by the French again in
  June 1762, being quickly retaken by an Anglo-American force in September.
  Thereafter fortifications were improved by the construction of works on top
  of Signal Hill and of Fort Amherst on the southern side of the Narrows.
  57
  Plan of St John’s
  (Newfoundland), 1762. Fort
  William, built from the late
  17th century, was the town’s
  main defense work (top
  center), but was in ruinous
  condition by 1762. A small
  battery and a boom were at
  the harbor’s narrow entrance.
  (From Mante’s 1772 History of
  the Late War in North America)
  
  Canada
  The capitulation of Canada on September 8, 1760 officially ended hostilities 
  in North America. All remaining French forts that had not been occupied 
  by British and/or American troops were to be surrendered by their French
  garrisons. This notably included the vast domain dotted with French forts on
  the western Great Lakes and beyond (see Fortress 93: The Forts of New France,
  Osprey: Oxford, 2010). Thus, the large frontier town of Detroit changed 
  flags on November 29, 1760 and Michilimackinac on October 1, 1761.
  Fortifications were kept up by the new British garrisons where needed, but no
  further outstanding constructions were made; no one knew if Canada would
  be returned to France or kept by Britain until a treaty ending the war was
  signed. In November 1762 General Amherst had a premonition that the
  frontier forts might be attacked “by an Enemy” and called for 7,500 troops 
  to garrison them (WO 34/93). Sure enough, Pontiac’s Indians set the frontier
  Changing the garrison of
  Detroit, November 29, 1760.
  French forts and fortified towns
  in Canada not already taken
  were surrendered to British
  troops following the
  capitulation of the French army
  at Montréal on September 8,
  1760. This evocative painting
  by Don Troiani shows the
  departure of Detroit’s French
  garrison escorted by British
  redcoats and green-coated
  American rangers. (By kind
  permission of the artist.
  Photos courtesy of the Military
  & Historical Image Bank)
  Fort Prince of Wales, Hudson’s
  Bay. This amazing stone fort
  was built by the Hudson’s Bay
  Company, certainly the only
  Vauban-style fortification in
  North America facing the Arctic
  Ocean, and perhaps elsewhere
  also. Its foundations were laid
  in 1731 and curtain walls were
  built by 1746. It was armed
  with up to 40 guns. (Photo by
  Ansgar Walk/Wikimedia)
  58
  
  ablaze in May 1763, taking forts in western Pennsylvania (see above). 
  Forts Michilimackinac, Ouiatenon, and St Joseph also fell while Detroit was
  besieged. The town was well protected by the palisade fortifications put up by
  the French and, following defeat at Bushy Run, Pontiac lifted the siege and
  made peace with the new British masters of North America.
  Hudson’s Bay
  With the bay ceded to Britain in 1713, the Hudson’s Bay Company worried
  about protecting its trading posts. Fort Prince of Wales was built from 1731 at
  the mouth of the Churchill River as the stone citadel of its trading posts in the
  bay. The Hudson’s Bay Company also had stockade forts in the interior. 
  All were manned by its fur-trading employees; there were no British military
  garrisons posted there, but the staff was instructed in 1744 to have their cannon
  and small arms “loaded and in good order,” and to exercise with them once a
  week “till well disciplined, and thereafter once a month.” Indian auxiliaries at
  some forts were also organized as “Home Guards.”
  LIFE IN THE FORTS
  Because of the great variety of forts as well as their geographical locations, the
  lifestyles of those who inhabited them could be radically different from one fort
  to the other. For a great many forts in the early settlements and on the frontier,
  the “garrison” consisted of the armed male settlers and, very often, their
  families. The presence of women and children in these forts goes back to the very
  earliest settlements and was common for the whole period under study. We have
  shown that in many provincial forts, such as Fort No. 4, settlers’ homes were
  also the fort’s curtain walls. Thus, life in these forts was much more like what
  one would expect in a farmer’s village, but with militia activities and training
  59
  Map of the British forts on
  Hudson’s Bay. All had various
  earth-and-timber fortifications
  except for Fort Prince of Wales,
  which was made of stone.
  (Private collection)
  
  being of the utmost importance. Every man
  obviously had to take his turn standing
  watch day and night. There might have been
  a small detachment of provincial or royal
  soldiers present, but they would have mostly
  lived with the families.
