Coastal artillery gun at Fort Columbia State Park

Fort Dawes was a

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

Coast Artillery Coastal artillery is the branch of the armed forces concerned with operating anti-ship artillery or fixed gun batteries in coastal fortifications. From the Middle Ages until World War II, coastal artillery and naval artillery in the form of ...

fort located on Deer Island in Winthrop/

Boston Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...

, Massachusetts. It was part of the

Harbor Defenses of Boston The Harbor Defenses of Boston was a United States Army Coast Artillery Corps harbor defense command. It coordinated the coast defenses of Boston, Massachusetts from 1895 to 1950, beginning with the Endicott program. These included both coa ...

.Harbor Defenses of Boston at NorthAmericanForts.com
/ref>

History

The site's military history began in 1906 as the Deer Island Military Reservation, acquired for

fire control Fire control is the practice of reducing the heat output of a fire, reducing the area over which the fire exists, or suppressing or extinguishing the fire by depriving it of fuel, oxygen, or heat (see fire triangle). Fire prevention and control i ...

and

mine field A land mine is an explosive device concealed under or on the ground and designed to destroy or disable enemy targets, ranging from combatants to vehicles and tanks, as they pass over or near it. Such a device is typically detonated automatic ...

control as part of the Taft program.Fort Dawes at FortWiki.com
/ref> During World War II, Fort Dawes was initially the site of a target detection radar for the harbor defenses and Battery Taylor (two 3-inch M1902 guns moved from nearby Fort Strong), both completed by late 1942. Also in 1942, construction began on Anti- Motor Torpedo Boat Battery (AMTB) 944, with two fixed and two towed 90 mm guns, along with the Harbor Entrance Control Post (HECP) for Boston Harbor--the installation that kept track of all vessels entering and leaving the harbor. AMTB 944 replaced Battery Taylor in October 1943, whose guns were placed in storage at that time.Berhow, p. 205 By 1945 Fort Dawes had a mine casemate controlling some of the mines guarding the northern approach to

Boston Harbor Boston Harbor is a natural harbor and estuary of Massachusetts Bay, and is located adjacent to the city of Boston, Massachusetts. It is home to the Port of Boston, a major shipping facility in the northeastern United States. History ...

. Fort Dawes can also lay claim to the largest collection of "artillery that never was" in the harbor defenses of Boston. Battery 105 and Battery 207 began construction in 1942. Battery 105 was completed as a large bunker housing magazines and fire control for two 16-inch guns, like those at Battery Murphy in Nahant and generally similar to the guns of Battery Long at

Fort Duvall Fort Duvall was a Coast Artillery fort, part of the Harbor Defenses of Boston, in Massachusetts. What was then called Spinnaker Island (Massachusetts), Hog Island in Hull, Massachusetts was acquired by the U.S. government in 1917, and the fort was ...

. By the time the emplacements had been finished, however, WW2 was being won, and the need for the battery was deemed to have passed, so it was never armed. The nearby battery of two 6-inch guns, Battery 207, was also never equipped with guns, for the same reason. In 1946 AMTB 944 was disarmed, and within a few years the site was abandoned. However, in the summer of 1956 or perhaps a bit longer, the airfield was used to run flights testing the new ideas of air traffic control. A small radar was installed there and used to track flights to determine if an airplane could be directed to follow a predetermined path. Prof. Eugenio Calabi was advisor on the project. In the early 1990s all of the military facilities on Deer Island were demolished and the earth stripped away for the construction of the

Deer Island Waste Water Treatment Plant The Deer Island Waste Water Treatment Plant (also known as Deer Island Sewage Treatment Plant) is located on Deer Island, one of the Boston Harbor Islands in Boston Harbor. The plant is operated by the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority ( ...

. All vestiges of Fort Dawes were destroyed.

References

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External links

Fort Dawes at FortWiki.com

List of all US coastal forts and batteries
at the Coast Defense Study Group, Inc. website
FortWiki, lists most CONUS and Canadian forts

{{FmrMAForts

Dawes Dawes may refer to: Places * Dawes (Parish), New South Wales, Australia *Dawes Point, New South Wales, Australia * Dawes Arboretum, in Newark, Ohio, U.S. *Dawes County, Nebraska, U.S. * Dawes Township, Thurston County, Nebraska, U.S. Other uses *D ...

East Boston Demolished buildings and structures in Massachusetts

History

See also

References

External links