“Lodging as the Nature of the Campaign will Admit”
The 4th Pennsylvania Battalion, along with the other regiments of their brigade, completed their fortifications along the Old French lines by early September in 1776. Officers and men had lived in tents since they encamped on this hill in July. With the works finished, Colonel Anthony Wayne issued the order to begin building better housing […]
“by Taylors of their respective Companies”
Many of the documents from 4th Pennsylvania Battalion Quartermaster John Harper reside in the collection of Fort Ticonderoga today. These papers document many aspects of the supply of this regiment, including its resupply with clothing and materials while encamped at Ticonderoga in 1776. These papers include receipts for large amounts of cloth for the regiment […]
Seeing Red
Visitors to our Founding Fashions exhibit in the Mars Educations Center are often confused by seeing three scarlet uniforms lined up in the gallery. Nowhere else in North America can you see so many 18th-century uniforms in one place, but you might ask, why only redcoats? What about the Americans? In fact, only one of […]
A Sword with Three Centuries of History
Fort Ticonderoga preserves an extensive collection of swords spanning more than two centuries encompassing an encyclopedic array of styles and types. While the memory of who used most swords faded away long before they became part of the museum’s collection, a few notable examples have important provenances. One such sword is that owned by […]
Ensuring that Present and Future Generations Learn From History
Fort Ticonderoga states that our mission is to “ensure that present and future generations learn from the struggles, sacrifices, and victories that shaped the nations of North America and changed world history.” While many museums and historic sites have some version of “preservation and education” in their missions, Fort Ticonderoga steps out on a limb—not […]
“Too Opposite Characters”
Today in the United States, broad regional differences are part of the national character, but in the early years of the Revolutionary War, regional differences were far more acute. As thirteen unique colonies allied together for their mutual independence, soldiers from these colonies, and eventually states, were often like foreigners brought together in the same […]
New Blog Series
The Exhibitionist will be an occasional series of blog posts from the office of the Director of Exhibitions. Historical artifacts are loaded with layers of meaning and stories about makers, artists, users, and collectors across generations. Physical exhibits can only tell a part of these stories, here we will try to go further. This series […]
Board with Tents?
Exploring Fort Ticonderoga in 1776 has required looking a lot more at the use of soldiers’ tents. The Fort itself, with a maximum capacity of only 400 officers and men, was already largely a supply depot when the northern continental army retreated back to the fort in July of 1776. The vast majority of these […]
Benjamin Warner’s Knapsack
In 1928 Fort Ticonderoga was given the honor of ensuring the preservation of an object that was once commonplace in the American Revolutionary War army, but that today may be a one-of-a-kind object. It is a soldier’s knapsack. This worn artifact may be the only extant example of a knapsack issued to Continental troops in the […]
Building Carpentry into 1776 Soldiers’ Life Programs
Along with the excitement of portraying 1776 and the Fourth Pennsylvania battalion as they served at Ticonderoga in that year, the Department of Interpretation is excited about expanding its soldiers’ life programs into carpentry. Over the past few years, the modern need of equipping staff with time-specific clothing and footwear has spurred on the historic […]