Fort Hamilton - History

History

On July 4, 1776, a small American battery on the site of today's Fort Hamilton (the east side of the Narrows) fired into one of the British men-of-war convoying troops to suppress the American Revolution. HMS Asia suffered damage and casualties, but opposition to the immense fleet could be little more than symbolic. The very significant event however marked one of the earliest uses of the site for military purposes.

The War of 1812 underscored the importance of coastal defense and helped to promote a new round of fort building. The cornerstone for Fort Hamilton was set in place on June 11, 1825. Six years and a half million dollars later, the fort was ready to receive its garrison.

Though references to the structure as Fort Hamilton occur as early as 1826, it was not officially named for the former Senior Officer of the United States Army and first Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, until the twentieth century. In 1839 the Federal government gave permission to New York State's 27th Regiment to drill at the fort, thus qualifying it as the nation's first National Guard training camp. The following year, it allocated $20,000 to improve the fort's armaments, and Captain Robert E. Lee was assigned the task of improving the defenses of the fort as well as those of other military installations in the area. Lee served as Fort Hamilton's post engineer from 1841 to 1846. Lieutenant Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson also served at Fort Hamilton and Captain Abner Doubleday served as the post commander in 1861.

During the Civil War, Fort Hamilton's garrison expanded. A ship barrier across the Narrows assisted Fort Hamilton and its sister forts on Staten Island, now called Fort Wadsworth, in protecting the harbor against the possibility of Confederate raiders. The forts also provided troops to help put down the New York Draft Riots of 1863. Rifled cannon made vertical-walled masonry fortifications obsolete during the Civil War, and in the last decades of the nineteenth century great advances in military technology brought a whole new generation of long-range guns mounted in inconspicuous emplacements. In the two World Wars, Fort Hamilton served as a major embarkation and separation center.