  Early regular garrisons were small in
  number and lived essentially in the
  communities that they protected. In the
  18th century more and more regular royal
  troops were posted in the American
  colonies as time passed, and garrison life
  took on a more military and disciplined
  stance with sizeable barrack blocks being
  built to house the troops. Although there
  were female camp followers with children,
  the presence of women and children was
  much less important in the large royal forts,
  especially as the number of troops posted
  in North America expanded. By the time
  of the Seven Years War, housing the tens
  of thousands of regular and provincial
  soldiers became a major issue; the American
  colonists were totally opposed to quartering
  them in their homes. Lodgings in forts
  overflowed and barracks were built to cope
  with the demand since tent cities could only
  be put up in mild temperatures. According
  to an October 1758 list of stores at Albany, lodgings would have wooden beds,
  bolster cases, sheets, chamber pots, bed pans, wooden bowls, spoons, brass
  kettles, and some tools (WO 34/75). Not luxurious, obviously, but consistent
  with standards for everyday life in the lower strata of society.
  THE FORTS TODAY
  The great majority of these forts have vanished or have been built over, either
  by the growth of cities (New York City, Wilmington, Pittsburgh, Detroit)
  or replaced by newer fortifications (Boston’s Fort Independence over Castle
  William, Halifax’s Citadel, Oswego’s Fort Ontario). Nearly all are designated
  by a plaque at the very least. Some have escaped oblivion and the remains have
  been preserved, sometimes restored, with interpretation centers or museums
  nearby (Frederica, Fort Pitt, Jamestown, Fort Frederick, Fort Crown Point,
  Newfoundland’s St John’s forts, etc.) or rebuilt (Forts No. 4, Ligonier, Stanwix,
  Tennessee’s Loudoun, etc.). The sites of most forts mentioned can be reached
  by the US Interstate or Trans-Canada Highway systems that connect to smaller
  local roads. Planes and/or ferries are necessary to visit those forts in
  Newfoundland and on the shores of Hudson’s Bay. One will also find, in rural
  areas, strongly built houses that were once settlers’ forts. Engaging on a trip
  to visit the forts of North America has to be one of the most educative,
  informative, and pleasant ways of traveling. Not only does one discover the
  past through its fortifications, but one can also see the present and, at times,
  perceive the future.
  60
  Plan of Fort Stanwix, 1758.
  Construction of this fort at the
  strategic Oneida Carrying Place
  (now Rome, New York) was
  started on 26 August 1758 by
  troops under the command of
  Brigadier General John Stanwix,
  hence its name. It consisted
  of an earth-and-wood fort
  built on a square plan with
  large bastions, and was not
  completed until 1762. (Print
  after original plan. Private
  collection)
  
  GLOSSARY OF FORTIFICATION TERMS
  Banquette
  A continuous step or ledge at the interior base of a parapet on
  which defenders stood to direct musket fire over the top of the
  wall. A fire step.
  Bastion
  A projection in the enceinte, made up of four sides, two faces and
  two flanks, which better enabled a garrison to defend the ground
  adjacent to the main or curtain walls.
  Barbette
  Said of cannon placed over a rampart without the protective
  embrasures.
  Battery
  An emplacement for artillery. 
  Berm
  A line of wooden stakes or logs, 6–8ft (1.8–2.4m) long, planted in
  the middle of a ditch and pointing vertically.
  Counterscarp
  The outer side of a ditch or moat. See Scarp.
  Covered way
  A depression, road or path in the outer edge of a fort’s moat or
  ditch, generally protected from enemy fire by a parapet, at the
  foot of which might be a banquette enabling the coverage of the
  glacis with musketry.
  Curtain
  The wall of a fort between two bastions.
  Demi-bastion
  A half-bastion with only one face and one flank.
  Ditch
  A wide, deep trench around a defensive work. When filled with
  water it was termed a moat or wet ditch; otherwise a dry ditch,
  or fosse. 
  Embrasure
  An opening in a wall or parapet allowing cannon to fire through it,
  the gunners remaining under cover. The sides of the embrasure were
  called “cheeks,” the bottom called the “sole,” the narrow part of the
  opening called the “throat,” and the wide part called the “splay.” 
  En barbette
  An arrangement for cannon to be fired directly over the top of a
  low wall instead of through embrasures. 
