Fort Gratiot was an American

stockade A stockade is an enclosure of palisades and tall walls, made of logs placed side by side vertically, with the tops sharpened as a defensive wall. Etymology ''Stockade'' is derived from the French word ''estocade''. The French word was derived f ...

fort in

Fort Gratiot, Michigan Fort Gratiot Township ( ) is a charter township of St. Clair County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 11,242 at the 2020 Census. It is named for Fort Gratiot, an American fort located there off and on between 1814 and 1879. ...

, in Saint Clair County, Michigan. The former location of the fort was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

in 1980.

History

The Army constructed Fort Gratiot in 1814 as an outpost to guard the juncture of the

Saint Clair River The St. Clair River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed November 7, 2011 river in central North America which flows from Lake Huron into Lake St. Clair, forming part of ...

and

Lake Huron Lake Huron ( ) is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is shared on the north and east by the Canadian province of Ontario and on the south and west by the U.S. state of Michigan. The name of the lake is derived from early French ex ...

. The fort took the name of the engineer supervising its construction,

Charles Gratiot Charles Chouteau Gratiot (August 29, 1786 – May 18, 1855) was born in St. Louis, Spanish Upper Louisiana Territory, now the present-day State of Missouri. He was the son of Charles Gratiot, Sr., a fur trader in the Illinois country during ...

. Soldiers occupied Fort Gratiot until 1822 and then abandoned the fort.

Lucius Lyon Lucius Lyon (February 26, 1800September 24, 1851) was a U.S. statesman from the state of Michigan. Along with Louis Campau, Lucius Lyon is remembered as one of the founding fathers of Grand Rapids, Michigan, the state's second-largest city. A ...

built

Fort Gratiot Light Fort Gratiot Light , the first lighthouse in the state of Michigan, was constructed north of Fort Gratiot in 1825 by Lucius Lyon, who later became one of Michigan's first U.S. Senators. The Fort Gratiot Light marks the entrance to the St. Clair ...

north of Fort Gratiot in 1825–1829. The Army then returned from 1828, and rebuilt the fort to a somewhat smaller size than the original, also building some timber-framed structures on the site, including a hospital and officer's quarters. The site was used intermittently until 1879. The Army abandoned Fort Gratiot in 1879. It was not entirely shut down until 1895. Pine Grove Park occupies part of the fort site. The timber-framed hospital and officers quarters were moved multiple times within the fort, finally being placed in the western section, along what is now St. Claire Street. In the 1980s, archaeological work determined the age of the structures, and in 2000–02, the Port Huron Museum acquired both homes and moved them to a lot in Lighthouse Park, where the Fort Gratiot Lighthouse is located. Restoration occurred from 2012-24 with a Grand Opening ceremony in August.

Description

The original fort was constructed entirely of wood. Logs formed the base, with piled earth and upright timbers forming a stockade. The fort was approximately 165 wide feet by 495 feet long. It likely had a two-story blockhouse.

Gallery

File:Fort Gratiot 1.jpg, Entrance to Fort Gratiot, residence square File:Fort Gratiot 2.jpg, Fort Gratiot from the northwest

References

{{Commons Category, Fort Gratiot (Michigan)

External links

Fort Gratiot Lighthouse

fortgratiot.us
Gratiot Gratiot Buildings and structures in St. Clair County, Michigan Port Huron, Michigan Military history of Michigan Military history of the Great Lakes Pre-statehood history of Michigan 1814 establishments in Michigan Territory National Register of Historic Places in St. Clair County, Michigan Michigan State Historic Sites in St. Clair County