Historical Development of the Fort
Fort Niagara, 1810
The first decade of the nineteenth century has proven to be the most frustrating of periods for documenting change at Fort Niagara. The written record says little about either repairs or improvement to the fortifications and buildings. No dated plan of Fort Niagara is known between 1798 and 1810. Thus, the exact years they represent must be deduced from details in the plans, and these are not always consistent.
One thing is clear. The interior of Fort Niagara continued to "open up" throughout the decade before the War of 1812. By 1810 the cluster of old barracks near the French Castle had disappeared. So too had the French chapel of 1757 and many of the barracks and bombproofs erected by the British during the American Revolution. Perhaps the latter had been constructed poorly and in haste. Many years later the daughter of American Surgeon Joseph West recalled that, before 1812, these had been "abandoned and the entrances closed ... having been so infested with rattlesnakes ... that it was hardly safe to walk across the parade."
Plans to repair the remaining wooden barracks in 1806 were deferred because of a shortage of garrison artificers, and outside observers such as George Heriot continued to note of Fort Niagara that the "Americans seem to take no measures either for its repair or enlargement." Four years later DeWitt Clinton lamented that it was "in a ruinous condition" and that the "only pleasant thing to the feelings of an American are the new barracks which are building."
Clinton's comment indicates that some action had finally been taken to make the soldiers more comfortable. Two new barracks seem to have been completed by the end of 1810 (460b and 464a). Another major change had also occurred by that time. Sometime before 1810 the "Gate of the Five Nations", primary entrance to Fort Niagara since 1756, had been closed up. The main gate would thereafter be situated on the river side.
The 1810 plan is also the first to show the bakehouse (31c) in its modern configuration. There are still many questions about the development of this small building which seems to incorporate architectural elements from the French, British and United States occupations. Although traditionally assigned a construction date of 1762, plans of the late eighteenth century show the bakehouse longer than it is today. Some of the additional length might represent less durable additions that were finally removed between c.1807 and 1810. There is no indication in the documentary evidence that the masonry structure visible today was constructed later than 1762.
By the eve of the War of 1812 Fort Niagara enclosed the fewest structures in more than fifty years. This plan is based on a map by British Assistant Quartermaster General Alexander Grey, dated November 20, 1810.