The Army Wanted a Fort on Magnolia Bluff

During the ten years ending with 1895, thirty-three sites lying along the Straits of Juan de Fuca, the waters of Puget Sound and Bellingham Bay have been declared military reservations, and ten since that time. Some of the executive orders of declaration have been revoked, a few of the reservations have been given up, and many of those still in part existing have been affected by individual claims at the date of declaration which have since been perfected, and have been much reduced in so far as extent of government title therein is concerned.

Recent improvements in ordnance, with its greatly extended range of fire, have rendered many of these sites of no further practical importance for military uses, and they should be abandoned. The United States fortification board so found after an inspection of the boundaries of Puget Sound made a few weeks ago to determine the best points at which to construct defensive works, and it reported but very few of the many sites still formally retained by the government as suitable. It recommended eleven prominent points as naturally adapted to such purposes, three of which have never been covered by declaration and are owned by individuals, corporations or Indians, or belong to the state of Washington.

Should the recommendations be approved, it is urged that all locations in the Puget Sound country now held as military reservations, and which the fortifications board has virtually found not required for defensive works, be turned over to the Interior Department for disposition, and that such as it has reported to be needed therefor be placed under military control, and by proper acquisition if necessary. By these means the way will be opened for the construction of the government defenses which are generally conceded to be demanded, and which undoubtedly will be undertaken as soon as general financial improvement admits of the requisite appropriations.

As regards protection to the inhabitants of that section through garrison posts, it has been in the nature of police and of benefit only in seasons of Indian hostilities. Fort Townsend, established originally in 1859, still remains and is garrisoned by a single company of infantry. The only advantage to be derived from its retention consists in the fact that it furnishes shelter for troops; for as far as the possibility of employing its small garrison is concerned, in the performance of duty for which the army is maintained, it might almost as well not exist. True, a detachment was drawn from it for service at Tacoma in the recent railway disturbances, but that was because of the necessity to concentrate as large a military force as possible to successfully execute the instructions of the War Department.

In some locality of the northern section of this state, beyond the Cascade Mountains, where now dwell 100,000 people, part of whom are restless, demonstrative and oftentimes turbulent upon fancied provocation, and a population, too, which is destined to be augmented within a brief period of time, one moderately large garrison should be established and permanently maintained. The vicinity of Seattle offers the most favorable conditions for location, as that is the center of a small territory in which the future use of troops will be demanded, and the place at which exhibitions of lawlessness beyond the power of the state to control have so frequently manifested themselves.

A short distance beyond the city, extending into the waters of the Sound, Magnolia Bluff, one of the most important points selected by the fortifications board for defensive works, would appear to be the proper site for the post of an infantry garrison, to be succeeded, as it doubtless would be in a few years, by an artillery command.

There the Fort Townsend garrison should be stationed and be materially increased. A force there of only a single infantry battalion, if no more troops were available, would be of great service. With sufficient garrisons at the cities of Spokane and Seattle, and with the present Vancouver Barracks strength kept intact, all localities within this military department, with the exception of Southern Oregon and Idaho, could be quickly reached by effective bodies of troops, and as permanently placed would be in position to observe the northern international boundary line. Southern Idaho and a good portion of Southern Oregon would be in easy communication with Boise Barracks. In respect to the long-mooted objection to its indefinite continuance as a military station, it has been met by a recent abundant supply of water.

Should not some such use of the Fort Townsend garrison be made, I would then respectfully recommend its removal to this point and the abandonment of the post.