The Harbor Defenses of New York was a United States Army Coast Artillery Corps harbor defense command. It coordinated the coast defenses of New York City from 1895 to 1950, beginning with the Endicott program, some of which were located in New Jersey. These included both coast artillery forts and underwater minefields. The command originated as an Artillery District(s) and became the Coast Defenses of Eastern New York and Coast Defenses of Southern New York in 1913. Circa 1915 the Coast Defenses of Sandy Hook separated from the latter command. In 1925 the commands were renamed as Harbor Defense Commands, and in 1935 the Harbor Defenses of Eastern New York was almost entirely disarmed, although possibly retaining the minefield capability. The New York and Sandy Hook commands and the Harbor Defenses of Long Island Sound were unified as the Harbor Defenses of New York on 9 May 1942.Stanton, pp. 455–481Coast Artillery Organization: A Brief Overview at the Coast Defense Study Group websiteRinaldi, pp. 165–166Berhow, pp. 427–434
History Early forts in New York City
Colonial period
Giovanni da Verrazzano, an Italian working for France, is credited with being the first European to explore the New York City area, in 1524. He was closely followed the next year by a Spanish expedition led by the Portuguese explorer Estêvão Gomes. In 1542 the French established a fortified trading post known as Fort d'Anormée Berge (Fort of the Grand Scarp), in southern Manhattan on an island in a lake later called Collect Pond. It is unclear when it was disestablished.Early New York City forts at American Forts Network Dutch settlement of the area began with an expedition in 1609 by Henry Hudson, an Englishman working for the Dutch East India Company, for whom the Hudson River (called the North River in the Dutch period) and other places are named. Other Dutch-sponsored explorers soon followed him, with a blockhouse/trading post in Manhattan by 1612.Fort Amsterdam at American Forts Network In 1614 Fort Nassau, a factorij or fortified trading post, was established at what is now Albany, New York. This was the first permanent Dutch settlement in the area, by the New Netherland Company as part of the colony of the same name. This colony was established primarily to exploit the North American fur trade, and grew over the next forty years with fortified settlements from the South River (Delaware River) to what is now Rhode Island.Laws and Ordinances of New Netherland 1638–1674, compiled and translated by E.B. Callaghan, 1868
In 1621 the Dutch West India Company took over management of New Netherland and other Dutch possessions in the New World. In 1624, after floods showed that Fort Nassau was untenable, it was replaced with Fort Orange. Also in that year, Dutch settlement of what became New York City began with a colony on Noten Eylandt (Nut or Nutten Island, now Governors Island). The next year the colony moved to Manhattoes (now southern Manhattan) to establish New Amsterdam, which has been settled ever since, and built Fort Amsterdam to protect themselves. In 1653 the wall at what is now Wall Street was added for protection from potential English attack. In 1655 Peter Stuyvesant led an expedition that subjugated the New Sweden colony along the Delaware River. In that same year, several hundred Munsee briefly occupied New Amsterdam during the Peach War and caused significant damage and loss of life in Pavonia and on Staten Island. In 1664 an English expedition arrived in what is now New York Harbor and demanded the colony's surrender. Stuyvesant felt the colony could not defend itself, regretting that his prior requests for troops and defensive resources from the Dutch West India Company had not been met, and on 8 September he surrendered New Netherland to the English. The English renamed the city "New York" at this time and established the Province of New York from the former New Netherland, also establishing the Province of New Jersey the next year. The colony was named for its nominal ruler, James, Duke of York, who later became King James II of England. Fort Amsterdam was renamed Fort James in his honor. Lingering resentment over the takeover was a cause of the Second Anglo-Dutch War in 1665. This ended with the Treaty of Breda in 1667, which made the English takeover official. In 1673, during the Third Anglo-Dutch War, the Dutch seized New York from the English, but the English regained the colony the following year via the Treaty of Westminster that ended that war.Hainsworth and Churches, pp. 95–110
The Signal Hill site on Staten Island at The Narrows, eventually known as Fort Wadsworth, was first fortified with a blockhouse by Dutch settler David Pieterszen de Vries in 1636. This blockhouse was destroyed in the Peach Tree War of 1655.Fort Wadsworth at American Forts Network The site is said to have been "continuously garrisoned" since another blockhouse was built in 1663 until the fort's closure in 1994, making it the oldest such site in the Thirteen Colonies until that time. The 1663 blockhouse survived at least through 1808; sources state that it was enclosed intact by the first Fort Tompkins at that time.Roberts, pp. 587–589
James II proved to be deeply unpopular in England, and he was deposed in the "Glorious Revolution" of 1688, being replaced by William and Mary. Some of James' colonial governors were not immediately replaced, and some of these were unpopular in the colonies they governed. Shortly before James' overthrow New England, New York, and New Jersey were combined as the Dominion of New England, with Edmund Andros as governor in Boston and Francis Nicholson as lieutenant governor in New York. In 1689 many of the locally recruited militia in both cities revolted as the Boston Revolt in April and Leisler's Rebellion at the end of May. Both Andros and Nicholson were imprisoned, and the New England colonies re-established their governments. In Boston the rebellion was soon over, but in New York Jacob Leisler acted as de facto governor of the province for nearly two years. The French took advantage of the situation by raiding Schenectady with their Indian allies in February 1690, causing Leisler to divert most of his resources to an unsuccessful retaliatory expedition against New France. On 19 March 1691 the newly appointed royal governor Henry Sloughter arrived in New York and imprisoned Leisler and several of the rebellion's leaders. Leisler and one other were executed on 16 May.Van Rensselaer, pp. 472–489
The fort in Manhattan went through several name changes from 1685 through 1714, finally becoming Fort George. In 1699 the wall that Wall Street is named for was dismantled.
