blessings is amply proved by the way in which they turn out to Fort
Independence, Castle Island, now a part of the Marine Park of their
city, for the fresh air and unexciting recreation it offers. Other
citizens of other cities create parks from their historic places
and, then, content to know that they have them when they want them,
allot the day and night watchmen entire seclusion in these domains.
With Bostonians it is different: On any bright and cheering day
throngs can be found at the old fort, of various classes and of
widely sundered poles of thought; but joined together in one great
common heritage, a capacity for making use of that which they have
and of taking their pleasure in a devout and noiseless manner not
to be seen amongst the habitants of any other great American city.
It is a pleasant place, Castle Island, and the air there on a sunny
day sweeping in from the great reaches of Boston’s environing
waters is a true elixir. The views in various directions are
entrancing, showing, in one direction, wide expanses of blue
with dim islands in the distance and cottony clouds overhead;
in another, the shipping and sky-line of Boston harbor and the
jumbled city. Geographically stated, Castle Island is a body of
hard, rocky land, most of which is occupied by the historic old
fort, and it is situated three miles from the head of Boston Harbor
and two hundred yards from City Point, South Boston, to which it
is connected by a wooden causeway. On the mainland, close at hand,
lies Boston’s famous Aquarium, where the flying fishes play!
Viewed from the head of the causeway, the fort is a very gay and
martial figure though in sober earnest it has never fired a shot
in anger in its life. Structurally speaking, it is a pentagonal,
five-bastioned enclosure whose granite walls occupy all of the
crest of the eminence which makes up the island. To the right, from
this stand-point, one sees running off a long thin shallow strip
of gravelly sand, which geologists assert has been a gift from the
sea since the erection of the fort. Originally, they say, the main
portion of the island was larger than it is now; so what was taken
from one place seems to have been added on to another.
[Illustration: FORT INDEPENDENCE FROM THE WATER, BOSTON, MASS.
Floating Hospital in Foreground]
Passing over the causeway one sees to the left hand, across a
ribbon of water, the island which Fort Winthrop crowns in a very
modest and inconspicuous fashion. Passing over a draw-bridge one
enters the reservation and finds one’s self beneath the shadow
of the walls of the fort and on the historic ground which its
predecessors and itself have held in fief for many, many years.
Benches may be found here and there for the rest-seeking
wayfarer, but if one is inspired to wander around the walls he will
find many interesting sights, and will be increasingly struck by
the strength and formidableness of the abandoned military work,
highly suggestive of the time when this island was the seat of
military power of his Majesty, the King of England, in his colonies
in America.
Historically speaking, Fort Independence is one of the oldest
fortified spots in America and it was of exceeding great dignity
in the early days of this country. But four years subsequent to
the incorporation of the town of Boston, an interesting event
which took place in 1630, Governor Winthrop and a party of his
Puritans visited the island and, we are told, were detained by the
ice without shelter for a day and a night. Nevertheless so well
able were they all to detach themselves from their personal petty
feelings that they each subscribed five pounds sterling of Great
Britain from their own pockets in order to raise the place to the
dignity of a fortified point. Two “Platforms” and a fort were to be
erected, these platforms being in the nature of bateaux with guns
mounted upon them. In the July following their adventure, which
had taken place in early spring, they induced the legislature to
consent to fortifying the place. The first fort has been described
as a “castle with mud walls.” The masonry was of lime made from
oyster shells.
In 1644 the arrival of a French man-of-war in the harbor of Boston
so alarmed the citizens of the province that the fort which had
gone into decay was rebuilt at the expense of six neighboring
towns. It was now constructed of pine trees, stone and earth, was
50 feet square inside and had walls 10 feet thick.
In 1665 the fort was repaired and enlarged,--the spirit of military
preparedness which had been awakened by the Frenchman’s arrival
having evidently been kept up. A small castle was added with brick
walls and three stories in height. There was a dwelling-room on
the first floor of this “castle”; a lodging-room above; a gun-room
over the latter furnished with “six very good saker guns” and
three lesser guns were mounted upon the roof. In this same year
occurred an event which gave rise to much curious speculation at
the time and is retained in legend. On the 15th of July a stroke
of lightning entered one of the rooms of the fort, killed Captain
Richard Davenport, the commanding officer, and did not enter the
magazine, only a step away, beyond a thin partition, where there
was stored enough gunpowder to have blown the fort beyond the seas.
