North Battery

Between 1875 and 1876, the army built the North Battery for heavy guns to strengthen the military effectiveness of Fort Trumbull. Designed for five cannon aimed toward the water, it had four gun platforms between earthen mounds and a fifth platform just north of the row of mounds. The cannon projected over a granite wall fronted by an earth embankment that shielded troops from enemy fire, while the mounds provided additional protection and two contained magazines for ammunition. Although an 1879 army plan intended the battery for the heaviest modern guns, the platforms remained empty until the late 1890s because of changes in military policy and a lack of funds. The army then installed three heavy guns known as 15-inch Rodmans, which could pivot in a semicircle to aim up- or downriver. When designed in the mid-nineteenth century, the 15-inch Rodman was the most powerful cannon in the world, remained a standard American coastal defense weapon into the 1880s, and continued in limited use into the early twentieth century, but by the time these guns were installed here they were becoming outdated.

New London, Connecticut · United States