Fort Adams HistoryKristin Mueller

Amy Cho

Fort Adams• Largest coastal fortification in

the US.• The harbor in Narragansett

Bay was natural, presented a military challenge.

• Enemy fleets must be prevented from entering and attacking and seizing the bay.

• An elaborate ceremony was held on the Fourth of July in 1799 to open this new fort and to christen it Fort Adams in honor of President John Adams

• Housed soldiers from 1824 – 1950.

• Fort Adams is an irregular open work at old Brenton's Point sited so that about twenty guns could cover the East Passage and an equal number fire in the direction of

• By the mid-1500s, the Italians had discovered the answer: low earthen ramparts, faced with masonry, surrounded by a ditch, and protected at the angles by bastions.

• Bastions were arrow-shaped projections from the fortification's main wall or curtain.

• These projections served the same role as the towers along a medieval castle's wall: deny attackers any dead space along the walls where they would be safe from the defender's weapons.

• Although the bastioned style of fortifications was developed over several centuries by engineers of many countries, the style is known commonly as "Vaubanian" after its most famous proponent, Sebastien le Prestre de Vauban.

• Starting as a cadet in 1651, Vauban rose to the rank of marshal of France and became famous as the engineer who fortified that country's borders during the reign of Louis XIV.

• Although Vauban constructed or rebuilt more than one hundred fortifications and supervised fifty-three successful sieges, his writings and efforts to create a professional corps of engineers had an even greater impact on military engineering than the works themselves.

• In Vauban's time, military engineers were essentially civilian contractors who worked with the army.

• Vauban's efforts led to the recognition of engineering as a true military specialty and eventually to the establishment of schools for the education of engineers.

• Vauban's writings and the works of others about his style of fortifications became textbooks for the world's armies.

• Having agreed upon the need to protect their harbor, Newporters, with some familiarity of the Vaubanian style of fortification in Europe, faced the question of where to build the forts.

• Although the entrances to Narragansett Bay remained unprotected, the Assembly did order the construction of watch towers on Conanicut Island and at Point Judith, Castle Hill, Sachuest Point, and Brenton's Point.

• At the time, the name Brenton's Point referred to the neck of land at the southwest entrance to Newport harbor where Fort Adams now stands.

• The name-taken from William Brenton, an early owner of the land-is now applied to the southernmost tip of Aquidneck Island.

• The answer was determined by a combination of geography and the characteristics of available ordnance.

• Narragansett Bay has three openings to the ocean, known today as the West and East Passages and the Sakonnet River.

• In earlier times these passages were known respectively as the West, Middle, and East Passages.

• Early surveys of the bay indicated that the West Passage and the Sakonnet River were not deep enough to accommodate major warships.

• Although this view later was proved wrong, it formed the basis for most of the early plans to defend Newport.

• Following the Revolutionary War, the former colonies once again let their seacoast defenses fall into a state of disrepair.

• In October 1784, the Rhode Island Assembly ordered that the works on Goat Island be repaired and armed.

• The renovated fort underwent yet another change of name, this time to Fort Washington.

• Concerned by the outbreak of war in Europe in 1793, the United States Congress took action the following year to create a unit of artillerymen and engineers, appoint a committee to study coast defense needs, and appropriate money to construct a number of fortifications that would become known as the First System.

• Newport was one of twenty-one locations selected to be fortified. Lacking trained engineers to supervise the work, Secretary of War Henry Knox placed a number of European engineers under contract.

• On March 29, 1794, Major Etienne Nicholas Marie Bechat, Sieur de Rochefontaine, was named the engineer for New England.

• Rochefontaine designed three fortifications for Narragansett Bay, a work on Goat Island to replace Fort Washington, another on Tonomy Hill, and a battery at Howland's Ferry.

• As late as 1945, a stone with the name Rochefontaine carved into it could be seen in the embankment in front of the Torpedo Factory's Explosive Division.

• Having Anglicized his name to Stephen Rochefontaine, he became commandant of the new Corps of Artillerists and Engineers in 1795, and was replaced at Newport by another French officer, Major Louis Tousard.

• Tousard was no stranger to Newport, having fought there during the 1778 siege and lost an arm during the fighting at Butt's Hill.

History

• Tousard returned to France, became involved in a revolution at Santo Domingo for which he was imprisoned, was freed at the intercession of the American minister in Paris, and then came to the United States where he was commissioned in the United States Army.

• Between 1798 and 1800, Tousard supervised construction of several works around Narragansett Bay, including an elliptical battery of stone for twelve or thirteen guns at North Point, subsequently named Fort Greene in honor of Revolutionary War General Nathanael Greene from Rhode Island, and a rectangular fort with two circular towers on the western corners located on Rose Island.

Construction people/techniques

• On August 10, 1825, Lieutenant Colonel Totten arrived at Fort Adams to take charge of the work.

• Joseph Totten was to supervise construction • Old Brenton's Point met that criterion, but space

limitations precluded a work in the shape of the regular polygons prescribed by theory.

• Totten chose an irregular pentagon with the northeast bastion particularly squeezed to accommodate the nature of the site.

Elements

• Two fronts facing the bay• Totten chose one- or two-level

casemates in the style of Montalembert.

• Complex set of Vaubanian defenses to protect rear

• Heavy, earth-filled ramparts of that style of fortifications were considered more resistant to the battering of enemy siege artillery than multilevel casemates

• Powerful redoubt-a miniature Fort Adams in some respects-near the present Eisenhower House to prevent a besieger from commanding the fort from the high ground farther down Brenton's Neck

Elements/comparison

• Massive work with structural walls constructed of local shale and Maine granite

• Alexander McGregor oversaw the stonework• Stonework still relatively intact • At the time he was building the fort, Colonel Totten

frequently advertised in the Newport Mercury for New England contractors to provide millions of common bricks

• Within the Third System, only Fort Monroe at Newport News, Virginia, and Fort Jefferson on the Dry Tortugas off Key West, Florida, are larger

Architect/developmental history

• None of the other forts display the sophisticated engineering features that make Fort Adams a showcase for the art of fortification.

