Historical Development of the Fort
Fort Conti, 1679
- 1 Storehouse/Quarters, 1679
- 30 Present location of "French Castle", 1726
The tiny wooden fort constructed by La Salle almost certainly stood at the top of the lake bank on the later site of the "French Castle" of 1726 (superimposed on this plan in solid line). Fort Conti was situated so as to be convenient to both the lake and the landing place on the Niagara River. High banks and a natural gully to the east made the point easily defensible.
Fort Conti was constructed entirely of wood and was little more than a fortified storehouse. It was described by La Salle's chaplain, Father Louis Hennepin, as "a house defended by palisades." The explorer himself noted that Fort Conti was composed of two forty foot-square redoubts of horizontal timbers joined by a "palisade" (stockade) and that it was musket-proof. Most sources indicate that the fort enclosed a single "house", probably built of logs. Fort Conti burned accidentally sometime during 1679. It was not rebuilt. No confirmed archaeological evidence of La Salle's post has yet been uncovered.
A plan of Fort Conti remains to be discovered, so the accompanying sketch is totally conjectural in regard to the configuration of the walls, the relationship of the fort to the point, the arrangement of the redoubts as bastions at opposite corners of the stockade, and the orientation and size of the house. It is possible that a less regular outline was created by La Salle's party, although he and many of his men possessed substantial military experience. The gate is shown on the river side at the head of a natural ramp leading to the landing place on the low land between the fort and the Niagara River.
Hennepin described the site of Fort Conti as "naturally defensive." The features which made it so were probably the gully, located just east of the site, and a distinct natural terrace on the lake bank upon which the 1726 "Castle" was later constructed. That location would have been the most logical choice for La Salle who relied on nature to enhance the defensibility ofhis tiny fort. When a conjectural plan of Fort Conti, sized to resemble other French stockades of the time, was plotted on the edge of the lake-side embankment, it fit squarely between these naturally protective landscape features. The hypothetical gate fell at the top of the natural ramp leading from the riverside landing place to the top of the bank.