Форт Маккинак: История захвата и британское владение.

[[File:Fort Mackinack I. jpg|thumb|300px|Fort Mackinack The British held the outpost throughout the American Revolutionary War. Captain Daniel Robertson commanded the garrison on Mackinac Island from 1782 to his replacement in 1784 by Lieutenant George Clowes. Despite the terms of the Treaty of Paris (1783), the British did not officially relinquish the fort to the United States until 1796.

In June 1812, British Major General Isaac Brock heard that America had declared war and sent a canoe party to Fort St. Joseph, Ontario to confirm that a state of war existed. This party returned with an order to attack Fort Mackinac, then known as Fort Michilimackinac. A minimal United States garrison of approximately sixty men under the command of Lieutenant Porter Hanks then manned Fort Mackinac. Although a diligent officer, Hanks had received no communication from his superiors for months. On the morning of July 17, 1812, a combined British and Native American force of seventy war canoes and ten bateaux under the command of British Captain Charles Roberts attacked Fort Mackinac. Roberts came from Fort St. Joseph and landed on the north end of Mackinac Island, 2 mile (3 km) from the fort. The British removed the village inhabitants from their homes and trained their two 6 pounder iron cannons at the fort. The Americans, under Lieutenant Hanks, were taken by surprise and Hanks perceived his garrison was badly outnumbered. The officers and men under Roberts numbered about two hundred (including 180 Canadians); a few hundred Native Americans of various tribes supported him. Fearing that the Native Americans on the British side would massacre his men and allies, Lieutenant Hanks accepted the British offer of surrender without a fight. The British paroled the American forces, essentially allowing them to go free after swearing to not take up arms in the war again. They made the island inhabitants swear an oath of allegiance as subjects of the United Kingdom. Shortly after the British captured the fort, two American vessels arrived from Fort Dearborn (Chicago), unaware of the start of the War of 1812, or the fort's capture by British forces. The British raised the American flag and when the vessels tied up at the pier, the British captured the two sloops as prizes of war. The ships were Erie (Captain Norton) and Friends Good Will (Captain Lee), the latter being taken by the British into service as The schooners Mary and Salina, anchored at port, were sent by the British to Detroit as cartels carrying the prisoners they had taken. After capturing the island, the British under the command of Colonel Robert McDouall of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment built Fort George, a stockade and blockhouse on the highest point of the island, to prevent the Americans from re capturing the island using the same strategy. Lieutenant Hanks made his way to Detroit and the American military post there. Upon his arrival, superiors charged him with cowardice in the surrender of Fort Mackinac. Before the court martial of Lieutenant Hanks could begin, British forces attacked Fort Detroit. A British cannonball ripped through the room where Hanks was standing, cutting him in half and killing the officer next to him as well. United States Army Colonel George Croghan and his superior General William Henry Harrison designed a campaign to take control of the Great Lakes and sever the fur trade alliance between the British and the tribes of the region; as part of this campaign, the Americans attempted to retake Mackinac Island in July 1814. The two pronged campaign also included an assault on Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin, located on the upper Mississippi River.

On July 26, 1814, a squadron of five United States ships arrived off Mackinac Island, carrying a landing force of 700 soldiers under the command of Colonel Croghan. This landing began the Battle of Mackinac Island. To his dismay, Colonel Croghan discovered that the new British blockhouse stood too high for the naval guns to reach, forcing an unprotected assault on the wall of Fort George. The Americans shelled Fort George for two days with most shells falling harmlessly in vegetable gardens around the fort. A dense fog forced the Americans back from Mackinac Island for a week. Major Andrew Holmes led the American forces in returning; they landed at the north end of the island near the location of the British assault in 1812. The Americans worked their way to the fort through dense woods, which Native American allies of the British protected, finally emerging into a clearing below Fort George. Colonel McDouall had placed a small force bearing muskets, rifles, and two field guns behind low breastworks at the opposite end of the clearing. When the Americans emerged from the woods into the clearing, the British guns targeted them easily. British forces killed 13 Americans, including Major Holmes and two other officers, and wounded 51 others. The heavy losses compelled Colonel Croghan to order his men to retreat back through the woods to the beach. The Americans rowed back to their ships and retreated. The American defeat in the Battle of Mackinac Island left the island and its forts in the hands of the British through the end of the War of 1812. Following the Treaty of Ghent, American forces reoccupied Fort Mackinac in July 1815. They renamed Fort George as Fort Holmes, in honor of Major Holmes, killed in the 1814 attack. After the War of 1812 and settlement of the northern border and tensions with Britain, Fort Mackinac gradually declined in military significance.

In 1895, Congress closed Fort Mackinac and Mackinac National Park. It transferred the fort and park to the State of Michigan, which created Mackinac Island State Park, the first state park in Michigan. The semi autonomous Mackinac Island State Park Commission in 1895 began governing Fort Mackinac and the other surrounding historic sites on or near Mackinac Island: Colonial Michilimackinac, Historic Mill Creek, the Old Mackinac Point Lighthouse, and Mackinac Island State Park. The Governor of Michigan appoints members of the commission, who meet many times during the course of a year to govern Mackinac State Historic Parks. The commission and historic parks preserve, protect, and present the rich and natural history of Mackinac Island and the Straits area. In the 1950s, Mackinac Island State Park Commission developed a new way of financing its park, based on the system that financed the Mackinac Bridge. Michigan financed construction of Mackinac Bridge through revenue bonds repaid from the cash flow of toll fees from the bridge after it opened in 1957. Mackinac Island State Park Commission modified this idea for park restoration purposes, with Fort Mackinac admission fees serving as the cash flow. More than three fourths of budget of Mackinac Island State Park Commission now comes from admission fees and other self generated cash flow. Most United States parks and recreation agencies instead depend upon public subsidies. Mackinac Island State Park Commission operates one of the largest parks in United States that generates a significant majority of its own operating budget.