  Enfilade fire
  Fire directed from the flank or side of a body of troops, or along
  the length of a ditch, parapet, or wall. Guns in the flank of a
  bastion can direct enfilade fire along the face of the curtain.
  Epaulement
  A parapet or work protecting against enfilade fire.
  Fascines
  Long bundles of sticks or small diameter tree branches bound
  together for use in revetments, for stabilizing earthworks, filling
  ditches, etc.
  Gabion
  A large, round, woven wicker cylinder intended to be set in place
  and filled with earth, sand, or stones. 
  Gallery
  An interior passageway or corridor running along the base of a
  fort’s walls.
  Gate
  A main entrance to a fortress.
  Glacis
  A broad, gently sloped earthwork or natural slope in front of a
  fort, separated from the fort proper by a ditch and outworks and
  so arranged as to be swept with musket or cannon fire.
  Guardhouse
  The headquarters for the daily guard. 
  Guérite
  A small lookout watchtower, usually located on the upper outer
  corner of a bastion.
  Hornwork
  A work made up of a bastion front; two half bastions and a
  curtain and two long sides termed branches. 
  Loopholes
  Small openings in walls or stockades through which muskets were
  fired.
  Magazine
  A place for the storage of gunpowder, arms, or goods generally
  related to ordnance.
  61
  
  Outwork
  An outer defense, inside the glacis but outside the body of the
  place. A ravelin is an outwork.
  Palisade
  A high fence made of stakes, poles, palings, or pickets, supported
  by rails and set endwise in the ground 6–9in. apart. See Stockade.
  Parapet
  A breastwork or protective wall over which defenders, standing
  on banquettes, fired their weapons.
  Rampart
  The mass of earth, usually faced with masonry, formed to protect
  an enclosed area. 
  Ravelin
  An outwork consisting of two faces forming a salient angle at the
  front and a flank angle to the rear that was usually closed at the
  gorge. Ravelins were separated from the main body of the place
  by ditches and functioned to protect curtains.
  Redoubt
  An enclosed fortification without bastions.
  Revetment
  The sloping wall of stone or brick supporting the outer face of
  a rampart. 
  Sallyport
  A passageway within the rampart, usually vaulted, leading
  from the interior of a fort to the exterior, primarily to provide
  for sorties.
  Sap
  A trench and parapet constructed by besiegers to protect their
  approaches toward a fortification.
  Scarp
  The interior side of a ditch or the outer slope of a rampart.
  Stockade
  A line or enclosure of logs or stakes set upright in the earth
  with no separation between them, to form a barrier 8ft (2.4m)
  62
  A “tent city” for British and
  American provincial troops on
  the south shore of Lake George
  in the summer of 1759. The
  usual practices of the European
  armies were equally valid in the
  American wilderness, the tents
  neatly laid out with “streets”
  and supply depots. (Painting by
  Thomas Davies in 1774 after his
  field notes. Fort Ticonderoga
  Museum, Ticonderoga, NY)
  
  or more high. Stockades were generally provided with loopholes.
  The loopholes were reached by banquettes or elevated walks.
  See Palisade.
  Tabby
  A cement-like building material made up of ground oyster shells,
  lime, and sand, mixed with salt water. Used especially in the
  southern colonies.
  SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
  Archives: 
  The National Archives (Kew, United Kingdom), Colonial Office (CO), and War
  Office (WO) series, maps and plans
  Library of Congress (Washington, DC), manuscripts division, George Washington
  papers
  Library and Archives Canada (Ottawa), maps and plans
  Archives Nationales (France), Outre-mer (Aix-en-Provence), Colonies, series C11A
  and Dépôt des Fortifications des Colonies
  Publications:
  Albert, George Dallas, The Frontier Forts of Pennsylvania, 2 Vols., State Printer:
  Harrisburg, 1916
  Bonner, William Thompson, New York: The World Metropolis 1623–1924, R. L.
