Fort Crown Point was a British fort built by the combined efforts of both British and provincial troops (from New York and the New England Colonies) in North America in 1759 at a narrows on Lake Champlain on what later became the border between New York and Vermont. Erected to secure the region against the French, the fort is in upstate New York near the town of Crown Point and was the largest earthen fortress built in the United States. The fort's ruins, a National Historic Landmark, are now administered as part of Crown Point State Historic Site.HistoryThe French built a fortress at Crown Point in the 1730s with 12ft thick limestone walls named Fort St. Frederic. British forces targeted it twice during the French and Indian War before the French destroyed it in the summer of 1759.The Crown Point fort was constructed by the British army under the command of Sir Jeffery Amherst following the capture of Carillon, a French fort to the south (which he renamed Ticonderoga), and the destruction of Fort St. Frédéric. Amherst used the construction of the fort as a means of keeping his men working through the winter of 1759 after pushing the French into modern Canada. Israel Putnam, who would later become a major general in the American Revolution, supervised much of the construction. According to archaeologist David R. Starbuck, Crown Point was "the greatest British military installation ever raised in North America."
