Fort Adams

Fort Adams is a former United States Army post in Newport, Rhode Island, that was established on July 4, 1799, as a First System coastal fortification, named for President John Adams, who was in office at the time. Its first commanding officer was Captain John Henry who was later instrumental in starting the War of 1812. The current Fort Adams was built between 1824 and 1857 under the Third System of coastal forts; it is part of Fort Adams State Park today.

The first Fort Adams was designed by Major Louis de Tousard of the United States Army Corps of Engineers as part of the first system of US fortifications. After some additions in 1809, this fort mounted 17 cannon and was garrisoned during the War of 1812 by Wood's State Corps of Rhode Island militiamen. The United States Secretary of War's report for December 1811 describes the fort as "an irregular star fort of masonry, with an irregular indented work of masonry adjoining it, mounting seventeen heavy guns. The barracks are of wood and bricks, for one company." After the War of 1812, there was a thorough review of the fortification needs of the United States and it was decided to replace the older Fort Adams with a newer and much larger fort. This was part of what became known as the Third System of U. S. fortifications. The new fort was designed by Brigadier General Simon Bernard, a Frenchman who had served as a military engineer under Napoleon Bonaparte. Bernard designed the new Fort Adams in the classic style and it became the most complex fortification in the Western Hemisphere. It included a tenaille and crownwork, a complex outer work on the southern (landward) side, designed to break up and channel an assault force. The fort also had a detached redoubt south of the main fort. In the United States, it is rivaled in size only by Fort Monroe in Hampton, Virginia, and Fort Jefferson on the Dry Tortugas in Florida. Construction of the new fort began in 1824 under First lieutenant Andrew Talcott and continued at irregular intervals until 1857. From 1825 to 1838 construction was overseen by Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Gilbert Totten, the foremost American military engineer of his day. In 1838 Totten became U. S. Army Chief of Engineers and served until his death in 1864. The new Fort Adams was first garrisoned in August 1841, functioning as an active U. S. Army post until 1950. During this time the fort was active in five major wars – the Mexican–American War (1846–1848), American Civil War (1861–1865), Spanish–American War (1898), World War I (1917–1918), and World War II (1941–1945) — but never fired a shot in anger. At the start of the Mexican–American War in 1846, the post was commanded by Benjamin Kendrick Pierce, the brother of President Franklin Pierce. The fort's redoubt, about south of the main fort, was built during this war. From 1859 to 1863 the fort was in the care of Ordnance Sergeant Mark Wentworth Smith, a Mexican–American War veteran who was wounded at the Battle of Chapultepec. He died in 1879 at the age of 76, the oldest active duty enlisted soldier in the history of the U. S. Army.

The United States Department of War was concerned about the political sympathies of residents in Maryland during the American Civil War, so the United States Naval Academy was moved in 1861 from Annapolis, Maryland, to Fort Adams. In September 1861, the academy moved to the Atlantic House Hotel in Newport, Rhode Island, and remained there for the rest of the war. Among the midshipmen assigned to the Naval Academy while it was at Fort Adams was Robley D. Evans who was wounded at Fort Fisher, North Carolina, in 1865, commanded the battleship Iowa during the Spanish–American War in 1898, and later commanded the Great White Fleet on the first leg of its epic around the world voyage of 1906–1908. Among Evans' classmates at Fort Adams were future Rear Admiral Charles Sigsbee, who commanded the battleship Maine, and future Captain Charles Vernon Gridley, who commanded the protected cruiser Olympia at the Battle of Manila Bay on 1 May 1898. In 1862 Fort Adams became the headquarters and recruit depot for the U. S. Army's 15th Infantry Regiment. This regiment, along with several others, was reorganized into a regiment of three eight company battalions, with the 3rd Battalion formed at Fort Adams in March 1864. From August to October 1863, Fort Adams was commanded by Brigadier General Robert Anderson, who had commanded Fort Sumter when it was attacked by Confederate forces in April 1861, beginning the American Civil War.