  Polk & Co.: New York, 1924
  Cook, Roy Bird, “Virginia Frontier defenses 1719–1795” in West Virginia History,
  Vol. 1, No. 2, 1940
  English, L. E. F., Historic Newfoundland, Government of Newfoundland: St John’s,
  1955
  Gallay, Allan (ed.), Colonial Wars of North America 1512–1763: An Encyclopedia,
  Garland: New York, London, 1996
  Haris, Cole (ed.), Historical Atlas of Canada: From the Beginnings to 1800,
  University of Toronto Press: Toronto, 1987
  Ivers, Larry E., Colonial Forts of South Carolina 1670–1775, University of South
  Carolina: Columbia, 1970
  McBride, W. Stephen, McBride, Kim A., and Greg Adamson, Frontier Forts in West
  Virginia, West Virginia Division of Culture and History: Charleston, WV,
  2003
  Scull, G. D. (ed.), The Montresor Journals, New York Historical Society: New
  York, 1882
  Stotz, Charles Morse, Outposts of the War for Empire, Historical Society of
  Pennsylvania and University of Pittsburgh Press: Pennsylvania, 1985
  Vrooman, John J., Forts and Firesides of the Mohawk Country, Baronet Litho Co.:
  Johnstown, 1951
  Winsor, Justin (ed.), Narrative and Critical History of America Vols. III, IV, and V,
  Houghton, Mifflin: Boston, NY, 1881–89
  Other:
  Pete and Phil Payette have compiled the outstanding “North American Forts”
  website, which attempts to list every fort since European discovery in North
  America as well as fortifications elsewhere that have had American garrisons. The
  result is a truly vast database listing thousands of forts with a short history for each
  entry and links to other sites such as online articles regarding the fort in question.
  http://www.northamericanforts.com
  63
  
  64
  References to illustrations are shown in bold.
  Plates are shown with page and caption
  locators in brackets.
  Alexander, Sir William  54
  Andros, Governor Sir Edmund  31
  Baltimore, Henry Lord  56
  Boston, Massachusetts  20, 21–23, 22
  British colonies  4–6
  Connecticut  29
  Delaware  41
  Georgia  52–54
  Maine  11, 11
  Maryland  40, E (42, 43)
  Massachusetts  20–26, B (24, 25), C (28, 29)
  New Hampshire  26–27
  New Jersey  40–41
  New York  30–39, D (38–39)
  Newfoundland  8, 9, 56–57
  North Carolina  49–50
  Nova Scotia  54–56
  Pennsylvania  41–48, F (46, 47)
  “Plymouth Plantation”  11
  Rhode Island  27, 28
  Roanoke  9–10
  Virginia  10, 10, A (12, 13), 48–49
  Cabot, John  7
  Cabot, Sebastian  7–8
  Canada  58–59
  Cartier, Jacques  9
  Charleston, South Carolina  50, 51
  chronology  6–7
  Columbus, Christopher  7
  Connecticut  29
  De Waag 19
  Delaware  41
  Dinwiddie, Governor Robert  43, 49
  Drake, Bernard  9
  Dutch colonies  4
  Delaware  41
  New Netherlands  13–17
  Dutch West India Company  13, 14
  Easton, Peter  9
  Elizabeth I, Queen of England  9
  English colonies see British colonies
  Eyre, Captain William  D (38–39)
  fishing fleets  8–9
  Forbes, Brigadier-General John  45
  Fort Algernon, Virginia  10, 10
  Fort Amsterdam, New Netherlands  14, 14,
  16, 17, 30, 30
  Fort Anne, New York  33
  Fort Anson, Massachusetts  23
  Fort Beversreede, Philadelphia  16, 18
  Fort Casimir, New Netherlands  18–20, 20, 41
  Fort Christina, New Sweden  16, 18, 19, 41
  Fort Congaree, South Carolina  50–51
  Fort Crown Point, New York  36, 36
  Fort Cumberland, Maryland  40, 41
  Fort Edward, New York  33–35, 34
  Fort Edward, Nova Scotia  55, 56
  Fort Frederica, Georgia  52–53, 53, 54
  Fort Frederick, Maryland  40, 40, E (42, 43)
