Castine, Me - Dungeon, Fort George

Castine, Me - Dungeon, Fort George

A colorized postcard photo: "Castine, Me - Dungeon, Fort George." A sloping, boulder-covered hill and a man-made opening into a cave. Tree-covered hills are in the distance. Dungeons Caves Hills Fort George is today a roughly square earthworks, about 200 feet on each side, with bastions at the corners that project out an additional 40 feet. These works are for the most part about 10 feet in height, although the easternmost bastion is 20 feet high. Features of the fort that have not survived include a palisade, moat, and gateway. The fort is one of a series of defenses erected by the British in 1779, which notably included the digging of a canal across much of the neck separating the Bagaduce Peninsula from the rest of the mainland. Castine is set at a strategically significant location near the head of Penobscot Bay, and was a point of conflict at several times between the 17th and 19th centuries. Pursuant to plans for establishing a military presence on the coast of Maine as well as the colony of New Ireland, a British force led by General Francis McLean arrived off Castine in June 1779, seized the town, and established Fort George and other fortifications in the area. The state of Massachusetts, of which Maine was then a part, responded by raising a large militia force, which in an operation known as the Penobscot Expedition, disastrously failed in its attempt to dislodge the British. The fort was not abandoned by the British until 1784. The site of the fort's remains is now a park of 7 acres, owned by the state and maintained by the town. The site was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1969. Fort George is the site of Majabigwaduce, the location for Bernard Cornwell's 2010 book The Fort, which is about the Penobscot Expedition.