NC Cultural Resources Newsroom

(Editor’s Note: Noise from the cannon firings is extremely loud. Signs will be posted around the site to warn visitors, however motorists and residents in the area on Saturday, Jan. 12, 2008, should also expect to hear loud booms. Visitors are warned to stay out of barricaded safety ranges for their own protection. No smoking is allowed in the demonstration areas due to the use of black powder. Visitors are cautioned to please turn down hearing aids, warn children and control pets during all demonstrations.)

KURE BEACH— The unmistakable boom of cannons will fill the air Saturday, Jan. 12, at Ft. Fisher State Historic Site in Kure Beach at its annual commemoration of the 1865 Second Battle of Ft. Fisher.

Firing times for the reproduction 32-pounder rifled and banded seacoast gun will be 11:30 a.m., 1:30 and 3:30 p.m.  Staff and volunteers will also discharge muskets (rifles) and field artillery pieces, including the site’s 12-lb. bronze Napoleon gun.   From 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., visitors will have a chance to experience Civil War camp life and learn about the artillery used in the conflict through demonstrations by period costumed staff and reenactors.  Free and open to the public, the program will feature talks on how the war affected civilians, particularly when such staples as flour and coffee were in short supply or ran out.

Listen to Civil War-era music played by local guitarist John Golden, watch reenactors demonstrate battle drills and tactics and learn about Confederate uniforms and equipment.  Cap off a visit with a demonstration of the cannon atop Shepherd’s Battery as you learn about the assault on the fort’s western bastion by Union troops and its subsequent fall. Tours will be given at scheduled times during the event and focus on the Second Battle of Fort Fisher, fought Jan. 13-15, 1865.

Once called “The Gibraltar of the South,” Ft. Fisher kept the port of Wilmington open to blockade-runners supplying Confederate armies until early 1865.  The fort’s fall after a massive Federal assault Jan. 15, 1865 helped seal the South’s fate. The mission of this state historic site is to preserve and interpret the history of Ft. Fisher, the largest earthwork fortification in the American Civil War.

Today, visitors can tour the remains of the fort’s land face, which features the reconstructed Shepherd’s Battery cannon.  A shaded scenic trail leads tourists from the visitor center past gigantic earthworks and around to the fort’s rear.  Exhibits include items recovered from sunken blockade runners, dioramas of the fort’s construction and its fall to Union troops and a fiber optic map that retraces the final attack on the Confederate fort.

Ft. Fisher State Historic Site is located in Kure Beach on US 421.  From I40 take College Road (S.R. 132) south through Wilmington to U.S. 421 and then go south through Carolina Beach and Kure Beach.  The fort is on the right just south of Kure Beach.  From Southport take the Southport-Fort Fisher Ferry.  This 30-minute ride takes one to the end of Federal Point.  Take U.S. 421 north for two miles; the fort is on the left.

Though admission is free, donations are appreciated.  For more information about this program or the fort itself, call the site at (910) 458-5538, email fisher@ncmail.net or visit our website at www.fortfisher.nchistoricsites.org.  All activities are subject to change due to circumstances beyond the site’s control.

Ft. Fisher is part of the Division of State Historic Sites, in the N.C. Department of Cultural Resources, a state agency dedicated to the promotion and protection of North Carolina’s arts, history, and culture.  For more information, visit www.ncculture.com.