Still the spirit of fire had its due, for in 1673 the fort was
burned to the ground. In the year following a new fort of stone
was erected. It had four bastions, mounted thirty-eight guns and
sixteen culverins, in addition to a water battery of six guns, and
was a very imposing work indeed.
In 1689 the people of Boston, favoring the Cromwellians in England,
seized the royal governor, Edmund Andros, and placed him in
confinement. They took possession of the castle and appointed Mr.
John Fairweather commander to succeed Captain John Pipon.
But all dissension is smoothed down by the hand of Time. Under
the administration of Sir Williams Phipps, an appointee of King
William, the fort was named Castle William and the Crown donated a
large sum of money toward the erection of a stronger structure. The
ordnance then became 24 nine-pounders, 12 twenty-four pounders, 18
thirty-two pounders, and 18 forty-eight pounders; and the bastions
became known by the names of the “Crown,” the “Rose,” the “Royal,”
and the “Elizabeth.” This augmentation of strength was the more
necessary as a French invasion of the New England colonies was
apprehended.
And so we run on through the years: In 1716 Lieutenant Governor
William Dummer, a well-known name in the history of Massachusetts,
assumed command of Castle William, agreeable to orders from
the Crown, and thereby incurred the ill-feeling of the general
court of the province which heretofore had had prerogative in
the appointment of a commandant. In 1740 the fort was repaired
in anticipation of war with France and a new bastion mounting 20
forty-two pounders was created and named Shirley bastion.
Ordnance presented by the King arrived in 1744; a second
magazine was built in 1747; and a third added during Shirley’s
administration. In 1747 a riot occurred in Boston and the governor
took refuge at the Castle. Upon assurance that his authority would
be sustained the governor returned to the city two days after his
flight.
On the 15th of August, 1757, Governor Pownal arrived to assume
the government of the province. Sir William Pepperell, conqueror
of Louisburg, held command of Castle William. In accordance with
custom Sir William surrendered the key of the castle to the new
executive and said, “Sir, I hand you the key of the province.” Not
outdone at all, Governor Pownal replied, “Sir, the interests of the
province are in your heart. I shall always be glad, therefore, to
see the key of the province in your hands.” Thus the doughty old
warrior was maintained in his command until his death in 1759.
In this same year died Captain Lieutenant John Larrabee, who had
lived for fifty years on the island in the service of the Crown.
In 1764 the Castle was used as an inoculation station during the
ravages of a plague of smallpox which swept the little city.
[Illustration: FORT WINTHROP FROM CASTLE ISLAND
Main Entrance
FORT INDEPENDENCE, CASTLE ISLAND, BOSTON, MASS.]
It was about this time that the fort began to take part in the
events with which Boston is associated before the outbreak of the
American Revolution. Stamps by which revenue was expected to be
raised from the colonies were brought to Boston in 1765 and for
security were lodged in Castle William. Vigorous opposition
in America caused the repealment of the act of which they were
intended to be the tokens of enforcement and they were taken back
to England at the expiration of not many months. These, it will
be seen, were not the stamps which figured in the famous Boston
Tea Party, but they were of the same nature. The maintenance of
a large force of military at Castle William by the Crown in the
years immediately following this was a source of irritation to the
patriots of the day, and had an influence in determining the events
which brought about the separation from the Mother Country.
Captain Sir Thomas Adams, who died on board the frigate _Romney_,
was buried on Castle Island October 8, 1772, and his obsequies were
conducted with great pomp. In removing earth to Fort Independence
thirty years later his corpse, enclosed in a double coffin highly
ornamented, but upon which the inscription had become illegible,
was dug out, and, no one discovering at the time whose remains the
coffin contained, it was committed to the common burying ground
at the south point of the island where its resting-place was soon
not to be distinguished from that of the common soldiers which
surrounded it.
