Fort Sumter and Fort Moultrie in Charleston, South Carolina
http://JonesFamilyTravels.com
For our last official day of adventures on our summer road trip, we visited
Fort Moultrie and saw
Fort Sumter in
Charleston, South Carolina. This worked out as a great history lesson for the kids, as well as for
Mom and Dad.
Fort Moultrie is the name of a series of citadels on
Sullivan's Island, South Carolina, built to protect the city of
Charleston,South Carolina. The first fort, built of palmetto logs, inspired the flag and nickname of
South Carolina, "
The Palmetto State". It is named for the commander in the
Battle of Sullivan's Island,
General William Moultrie.
Fort Moultrie is the only area of the
National Park System where the entire 171-year history of
American seacoast defense (1776--1947) can be traced.
American Revolution
South Carolina patriots began to build a fort to guard Charleston, South Carolina, harbor in
1776.
British Admiral Sir Peter Parker with nine
British warships attacked the fort—still unnamed and incomplete—on June 28, 1776, near the beginning of the
American Revolutionary War. The soft palmetto logs did not crack under bombardment but rather absorbed the shot; cannon balls reportedly even bounced off the walls of the structure.
William Moultrie, commander of the
2nd South Carolina Regiment, and his four hundred men fought a day-long battle that ended with the heavily damaged
British ships being driven from the area. This victory galvanized the
Patriots' cause for independence.[1] The fort hence took its name Fort Moultrie in his honor.
Charleston locals celebrate "
Carolina Day" to commemorate the bravery of the defenders of the fort.
During this battle, the
Moultrie flew a flag of his own design, authorized by the colonial government. It was later called the
Moultrie flag or
Liberty flag and became iconic to the
Revolution in the
South.
The British eventually captured Fort Moultrie as part of the
Siege of Charleston in spring 1780.
Nevertheless, the colonists won the war, and
British troops departed in 1782, at which time the flag was presented in Charleston, by General
Nathanael Greene, commander of the southern Regulars.
Fort Moultrie changed little over the next five decades. The
Army altered the parapet and modernized the armament, but defense of Charleston centered increasingly around newly created Fort Sumter. By the time of the
American Civil War, Fort Moultrie, Fort Sumter,
Fort Johnson, and
Castle Pinckney surrounded and defended Charleston.
Fort Moultrie nevertheless began to record meteorological observations in the early
1820s.
The Army detained
Seminole Indian fighter
Osceola and some fellow
Seminole prisoners at Fort Moultrie late 1837. Osceola died of malaria in January 1838; the Army buried his corpse at Fort Moultrie and thereafter maintained his grave.
[edit]Civil WarSouth
Carolina seceded from the
Union on
December 20,
1860. Unlike their counterparts at the other forts, defenders of Fort Moultrie chose not to surrender to the South Carolina forces. On
December 26, 1860, Union
Major Robert Anderson moved his garrison at Fort Moultrie to the stronger Fort Sumter. On
February 8, 1861, South Carolina joined other seceded
Deep Southern states to form the
Confederate States of America. In April 1861,
Confederate troops shelled Fort Sumter into submission and the American Civil War began.
In April 1863,
Federal ironclads and shore batteries began a bombardment of Fort Moultrie and the other forts around
Charleston harbor. Over the ensuing twenty months, Union bombardment reduced Fort Sumter to a rubble pile and pounded Fort Moultrie below a sand hill, which protected it against further bombardment. The Rifled cannon proved its superiority to brickwork fortifications but not to the endurance of the Confederate artillerymen who continued to man Fort Moultrie. In February 1865, the
Confederate Army finally abandoned the rubble of Fort Moultrie and evacuated the city of Charleston.
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