  Fort Frederick, New York  31, 33
  Fort George, New York  30, 31
  Fort Halifax, Maine  26, 27
  Fort Herkimer, New York  36, 37
  Fort Huis de Goed Hoop, Connecticut  16
  Fort Hyde, North Carolina  49
  Fort Independence, Boston  23
  Fort John, New Jersey  40
  Fort Johnson, South Carolina  50
  Fort Ligonier, Pennsylvania  43, 47, F (46, 47), 
  48
  Fort Littleton, South Carolina  51
  Fort Nassau, New Netherlands  13, 16, 18
  Fort Necessity, Pennsylvania  44, 44, 49
  Fort No. 4, Massachusetts  25, B (24, 25), 27
  Fort Orange, New Netherlands  13–14, 
  15–16, 16
  Fort Oswego, New York  37, 37, 38, 39
  Fort Pitt, Pennsylvania  46, 46, 48
  Fort Prince George, Virginia  48, 49
  Fort Prince of Wales, Hudson’s Bay  58, 59
  Fort Raleigh, Roanoke Island  9, 9
  Fort St Simons, Georgia  52, 53
  Fort Still Water, New Netherlands  13
  Fort Trinity see Fort Casimir, New Netherlands
  Fort William, Newfoundland  57
  Fort William and Mary, New Hampshire  27
  Fort William Henry, New York  35, 35, D
  (38–39)
  Fort William Henry, Pemaquid  25–26, C
  (28, 29)
  Frederycksz, Cryn  14
  French colonies  4
  Garrison houses  23, 25
  Georgia  52–54
  Gilbert, Sir Humphrey  8, 9
  Golden Hind 9
  Grenville, Sir Richard  9
  Halifax, Nova Scotia  54, 55, 56
  Henry VII, King of England  7
  Hudson, Henry  13
  Hudson’s Bay  59, 59
  Iberville, Pierre Le Moyne d’  25–26, C (28, 29)
  Indians  4, 9, 10, 15, 20–21, 23, 26, 30–32, 
  49–50, 51–52
  James I, King of England  54
  Jamestown, Virginia  10, A (12, 13)
  Johnson, Sir John  34, 35
  Kieft, William  15
  Lane, Ralph  9, 9
  life in the forts  59–60
  Maine  11, 11
  Martin, Christopher  56
  Maryland  40, E (42, 43)
  Massachusetts  20–26, B (24, 25), C (28, 29)
  Mather, Cotton  C (28, 29)
  Mayflower 11
  Maynard, John  B (24, 25)
  Militia  21, 49, 50, 59–60
  Minuit, Peter  14, 18
  Montiano, Governor Manuel de  54
  Montresor, John  31, 35
  museums  60
  New Hampshire  26–27
  New Haven colony  28
  New Jersey  40–41
  New Netherlands  13–17, 20
  New Sweden  18–20
  New York  30–39, D (38–39)
  Newfoundland  8, 8–9, 56–57
  Nicolls, Colonel Richard  16
  North Carolina  49–50
  Nova Scotia  54–56
  Penn, William  41
  Pennsylvania  41–48, F (46, 47)
  Percy, George  A (12, 13)
  Pilgrims, the  11, 20
  pirates  9, 50
  Plymouth Company  10–11
  “Plymouth Plantation”  11
  Popham, Sir John  10–11
  Prinz, Johan  18
  Puritans  20, 21, 26–27, 28
  Quakers  41–43
  Raleigh, Sir Walter  9
  Rhode Island  27, 28
  Risingh, Johan  19
  Roanoke colony  9–10
  Romer, Colonel Wolfgang William  23
  Schenectady  31–32, 33
  Seven Years War (1756-63)  24, 30, 43, 60
  slavery  10
  South Carolina  50–52
  Spanish colonies  4
  St John’s, Newfoundland  8, 8–9, 56, 57
  Standish, Miles  11
  Stotz, Charles M.  F (46, 47)
  Strachey, William  A (12, 13)
  Stuyvesant, Peter  14–15, 16, 17, 18, 19
  Swedish colonies  4
  Delaware  41
  New Sweden  18–20
  “tent cities”  62
  training in the forts  59–60
  Treaty of Breda (1667)  17
  Treaty of Utrecht (1713)  55, 57
  Virginia  10, 10, A (12, 13), 48–49
  War of the Austrian Succession (1740-48)  
  41–43
  Washington, George  40, 41, 43, 44, 44, 48,
  49, 49
  White, Governor John  9–10
  William III, King of England  23
  women and children in forts  59, 60
  Wynne, Captain Edward  56
  INDEX
  
SOURCE: textdata/thevault/Osprey System/Fortress (FOR)/FOR 101 - The Forts of Colonial North America.pdf