With this coffin necessarily others were removed, and one was
favored with an inscription which betrayed, we may assume, either
native simplicity or British sarcasm. It read: “Here lies the body
of John, aged fifty years, a faithful soldier and a Desperate Good
Gardner”!
It does not appear that the force quartered on the island was
engaged in the first two battles of the Revolution. The commandant
of the castle had been sent in February, 1776, to seize powder and
other military stores at Salem; but he was delayed at the ferry by
the militia until the objects of the depredation had been moved
beyond his reach. He returned peaceably to the island. The same
officer was ordered from Castle William at this time with five
hundred men to draw the Americans, by a false attack, from their
posts at Roxbury. The attack did not succeed and the burning of
five or six houses in Dorchester was the only result.
In the meantime a formidable force of Americans was concentrated
in the vicinity of Boston under Washington; so General Howe, the
successor of General Gage, evacuated the town March 17, and the
British fleet dropped below the Castle. The embarkation had been
a scene of confusion and distress, it being the 27th of March
before the transports were able to put to sea. At their departure
the British troops threw into the water iron balls and shot, broke
off the trunnions of the ordnance given to Castle William in 1740,
destroyed the military stores and battery apparatus which they
could not take with them and finally blew up the citadel, leaving
the island a mass of ruins. Part of the British fleet lay in the
lower harbor until June, when it was harassed by American troops
under General Lincoln and raised the blockade of Boston Harbor
after the exact duration of two years. With the British troops the
seat of the war was removed from Massachusetts, and Castle Island
was thenceforth, unmolested, in American possession.
Colonel John Turnbull was the officer sent by General Washington
to take possession of the island after the evacuation. Lieutenant
Colonel Paul Revere was stationed on the island from 1777 to 1779.
At the conclusion of the Revolution it was enacted by the
legislature of Massachusetts that all criminals of the State
under sentence of confinement should be removed to Castle Island.
Pursuant to this law convicts were sent to the island, and
though their number never exceeded ninety their audacity taxed
the vigilance of the garrison; they made several bold, fruitless
efforts to escape, and in their mutinies some were killed and
some wounded. Others met their death while endeavoring to form
subterranean passages. Stephen Burroughs, whose extensive forgeries
gave him great notoriety, here learned the art of a nailer, and in
his published memoirs has publicly boasted of his Castle Island
exploits.
It was with reluctance that the legislature of Massachusetts could
bring itself to the cession of the Castle to the United States
government, but the State was nevertheless willing to sacrifice the
partial advantage to the public good and, October, 1798, passed an
act by which the transfer was accomplished.
In 1799 President Adams visited the fort and was received with
due honors. It was at this time that the name was changed to
Independence. With regard to this, Captain Nehemiah Freeman wrote:
“The baptism was not indecorous and the godfather (President Adams)
is certainly unexceptionable; but Fort Independence must count
some years before he can entirely divest his elder brother of his
birthright; and though the mess of pottage might have been sold
in 1776 yet the title of ‘The Castle’ is rather endearing to the
inhabitants of Massachusetts and is still bestowed by the greater
part as the only proper appellation.”
A new fort was now planned and constructed under the direction of
Lieutenant Colonel Louis Toussard, who was inspector of all of
the posts of the Eastern seaboard. The first stone was laid May
7, 1801, and the whole superstructure was raised from an original
design not influenced by the structure standing hitherto. On the
23d of June, 1802, the national colors were first displayed at
the new fort. The work was a barbette fortification and was not
materially different from the present-day structure.
[Illustration: HARBOR SIDE, FORT INDEPENDENCE, BOSTON, MASS.]
The five bastions of the fort were named, in 1805, as follows:
First, “Winthrop” after Governor Winthrop, under whose auspices
the first fort was built; second, “Shirley,” who repaired Castle
William, erected other works and made it the strongest fortified
point in British America; third, “Hancock,” after the first
governor of the commonwealth of Massachusetts, under whose
administration new works were thrown up; fourth, “Adams,” after
John Adams, who bestowed its present name upon the fort and
collected materials for its construction; fifth, “Dearborn,” after
General Dearborn, Secretary of War, under whose auspices Fort
Independence was actually rebuilt.
