Fort Macon (Atlantic Beach, NC)

Hi everyone!  It's been awhile since I have had the chance to do a post.  My husband recently graduated from Coast Guard boot camp at Cape May, NJ!  We have since been stationed in North Carolina and are finally settled in and ready to enjoy Christmas and the New Year with our little one.  We haven't had the chance to do too much exploring over here (yet) but we have had the chance to go to one historical site which is the Fort Macon State Park.  I can't tell you about everything we saw because there is SO much - but I'm going to tell you the basics and share plenty of pictures. :)

    "Fort Macon was built between 1826 and 1834 and was guarding the entrance to Beaufort Harbor.  It was one of a series of seacoast fortifications for national defense.  The fort was seized on April 14, 1861 (the outbreak of the Civil War) by local secessionist militia forces.  

    Union General John G. Parke's brigade of General Ambrose E. Burnside's Coastal Division captured Carolina City, Morehead City, and Beaufort in March 1862.  Confederate Colonel Moses J. White, commanding Fort Macon's 403-man garrison, refused 3 Union Surrender demands.  Parke established 22 companies of U.S. infantry and artillery at Hoop Pole Creek, 5 miles west of Fort Macon, and besieged the Fort.  Parke's troops constructed emplacements for two mortar batteries and one rifled cannon battery about 3/4 mile from the fort.  Four U.S. Navy gunboats offshore assisted in the siege, along with floating batteries positioned northeast of the fort.  

    On April 25, the Union batteries and gunboats bombarded Fort Macon for 11 hours.  By afternoon, the powerful rifled cannons had breached the fort's walls and endangered its magazines.  The Confederate's ran up the white flag at 4:30 p.m., and White formally surrendered to Parke's forces the following morning.  Seven Confederates were killed and 18 wounded while the Federal's lost 1 killed and 2 wounded.  U.S. forced occupied the fort and the Beaufort Harbor for the remainder of the war."

That was information from the park itself (I don't want to get anything wrong and it's a nice short summary), enjoy some pictures of the park!

Fort Macon Mini

 The oven they used to cook.

Some weapons and ammunition (also below)

I hope you enjoyed learning a little more about this and seeing some pictures. For more info you can check out the website at http://www.ncparks.gov/fort-macon-state-park :)