A Look at History
Buildings of Fort Mackinac Reflect the History of the Post
BY FRANK STRAUS

The whitewashed stone walls of historic Fort Mackinac contain 14 original buildings built at different times during the more than one century (1782-1895) that the fort was an active military post. These buildings reflect the fort's transition from a dangerous post beyond the most distant frontiers of settlement by English-speaking peoples, to a relatively pleasant station guarding a frontier resort.

The Officers' Stone Quarters, one of the fort's oldest buildings, was built by men acting under the command of Lieutenant Governor Patrick Sinclair, an officer in the British Army. Sinclair commanded the construction of the original Fort Mackinac (which looked very different from the fort as it is built and presented to the public today) in 1780- 81. The new fortification was a replacement for the insecure and obsolete Colonial Michilimackinac, located on the northern tip of the Lower Peninsula adjacent to what is now Mackinaw City. The new island fort and its stone living space for officers were built atop a frowning cliff, meant to deter possible rebel attackers. The Officers Stone Quarters may have been designed as a place of refuge for the fort's garrison to use in case the fort's exterior walls were stormed. Its stone walls range from three to six feet thick in places. Anyone who walks through the quarters' doors to enter the building can get a sense of the security concerns of Sinclair and his men.

A barracks for the English, Scottish, and Canadian enlisted men burned twice; a third barracks, which stands today, was built in 1859. (Photograph courtesy of Tom Pfeiffelmann)

A further touch of the Fort's security concerns at this time can be seen from the presence, studding the Fort's walls, of the three Fort Mackinac blockhouses. The blockhouses, which were probably built soon after the American army first occupied Fort Mackinac in 1796, continue the stony defensive stance of the Fort's walls and officer's quarters. The blockhouses were built along high points of the Fort's walls. Their wooden upper stories were built to contain tiny windows and floor slits, through which defenders could fire weapons at attackers. The blockhouses' sturdy construction made it possible to haul small cannons up the second floor to fire lethal grapeshot. Although the blockhouses were never used in combat, their construction reveals the state of the art of military science in the 1790s. Blockhouses of this exact type were soon superseded, but the concept behind these structures survived as late as the German "pillboxes" of the Siegfried Line in World War II.

After the War of 1812, the Americans established substantial control over Mackinac Island and its vicinity. With the threat level from Native Americans substantially reduced, the American army could build new buildings within Fort Mackinac of flammable wood, rather than stone. New buildings could be built to increase the garrison's quality of life. The fort's tiny hospital, built in 1829, reflects this new emphasis. The hospital created a space for soldiers to be examined and treated for illnesses. It is much smaller than hospitals of the 20th and 21st centuries, but physicians of the caliber of Dr. William Beaumont, the eminent founder of the science of human digestion, could provide state-of-the-art medical care to the officers and soldiers under their care.

Other buildings built during the 1800s replaced earlier buildings that had burned or been torn down. The original British fort, built in 1780-81 under Sinclair's command, had included a barracks for the English, Scottish, and Canadian enlisted men; the barracks was built opposite the Officers' Stone Quarters, with the two buildings facing each other across a small parade ground. This barracks burned twice; a third barracks, which stands today, was built in 1859. Soon the soldiers stationed there would march away to help fight the South.

After the Civil War, Fort Mackinac further evolved into the Victorian post familiar to visitors today. This period, from 1865 until 1895 and centering on the 1880s, is the period that the Fort's guides and soldiers interpret today. The Fort became more visually friendly and colorful, with the grass clipped and many of the buildings repainted in a light brown color. Buildings built during this period reflect the Fort's peacetime life. Officers, and even some soldiers, were encouraged to marry and live as families within the Fort and its outbuildings. So many children became part of the Fort's everyday life that in 1879 the Army built a small schoolhouse atop the high hill behind the Soldiers Barracks.

The Fort's older buildings were becoming obsolete for their intended use. In the 1880s, the West Blockhouse was converted into a reservoir for the Fort's water supply. The well-supported second floor, which had been built to hold up heavy cannon, instead held a tank of water. From the converted blockhouse, a network of iron pipes fed the water downward to points of use. The Fort's last building, the Bath House (1885), was built to contain bathtubs for the frequent use of the soldiers stationed at Fort Mackinac during the Fort's final years. The soldiers had become living exhibition men in a peacetime facility that was open to the public during the summer months. During those happy years, a tourist on Mackinac Island could just come up to the Fort and be let in by the sentry. Possibly bearing one of the newly invented Kodak cameras, the traveler could wander about the Fort, talk with the soldiers, and even take photographs. Our Army was proud, at that time, of the openness of its facilities to the general public, which was compared with the heavy security surrounding military posts in old Europe. It would not do for these representatives of the public face of the U.S. Army to smell bad.

Fort Mackinac's current role is that it is an interpretive museum that preserves a structural complex displaying U.S. Army life during the 1880s and early 1890s. All of the buildings that stood at the time the Fort was abandoned in 1895 have been preserved and reopened to the public. The Fort is once again a place for tourists and travelers.