In 1833 the garrison was withdrawn and the post given over to the
Engineers Department for constructing a new work, in effect a
modernification and improved edition of the former structure. Work
was prosecuted at intervals during the succeeding eighteen years.
The post was regarrisoned July 4, 1851. The garrison was finally
withdrawn November 25, 1879, and Fort Independence went out of
service.
Not long after that the island was deeded to the city by the
Federal War Department for use as a public park. That it could ever
be of service as a fighting man now in its old age is extremely
improbable. The defence of Boston depends upon batteries located at
a far greater distance from the city.
To the north from Fort Independence can be seen the island upon
which Fort Winthrop is situated and in the distance at the mouth
of the harbor can be seen dimly the site of Fort Warren. Both of
these posts have reached a dignified age, but neither has years or
historical importance approximating that of their big brother.
FORT COLUMBUS, OR JAY
GOVERNOR’S ISLAND--NEW YORK HARBOR
Even Governor’s Island, once a smiling garden, appertaining
to the sovereigns of the province, was now covered with
fortifications, inclosing a tremendous block-house,--so that
this once peaceful island resembled a fierce little warrior
in a big cocked hat, breathing gunpowder and defiance to the
world!--Washington Irving, “Knickerbocker’s New York.”
The graceful little island of Washington Irving is described in a
recent publication of the government printing office at Washington
after the following eloquent fashion: “Irregular in form but
approaches nearly the segment of an oblate spheroid, its longest
diameter being from north to south, and about 800 yards in length.
The transverse diameter is about 500 yards. It has an elevation
above high-water mark of 20 feet, and its face is smooth and green,
with a rich carpet of grass.”
On the top of the highest feature of this smooth, green face with
its rich carpet of grass is Fort Columbus, more properly known by
its ancient name of Fort Jay.
[Illustration: ENTRANCE TO FORT COLUMBUS (FORT JAY) GOVERNOR’S
ISLAND, NEW YORK HARBOR]
No doubt you will find it hard to visualize the importance of Fort
Jay. It is the head-quarters of the Department of the East of the
army of the United States, you may be told. Yes, you will answer
indifferently, it is a quiet little place, not nearly so noisy
as the roaring forties of Broadway; it keeps to itself and is a
sort of annex to the foot of the city to prevent the sea-ward
view from the Battery being without variety! Yet once on a time,
not much more than a hundred years ago, Fort Jay was of so great
importance to the city that the citizens all, rich men, poor men,
beggarmen, and thieves (then, too), turned out in a body to build
up the place overnight.
The first point of land ever occupied in New York by the Dutch was
Governor’s Island, we are told on the excellent authority of Joseph
Dankers and Sluyter, of Wueward, in Frusland, in “A Voyage to The
American Colonies in 1679-80”: “In its mouth (East River) before
the city, between the city and Red Hook on Long Island, lies Noten
Island (Governor’s Island) opposite the fort, the first place the
Hollanders ever occupied in the bay. It is now only a farm with
a house and a place upon it where the governor keeps a parcel of
sheep.”
The fort here referred to was not Jay but Fort Amsterdam, later
Fort George, of historic memory, which stood on Manhattan where the
Customs House of New York City now is. “Red Hook on Long Island”
later was fortified, too, forming one of the line of defences
captured by the British from the Americans in their descent upon
New York in the early days of the Revolution. The Indian name for
Governor’s Island was Pagganck, and Noten--as above written,--or
Nutten, or Nooten, came about from the abundance of nuts which
could be found on the island.
