Fort Preble

Harbor Defenses of Portland

CDSG REPRESENTATIVE SITE VISIT REPORT

Fort Name: Fort Preble, Harbor Defenses of Portland, Maine, 1808-1953.

Date of Visit: June 2006.

Current Site Name: Southern Maine Community College, Fort Road, South Portland, ME 04106

Site Use: State Community College Campus. The shoreline is leased by the City of South Portland as part of the citys Spring Point Shoreway, a walking trail with interpretive signs, arboretum, picnic shelter, and playground.

Public Access: The campus and shoreway are open to the public with no fee.

Dates and Hours of Operation: Daily from sunrise to sunset, year around.

Type of Programs Offered at the Site: The Spring Point Shoreway includes interpretive signs covering the human and natural history of the site, including fortifications. Signs on former military buildings on campus mention the previous use for the structures.

The Portland Harbor Museum, located on site, carries some books related to fortifications.

Dates and Hours of Operation: Mid-April to Memorial Day, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, 10-4:30; Memorial Day-mid-October, 7 days, 10-4; mid-October -Thanksgiving weekend, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, 10-4. Admission $4.00.

Overall Condition of the Site: Most of the non-tactical buildings are in use by the college. Two mortar batteries have been buried and another destroyed, but the surviving batteries are in good condition.

Restoration Projects: Volunteers have cut grass and brush, painted metalwork on batteries, and repaired erosion on a magazine.

Tactical Structures:

North Battery–1870s: The concrete, earth-covered powder magazines survive in good condition, but their entrances are blocked. The smoothbore gun emplacements have been removed. The forts first frame fire control switchboard building was constructed in one of the emplacements and then protected within a concrete structure with an earth cover after World War I. In 1939 an antiaircraft command post was built on top of the switchboard building, which has now collapsed. Some of the concrete walls of the dug-in command post have collapsed.

Battery Mason 1906 (one 3 inch pedestal gun) was built in an early smoothbore emplacement and survives in good condition. It features a telephone booth with a built-in concrete megaphone. The doors to the magazines are sealed. In 1942, the gun was moved to a location in the South Battery.

New Fort Preble 1863, the unfinished, one-story granite casemated, work was begun in 1863. It was uncompleted at the end of the Civil War and never finished.

Fort Preble 1808: The circular brick front of the modified star fort was covered with a granite facade during reconstruction in the 1860s. In 1906, the brick rear and side walls of the fort were taken down and a modern 6-inch battery built behind the facade of the original fort.

Battery Rivardi1906 (two 6 inch DC guns) was built on the site of the 1808 fort and the keystone from the old fort was incorporated into the rear of the battery, which is in good condition, although the metal stairs and landing of the battery commanders station has been removed and a ships ventilator installed in place of one of the originals. The doors to the battery are locked. The guns were removed in 1918 for use as field artillery in Europe. The cement plaster latrine has been removed.

Antiaircraft Battery–1920 (3-3 inch AA guns) was established at Battery Rivardi, using its magazine to store the shells and equipment. Gun blocks were placed on the parapet of Gun Number One and Gun Number Two, and the third on top of a 1870s magazine behind the battery. In 1939, a permanent command post with dug-in emplacements for the gun director, height finder, battery commanders scope, and communications area was built on top of the protected fire control switchboard building.

South Battery 1820: an external or water battery was begun south of the old fort by 1820, and expanded during the 1860s. In the 1870s, pairs of smoothbore gun emplacements protected by traverse magazines were extended all the way to the Old Settlers Cemetery. In 1942, a concrete gun block was built in the South Battery and the 3-inch gun of Battery Mason was moved to it to become Battery Mason II. When the Spring Point Shoreway was constructed, the South Battery was demolished, except for four smoothbore emplacements, two of which have their earth cover removed. The other two emplacements have their granite and slate parapet walls intact, and a large parapet into which a zigzag infantry trench was dug, probably during World War I. One surviving early powder magazine was converted to a plotting room for the mortar batteries in the 1930s. The entrance to the magazine has been blocked.

Batteries Chase and Battery Kearny–1901, (each mounted 8-12 inch rifled mortars in two pits) were demolished and the SMCC Culinary Arts Center was built on the site.

Other Tactical Structures:

DPF Building-year has been demolished but the concrete pillar for the DPF survives and is used as a coast artillery memorial and as a base for a remote weather camera for a local television station.

Cable Tank ca. 1938 near the quartermaster wharf was probably built after the mine wharf at Fort Williams was destroyed by the surf in Ship Cove. The tanks have been filled.

Non-Tactical Structures:

Quartermaster Wharf has been rebuilt several times of the years.

Artillery Engineer Storehouses are the one story concrete building next to the wharf and the small brick building next to it.

Two-Bay Garage at the end of the North Battery was formerly the blacksmith shop.

Ordnance Machine Shop in front of the North Battery, now the Portland Harbor Museum.

Ordnance Garage, east of the Ordnance Machine Shop.

Quartermaster Store House has a wooden addition.

Double Officers Quarters on the south has been turned into a bed and breakfast. The one on the north is used for offices.

Commanding Officers Quarters are just west of the DPF pillar. The other single officers quarters are now used as the residence for the college president.

Guard House has lost its dormer and is now attached to the student center, used as a bookstore.

Administration Building is used by the college for the same purpose.

Hospital has been recently renovated for use as a classroom.

Barracks Building has lost its porches and is a classroom building. A second barracks across the parade ground was lost in a fire in the 1960s.

Fire Station and Bakery have been renovated and linked together.

Condition of the Individual Elements: A number of the buildings have been altered but most are in good condition. The grounds are also well cared for.

The site is not protected.

Current Site Owner(s):

(1) Southern Maine Community College

Site Supervisor: Burt Daveport, Facilities Management

2 Fort Road, South Portland, ME 04106

Phone: 207-741-5656

Email: bdavenport@smccME.edu

(2) Spring Point Shoreway, City of South Portland

Site Supervisor: Sarah Neuts, Manager, Parks Division

21 Nelson Road, South Portland, ME 04106

Phone: 207-767-7670

Email: Sneut@southportland.org