Defending Helena

Defending Helena. . Shortly after the capture of Helena in July 1862, the Union army took measures to protect the city. Engineers designed a large earthen fort, which African American laborers completed in October 1862. General Benjamin Prentiss named the heavily armed fort for the city's first Union commander, General Samuel Curtis. , Construction Begins , Within weeks of the Union army's arrival in Helena, engineers began work on a large redoubt, an enclosed earthwork. They sited the earthen fort on high ground at the end of a ridge. In 1862, the fort stood three blocks north of here, just west of the city. , Fort Curtis's Formidable Guns , Engineers designed the impressive fort to protect Helena from attack. Huge guns brought by Mississippi River steamboats bristled from the ramparts. The army hoped that the formidable weapons would cause the Confederates to think twice before attacking. , Six 24-pounders and one 32-pounder cannon armed Fort Curtis. The 32-pounder gun alone weighed 7,200 pounds and could fire a projectile over a mile., [Photo captions] , Top right:The guns in Fort Curtis, like the guns in Fort Stevens above, fired over the wall of the fort rather than through openings cut into the wall. , Middle right: The guns at Fort Curtis looked like these seen here, in seacoast mounts on the rampart of Fort Totten near Washington, DC. , Bottom right: Seven Union officers stand next to a 32-pounder cannon in a fort that protected Washington, DC.