[Illustration: Fort Washington Point. Fort Lee on Opposite Shore
Where was Fort Amsterdam; the Customs House
FORT SITES IN PRESENT-DAY NEW YORK CITY]
In 1637, the redoubtable Wouter Van Twiner, first governor of
the colony under the New Amsterdam company of which he had been
a director, secured for his personal use the island. It is fair
to look at this gentleman inquisitively. “The renowned Wouter
(or Walter) Van Twiller was descended from a long line of Dutch
Burgomasters,” says Washington Irving, “who had successively dozed
away their lives, and grown fat upon the bench of magistracy in
Rotterdam; and who had comported themselves with such singular
wisdom and propriety that they were never either heard or talked
of--which, next to being universally applauded, should be the
object of ambition of all magistrates and rulers ... many a
dunderpate, like the owl, the stupidest of birds, comes to be
considered the very type of wisdom. This, by the way, is a casual
remark which I would not for the universe have it thought I apply
to Governor Van Twiller. It is true he was a man shut up within
himself, like an oyster, and rarely spoke except in monosyllables;
but then it was allowed he seldom said a foolish thing. So
invincible was his gravity that he was never known to laugh or even
to smile through the whole course of a long and prosperous life.
Nay, if a joke were uttered in his presence, that set light-minded
hearers in a roar, it was observed to throw him into a state of
perplexity. Sometimes he would deign to inquire into the matter,
and when, after much explanation, the joke was made as plain as a
pike-staff, he would continue to smoke his pipe in silence and
at length, knocking out the ashes, would exclaim, ‘Well, I see
nothing in all that to laugh about.’
“The person of this illustrious old gentleman was formed and
proportioned as though it had been moulded by the hands of some
cunning Dutch statuary, as a model of majesty and lordly grandeur.
He was exactly five feet six inches in height, and six feet five
inches in circumference. His head was a perfect sphere and of such
stupendous dimensions that Dame Nature with all her sex’s ingenuity
would have been puzzled to construct a neck capable of supporting
it; wherefore she wisely declined the attempt and settled it
firmly on the top of his backbone just between the shoulders.
His body was oblong and particularly capacious at bottom; which
was wisely ordained by Providence, seeing that he was a man of
sedentary habits and very averse to the idle labor of walking. His
legs were short but sturdy in proportion to the weight they had
to sustain; so that when erect he had not a little the appearance
of a beer-barrel on skids. His face, that infallible index of the
mind, presented a vast expanse unfurrowed by any of those lines and
angles which disfigure the human countenance with what is termed
expression. Two small gray eyes twinkled feebly in the midst, like
two stars of lesser magnitude in a hazy firmament, and his full-fed
cheeks, which seemed to have taken toll of everything that went
into his mouth, were curiously mottled and streaked with dusky red,
like a Spitzenberg apple.”
After the seizure of the colony by the British in 1664, the
island became a perquisite of the governor’s office, a sort of
retreat from care for the occupant of that harassed position,
and was developed into a smiling garden. At this time it became
known as Governor’s Island, the name that has become its official
designation on the charts of the present day.
The first immigrants to New York under the English were assigned by
the council to Nutten Island for detention until the presence or
non-presence of contagious disease in their ranks could be proved.
These immigrants were about fifty Palatines who had been driven
from their home land by the war between Louis XIV and Holland and
Austria. Subsequently 10,000 followed these first fifty unfortunate
exiles. The island thus became the first quarantine station of the
city of New York.
During the wars of the Spanish Succession until the Treaty of
Utrecht in 1713 the people of the colonies of British North America
were in constant dread of attack by the French navy and during
this time it was urged continually that Governor’s Island should
be changed from a garden to a fortified spot. Notwithstanding this
fact the successive executives Slaughter, Fletcher and Cornbury did
nothing toward carrying out the desires of their subjects.
It was a happy-go-lucky, careless era. Indeed when one looks back
upon the perils of the early colonies and how they were survived it
is like looking back upon the perils of childhood and wondering
how one ever managed to get through. The colonies “just growed,”
which is true of a variety of things in this world, no doubt.
During Governor Cornbury’s administration, fifteen thousand pounds
(a value in present day terms of far beyond seventy-five thousand
dollars) was appropriated for building a fort upon Governor’s
Island, but Governor Cornbury used the money to build a pleasure
house instead, to which he and succeeding governors might retire
from press of business.