Fort Ellsworth
The Union’s Key Defensive Bastion for the District of Columbia
Fort Ellsworth was erected on Shuters Hill in the spring and summer of 1861, shortly after the outbreak of the Civil War, transforming this prominent height into a cornerstone of the defenses of the United States. Following Virginia’s secession, Union forces took occupation of Alexandria on May 24, and the Fort’s construction began the next day. Union engineers, soldiers, and laborers—including escaped enslaved people—hurriedly built an imposing earthen fort with timber revetments. The irregular star-shaped design featured a 618-yard perimeter, bombproof shelters, powder magazines, and emplacements for 29 guns. Its largest gun had a range of over 5½ miles.
Strategically positioned on the highest point available, Fort Ellsworth commanded sweeping views of up to 20 miles. Its artillery could cover the Orange and Alexandria Railroad, the Little River Turnpike, the Leesburg Turnpike, and the southern approaches. Together with nearby works like Battery Dahlgren, it helped form a formidable layered defense that protected Washington, D.C., from Confederate advances out of Manassas and beyond. Though it never fired in a major battle, its presence helped deter attacks and safeguarded vital supply lines throughout the war. With Fort Ellsworth in place, any attack on Alexandria was effectively deterred.
Named for a Key Friend of President Lincoln
The Fort bears the name of Colonel Elmer Ephraim Ellsworth, the dashing commander of the 11th New York Fire Zouaves. He was a close personal friend of President Abraham Lincoln, whom he met in Springfield, Illinois, in 1859–1860 while studying law in Lincoln’s office, assisting with the 1860 presidential campaign, and later accompanying the president-elect to Washington, D.C. On May 24, 1861—the very day Union forces crossed the Potomac and seized the strategically important Confederate-leaning city of Alexandria, Virginia, just across the river from Washington—Ellsworth led a detachment into the Marshall House hotel. There, he spotted and personally cut down a large, highly visible Confederate flag (a stars-and-bars) that had been defiantly flying from the roof, visible from the White House itself. As he descended the stairs with the flag, the hotel’s proprietor, James W. Jackson, emerged from a hidden spot and shot Ellsworth at close range with a double-barreled shotgun, killing him instantly. Corporal Francis E. Brownell immediately killed Jackson in response. At just 24 years old, Ellsworth became the first Union officer and the first conspicuous casualty of the Civil War. Lincoln mourned him deeply, ordering his body to lie in state in the White House. “Remember Ellsworth!” became a rallying cry across the North, inspiring enlistments and leading units such as the 44th New York Volunteer Infantry to nickname themselves the “Ellsworth Avengers.” His sacrifice symbolized early Union resolve and youthful patriotism at the outset of the conflict.An Important Legacy
Garrisoned by rotating units, life at Fort Ellsworth mixed drill, vigilance, and the routine privations of war. In 1862, writer Nathaniel Hawthorne visited and reflected on the ramparts: the bare earthworks would one day become “grass-grown and picturesque memorials of an epoch of terror and suffering.” The Fort was dismantled in 1865, shortly after the Confederacy’s surrender to General Grant at Appomattox.Today, the land that contains most of the archaeological remains of Fort Ellsworth belongs to the grounds of the George Washington Masonic National Memorial. Visitors who tour the Memorial may see the outline of the Fort clearly from the observation deck at the top of the building.
The interior of the Fort, showing the American flag flying, April 3, 1864.