• Most of the innovation can be attributed to Totten's inventive mind, and his use of the construction, which lasted until 1857, as a school of application for young engineer officers

• Totten conducted scientific experiments to determine the resistance of various materials used in fortifications to enemy fire, designed a greatly improved embrasure for seacoast forts, and made numerous contributions to civil engineering

features

Features of Fort Adams that are uncommon or unique in United States military architecture:

-galleries under the ditches -counterscarp galleries -underground listening galleries

tunneled under the glacis -extensive outer defenses

including the redoubt and tenailles

-massive earth-filled, masonry cribs designed to protect the outer face of the fort's crown work from battering by a besieger's artillery

Use/military history

• Third System forts were destined to play an important role at the start of the Civil War

• Gilmore's artillery had dismounted eleven of the Confederate guns and battered a large breach in the fort's brick wall

• Fort Adams was rearmed with new Rodman guns, 10-inch pieces in the casemates and 15-inch guns in open batteries atop the southwest bastion of the crown work

• Inexpensive earthen forts matched not only engineering thinking of the time, but also the fiscal mood of Congress.

History/condition

• United States Navy established the Torpedo Station on Goat Island at Newport

• More than twenty years after the end of the Civil War, Fort Adams could reply with nothing more powerful than two 15-inch Rodman guns en barbette and ten 10-inch Rodmans in the casemates

• Congress added a provision to its 1885 Fortifications Appropriation Act requiring the president to appoint a special board similar to the earlier Bernard Board to study the issue of coast defense (relating to the weakness of such a fort when it came to modern-day weapons)

History/condition

• The high ground at Fort Adams adjacent to the Third System redoubt provided room for four gun batteries, including Battery Reilly with two 10-inch disappearing guns

• Two batteries of 12-inch mortars were also located at Fort Adams

• During joint Army-Navy maneuvers in 1902, the commander of Fort Adams periodically trained his searchlights up the bay in hopes of detecting any enemy ships that might have sneaked in through the Sakonnet River

Present condition

• Modern mine casemates, bunkers from which the minefields were controlled, at Hull Cove on Conanicut Island replaced earlier ones at Fort Adams

• Seen as the masterpiece of the bay's earlier defenses

• Now part of a state park that includes athletic and sailing facilities and is a favorite place for picnics and other recreations

• The fort itself has been the backdrop for musical events, including the Jazz Festival, which began in Newport in 1954

Important Terms

• Banquette: An elevation of earth within a fort, three or four feet wide, and less than 5 feet from the top of the parapet, to enable short men to fire over the wall.

• Bastion: An extension at the corner of a fort consisting of two faces and two flanks. It allows the defenders of the fort to cover adjacent bastions and curtains with defensive fire. A demibastion is a small bastion that does not have both faces or both flanks.

• Casemate or Casement: Bombproof chambers in a fort from which guns are fired through windows, called embrasures.

Important Terms

• Banquette: An elevation of earth within a fort, three or four feet wide, and less than 5 feet from the top of the parapet, to enable short men to fire over the wall.

• Bastion: An extension at the corner of a fort consisting of two faces and two flanks. It allows the defenders of the fort to cover adjacent bastions and curtains with defensive fire. A demibastion is a small bastion that does not have both faces or both flanks.

• Casemate or Casement: Bombproof chambers in a fort from which guns are fired through windows, called embrasures.

Important Terms

• Ditch: A defensive trench that prevents attackers from being able to easily attack and scale the fort walls. The walls of the ditch were usually lined with stone. A ditch that contains water is called a moat.

• Embrasure: An opening in the fort walls from which cannon can be fired. They were often flared outward to enlarge the field of fire and could be closed with a wooden cover when not being used.

• Gallery: A long enclosed passageway, or corridor. Galleries ran along the base of the fort's walls and were used as defensive positions and as a means to move around the fort without being exposed to enemy fire.

Important Terms

• Glacis: A sloped earthen rampart that protects the fort's vertical walls from cannonfire and prevents surprise attacks. The glacis could also be covered by defensive fire from the parapets and covered way.

• Loophole: A small opening, usually a flared slot, through which small arms may be fired. They also were used to allow light and air to enter into the galleries and as a means to observe enemy movements safely.

• Parapet: A short wall of earth or stone used to protect soldiers and cannon at the top of a scarp. The parapet sits on top of the ramparts.

Important Terms

• Place of Arms: A protected area, usually near a sally port, in which small groups of men can be assembled when leaving or returning to the fort. Sorties, small patrols and counterattacks, could be mounted from these areas.

• Rampart: A raised earthen mound or stone fortification surrounding a place. It is usually surmounted by a parapet.

• Redoubt: Any small fort with its own defenses which is located near a larger fort. One or more redoubts would be used as a place of last defense if the main fort should be lost.

Important Terms

• Sally Port: An opening in the fort's walls that is used to enter and leave. It was often sloped downward toward the outside of the fort.

• Scarp: The main slope of the outer walls of the fort. The scarp is often protected from attack by a ditch and other defensive works. The wall on the opposite side of the ditch from the scarp is called the counterscarp.

• Tenaille: A wide, angular defensive work used to protect the main entrances to a fort from cannon fire and direct assault.

• Terreplein: The level space on the top of the ramparts on which cannon were placed. Defenders of the fort could also fire down on an enemy and use the high position of the terreplein to see approaching ships and armies.

All information direct quote or very closely paraphrased information from

http://www.fortadams.org/history.htm