As part of a major upgrade to U. S. seacoast defenses, Fort Adams' armament was modernized in the 1870s with eleven Rodman guns, thirteen Rodman guns, and four (100 pounder) Parrott rifles. Three new emplacements were built for the guns; the remainder replaced older weapons in the fort, of which all but 20 32 pounders were removed by 1873. For mobile defense, four siege rifles, four Ordnance rifles, and four mortars were provided. In 1894, four converted rifles were added in a new battery south of the fort. NameNo. of gunsGun typeCarriage typeYears activeGreene Edgerton16 coast defense mortar M1890barbette M18961898–1942Reilly2 gun M1888disappearing M18961899–1917Talbot2 Armstrong gunpedestal1899–1919unnamed1 gun M1888converted Rodman carriage1898–1899?Bankhead3 Armstrong gunpedestal1907–1913Belton2 gun M1903pedestal M19031907–1925

Batteries Greene Edgerton, Reilly, and Talbot were built between 1896 and 1899 and were the first of these to be completed. Battery Greene Edgerton included sixteen mortars, all of which were at first called Battery Greene, but the battery was divided into two groups of eight in 1906. Battery Talbot, one of a number of batteries added on the United States East Coast at the outbreak of the Spanish–American War in 1898, included two Armstrong guns. An unnamed battery of a single 8 inch M1888 gun on a converted 1870s carriage also existed briefly from 1898. In 1907 two additional batteries were completed, Battery Bankhead with three 6 inch Armstrong guns and Battery Belton with two 3 inch M1903 guns. Battery Talbot was named for Silas Talbot, a U. S. Army officer from Rhode Island in the American Revolutionary War who later became a United States Navy officer and commanded the frigate Constitution from 1799 to 1801. Battery Bankhead was named for Brevet Major General James Bankhead, who served in the War of 1812, Second Seminole War, and Mexican–American War. Battery Belton was named for Francis S. Belton, who served in the War of 1812 and the Mexican–American War. Thornton Wilder, author and playwright whose 1973 novel Theophilus North is set in Newport, served a three month enlistment in the United States Army Coast Artillery Corps at Fort Adams during World War I. Wilder rose to the rank of corporal in the Army. The two guns of Battery Reilly were dismounted in 1917 for potential service as railway guns, but after considerable delay they were sent to Fort Warren near Boston, Massachusetts, in 1919 to replace guns removed from that fort. Eight of the sixteen mortars at Battery Greene Edgerton were removed in 1918 for potential railway artillery service; this was also done as a force wide program to improve the rate of fire due to overcrowding in the mortar pits during reloading. World War I ended on 11 November 1918. With the war over, Battery Talbot was disarmed in 1919 and its guns sent to Newport and Westerly as memorials. At some time after the war three M1917 anti aircraft guns were deployed at the fort, supplemented by at least two mobile guns (or possibly mobile 75 mm guns) on White truck or Ford Model T chassis. An Anti Motor Torpedo Boat Battery (AMTB 925), with two 90 millimeter guns on mobile mounts, was also at Fort Adams by December 1943. As the war progressed, the number of troops was gradually reduced to about 500 by the end of the war in August 1945.

In 1953, the U. S. Army transferred ownership of Fort Adams to the U. S. Navy, which still uses some of the grounds for family housing. President Dwight D. Eisenhower lived at the former commanding officer's quarters (now called the Eisenhower House) during his summer vacations in Newport in 1958 and 1960. From the early 1950s until the mid 1970s, Fort Adams fell victim to neglect, the weather, and vandalism. In 1965, the fort and most of the surrounding land was given to the State of Rhode Island for use as Fort Adams State Park. In 1976, Fort Adams was declared a National Historic Landmark in recognition of its distinctive military architecture, which includes features not found in other forts of the period. Through the efforts of State Senator Eric O'D. Taylor, in the 1970s Fort Adams was cleaned up, opened for tours, and used for the filming of the PBS television miniseries The Scarlet Letter. The tour program was cancelled circa 1980 due to budget cutbacks by the State of Rhode Island. Since 1981, the Fort Adams grounds have been host to the Newport Jazz Festival and the Newport Folk Festival. In the early 1990s, Fort Adams was subjected to an environmental remediation program which made the fort safe for public access. In 1994, the Fort Adams Trust was formed; to provide guided tours at the fort and oversee restoration work there. In 1995 the Fort Adams Trust began giving tours at the fort from May to September. Since that time, the fort has had several areas of the fort restored as well as having its land defenses cleared of overgrowth, and the trust's restoration efforts are ongoing

In 2012, the park was the official venue for the America's Cup World Series in Newport.