Fort Amador () and Fort Grant were former

United States Army The United States Army (USA) is the primary Land warfare, land service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is designated as the Army of the United States in the United States Constitution.Article II, section 2, clause 1 of th ...

bases built to protect the Pacific (southern) end of the

Panama Canal The Panama Canal () is an artificial waterway in Panama that connects the Caribbean Sea with the Pacific Ocean. It cuts across the narrowest point of the Isthmus of Panama, and is a Channel (geography), conduit for maritime trade between th ...

at Panama Bay. Amador was the primary on-land site, lying below the

Bridge of the Americas The Bridge of the Americas (; originally known as the Thatcher Ferry Bridge) is a road bridge in Panama which spans the Pacific entrance to the Panama Canal. Designed by American civil engineering company Sverdrup & Parcel, it was completed ...

. Grant consisted of a series of islands lying just offshore, some connected to Amador via a causeway.

Fort Sherman Fort Sherman is a former United States Army base in Panama, located on Toro Point at the Caribbean (northern) end of the Panama Canal, on the western bank of the Canal directly opposite Colón, Panama, Colón (which is on the eastern bank). It w ...

was the corresponding base on the Atlantic (northern) side. All of the forts were turned over to the

Republic of Panama Panama, officially the Republic of Panama, is a country in Latin America at the southern end of Central America, bordering South America. It is bordered by Costa Rica to the west, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean Sea to the north, and ...

in 1999, and the area is now a major tourist attraction.

History

The offshore islands had always been considered excellent defensive grounds and were long visited by English

pirates Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and valuable goods, or taking hostages. Those who conduct acts of piracy are call ...

Sir Francis Drake Sir Francis Drake ( 1540 – 28 January 1596) was an English Exploration, explorer and privateer best known for making the Francis Drake's circumnavigation, second circumnavigation of the world in a single expedition between 1577 and 1580 (bein ...

Captain Cook Captain James Cook (7 November 1728 – 14 February 1779) was a British Royal Navy officer, explorer, and cartographer famous for his three voyages of exploration to the Pacific and Southern Oceans, conducted between 1768 and 1779. He complet ...

, and

Henry Morgan Sir Henry Morgan (; – 25 August 1688) was a Welsh privateer, plantation owner, and, later, the lieutenant governor of Jamaica. From his base in Port Royal, Jamaica, he and those under his command raided settlements and shipping ports o ...

all used Taboga and Perico as refuges, after raiding Spanish

galleon Galleons were large, multi-decked sailing ships developed in Spain and Portugal. They were first used as armed cargo carriers by Europe, Europeans from the 16th to 18th centuries during the Age of Sail, and they were the principal vessels dr ...

s. It was here that then-Captain

Ulysses S. Grant Ulysses S. Grant (born Hiram Ulysses Grant; April 27, 1822July 23, 1885) was the 18th president of the United States, serving from 1869 to 1877. In 1865, as Commanding General of the United States Army, commanding general, Grant led the Uni ...

ended his cross-Panama march in 1852. During the construction of the Panama Canal, notably the Culebra Cut, waste material was dumped in a mangrove bush then known as the "Balboa dump". As the work progressed, the dump was backfilled to create a large breakwater, which was later extended to the nearest of the offshore islands, Naos. This work was completed in 1912, and the military reservations were given their official names that year. Fort Amador is named for Manuel Amador Guerrero, the first president of Panama, while Fort Grant was named to commemorate Grant's earlier crossing to that point. The two forts initially claimed only about of land, but this expanded over the years to over . Amador was the primary infantry and support area, and grew to include a rather prominent "tank farm" for fuel storage. Grant was used primarily for naval defence, and included a number of large batteries on the various islands. To supply them, the causeway was extended to connect from Naos to the other nearby islands, Culebra, Perico, and Flamenco, all of which had batteries of various sizes. Grant also included the nearby unconnected islands of San Jose, Panamarca, Changarmi, Tortolita, Torola, Taboga, Cocovieceta, Cocovi, and Venado.

Armament

Fort Amador was initially armed with two batteries, each of two six inch disappearing guns. Batteries Birnie and Snith, begun in 1913, were completed in 1917. They remained in service until 1943, when the guns were removed, and the structures buried. The area was then used for housing. A 90mm Anti-Motor Torpedo Boat (AMTB) Battery replaced them in 1942; it, too, was disarmed and buried in 1948.

References

* Military Railroads on the Panama Canal Zone by Charles S. Small, Railroad monographs 1982 * Life Magazine March 17, 1941

External links

* * Includes excellent drawings of the

. *

Historic American Buildings Survey The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , , "little star", is a Typography, typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a star (heraldry), heraldic star. Computer scientists and Mathematici ...

(HABS) documentation, filed under Panama City, Former Panama Canal Zone, CZ: ** ** ** ** {{coord, 8, 56, 17, N, 79, 32, 52, W, display=title, region:PA_type:landmark_source:GNS-enwiki Installations of the United States Army Military history of Panama Military installations of the United States in Panama Panama Canal Historic American Buildings Survey in the former Panama Canal Zone

History

Armament

See also

References

External links