Ft. Stevens State Park - Hammond, OR
Posted by: 
dkestrel
N 46° 11.550 W 123° 58.520
10T E 424740 N 5115898
Constructed in 1863-64 during the Civil War as an earthwork battery, located on the south shore of the mouth of the Columbia River.
Waymark Code: WMJXTN
Location: Oregon, United States
Date Posted: 01/13/2014
Views: 10
The Civil War earthworks at Fort Stevens (original destroyed) are being reconstructed.It was originally called Fort at Point Adams. It was later named Fort Stevens in 1865, in honor of the former territorial governor of Washington, Isaac I. Stevens who was killed in action during the Civil War.
The original fort was an earthworks fort, built under supervision of the United States Army Engineers starting in July 1863. The earthworks were five sided with bastions at each corner and a salient point on the water side. The whole earthworks was surrounded by a deep wet moat. Entrance was made across the moat on a drawbridge through a sallyport. Wooden gun platforms were provided to mount 29 cannon. The Fort was completed 8 Apr 1865 and was first occupied by a company of the 8th California Volunteer Infantry, 25 April 1865. The guns mounted by the troops included a large 15" smoothbore Rodman cannon mounted at the salient point on a center pintle and nine other Rodman guns of smaller caliber. By June 1867, twenty six guns had been mounted. In the years between 1867 and 1882, the guns were test fired but little else was done to keep the fort in good repair. By 1880 the gun platforms were rotting out and the earthworks had deteriorated significantly. The garrison was withdrawn in 1882 and the post placed in the charge of ordinance sergeant Elias H. Brodie.
Fort Stevens was the primary military installation in what became the Three Fort Harbor Defense System at the mouth of the Columbia River. The other two forts in the system were Post at Cape Disappointment, later Fort Cape Disappointment and later Fort Canby built at the same time as Fort Stevens and Fort Columbia (built between 1896 and 1904) both on the Washington side of the river.The fort was built to defend the mouth of the Columbia from potential British attack during ongoing regional tensions related to the Pig War of 1859–70 in the San Juan Islands, and remained relevant during the 1896-1903 Alaska Boundary Dispute when British-American tensions were high and once again on the brink of war.
Visit Instructions:
To post a log for this waymark a photo of you, the sign at the waymark with your GPS in view must be uploaded.