Fort Stevens was part of the extensive fortifications built around Washington, D.C., during the American Civil War.LocationThe fort was constructed in 1861 as "Fort Massachusetts" and later enlarged by the Union Army and renamed "Fort Stevens" after Brig. Gen. Isaac Ingalls Stevens, who was killed at the Battle of Chantilly, Virginia, on September 1, 1862. In 1861, it had a perimeter of 168 yards and places for 10 cannon. In 1862, it was expanded to 375 yards and 19 guns.It guarded the northern approach to Washington, D.C., the Seventh Street Turnpike. By 1864 Fort Stevens was one part of a thirty-seven mile-long arrangement of fortifications, consisting of sixty-eight forts intended to defend the capital.ConstructionThe fort was constructed as a part of a defensive ring around Washington. Following the Union defeat at Bull Run, Congress voted to augment the city's defenses, which consisted of a single fort (Fort Washington) twelve miles to the south on the Potomac. (Eventually, "68 forts, 93 batteries, 20 miles of rifle pits, and 32 miles of military roads surrounded the capital and Washington became the most heavily fortified city in the world.")In September 1861 Union troops took possession of a property owned by a free black family Elizabeth Proctor Thomas and her siblings at the Seventh Street Turnpike, seeing it as "an ideal and necessary location for a fort." The soldiers ultimately destroyed her home, barn, orchard, and garden to build what was then named Fort Massachusetts.
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