New York City was a base for British operations in the French and Indian War (the North American theater of the Seven Years' War) from 1754 to 1763. That conflict united the colonies for the first time in common defense, and ended by eliminating the French military threat that the colonists had relied upon Britain to defend them from.Fowler, pp. 134–139 In 1765 the British Parliament imposed a Stamp Act to augment local expenditures for defending the colonies. One result was that delegates from nine colonies met to protest at what would later be known as Federal Hall in Manhattan as the Stamp Act Congress, protesting "taxation without representation". In November of that year a committee of the Sons of Liberty was established in New York.Miller 1943, pp. 65–74
Revolutionary War
In April 1775 the American Revolution broke out full-scale at Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts. In March 1776 Patriot forces captured Boston. Their commander, General George Washington, thought the evacuating British force would immediately attempt to capture New York and sent troops to the city, soon followed by himself. Several forts were built by the patriots in the New York City area in June and July 1776, including Fort WashingtonNYC park website on Fort Washington in northwestern Manhattan and Fort Constitution (later Fort Lee) across the Hudson in the town later named for it.Fort Lee Historic Park at Palisades park website Both forts were just south of the current George Washington Bridge. Fort Lee was named for Patriot general Charles Lee. A chevaux de frise barrier was placed in the Hudson between the two forts to prevent ships passing. Both forts were hastily built and had few defensive features, even lacking ditches. Another fort that proved important was a set of batteries on Nutten Island (now called Governor's Island). Numerous small forts were also built in the city.Roberts, pp. 596–605
On 3 July 1776 the British landed unopposed on Staten Island and soon captured Flagstaff Fort on Signal Hill, later the site of Fort Wadsworth. The British forces were under General Sir William Howe. They included troops evacuated from Boston along with reinforcements, some of which were Hessian troops from Germany. On 4 July 1776 a small American battery called the Narrows Fort,NYC Revolutionary forts at American Forts Network on the site of the later Fort Hamilton (the Brooklyn side of the Narrows), fired into one of the British men-of-war convoying the British invasion force. HMS Asia suffered damage and casualties, but opposition to the immense fleet could be little more than symbolic. However, the Nutten Island batteries engaged and on 12 July 1776; this may have made the British cautious about entering the East River.Smith 1913, p. 49 In late August the British landed in Brooklyn and on 27 August the Battle of Long Island was fought, the largest battle of the Revolution in total number of troops engaged. Washington's forces were thrown back to their fortifications on Brooklyn Heights, and soon made a withdrawal under cover of night and fog across the East River to Manhattan, unimpeded by the Royal Navy.McCullough, p. 191
On 6 September the submarine Turtle made the first recorded submarine attack in history in New York Harbor. This one-man hand-powered submarine had been built the previous year by David Bushnell, an inventor from Connecticut. Turtle was crewed by Sergeant Ezra Lee, also from Connecticut. Lee reported that he attempted to attack HMS Eagle, flagship of Admiral Sir Richard Howe, brother of the general. Turtle was equipped to attach a mine (called a "torpedo" in those days) to a ship by means of a spike or possibly an auger. Lee reported that he was unable to attach the mine to the ship, and surfaced and retreated. He also stated that British boats approached him from Governors Island, so he released the mine, which exploded.Schecter, p. 174 On 5 October another attempt was made, but Lee withdrew when the target's crew spotted him. Later that month the British captured Turtle and scuttled her near Fort Lee, New Jersey, although Bushnell may have salvaged her later. Her final fate is unknown.
During the Long Island battle the British had captured General John Sullivan. Admiral Howe convinced him to deliver a message to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia, and released him on parole. Washington also gave his permission, and on 2 September Sullivan told the Congress that the Howes wanted to negotiate, and had been given much broader powers to treat than those they actually held. This created a diplomatic problem for Congress, which did not want to be seen as aggressive. Consequently, Congress agreed to send a committee to meet with the Howes in a move they did not think would bear any fruit. On 11 September, the Howe brothers met with John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and Edward Rutledge in the Staten Island Peace Conference. The Americans insisted on retaining independence as expressed in the Declaration of Independence, and the Howes said they had no authority to allow that, and specifically regarded the patriot delegates as British subjects. So the war continued.Ketchum (1973), pp. 116–117