Eastport is a city and archipelago in Washington County, Maine, United States. The population was 1,288 at the 2020 census, making Eastport the least-populous city in Maine. The principal island is Moose Island, which is connected to the mainland by a causeway. Eastport is the easternmost city in the continental United States.
The Aroostook War, or the Madawaska War, was a military and civilian-involved confrontation in 1838–1839 between the United States and the United Kingdom over the international boundary between the British colony of New Brunswick and the U.S. state of Maine. The term "war" was rhetorical; local militia units were called out but never engaged in actual combat. The event is best described as an international incident.
General Sir John Coape Sherbrooke, was a British soldier and colonial administrator. After serving in the British army in Nova Scotia, the Netherlands, India, the Mediterranean, and Spain, he was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Nova Scotia in 1811. During the War of 1812, his policies and victory in the conquest of present-day Maine, renaming it the colony of New Ireland, led to significant prosperity in Nova Scotia.
The New South Wales Corps, later known as the 102d Regiment of Foot, and lastly as the 100th Regiment of Foot, was a formation of the British Army organized in 1789 in England to relieve the New South Wales Marine Corps, which had accompanied the First Fleet to New South Wales. In Australia, the New South Wales Corps gained notoriety for its trade in rum and mutinous behaviour.
Passamaquoddy Bay is an inlet of the Bay of Fundy, between the U.S. state of Maine and the Canadian province of New Brunswick, at the mouth of the St. Croix River. Most of the bay lies within Canada, with its western shore bounded by Washington County, Maine. The southernmost point is formed by West Quoddy Head on the U.S. mainland in Lubec, Maine; and runs northeasterly through Campobello Island, New Brunswick, engulfing Deer Island, New Brunswick, to the New Brunswick mainland head at L'Etete, New Brunswick in Charlotte County, New Brunswick.
The siege of Fort Erie, also known as the Battle of Erie, from 4 August to 21 September 1814, was one of the last engagements of the War of 1812, between British and American forces. It took place during the Niagara campaign, and the Americans successfully defended Fort Erie against a British army. During the siege, the British suffered high casualties in a failed storming attempt; they also suffered casualties from sickness and exposure in their rough encampments. Unaware that the British were about to abandon the siege, the American garrison launched a sortie to destroy the British siege batteries, during which both sides again suffered high losses.
Fort Jay is a coastal bastion fort and the name of a former United States Army post on Governors Island in New York Harbor, within New York City. Fort Jay is the oldest existing defensive structure on the island, and was named for John Jay, a member of the Federalist Party, New York governor, Chief Justice of the United States, Secretary of State, and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. It was built in 1794 to defend Upper New York Bay, but has served other purposes. From 1806 to 1904 it was named Fort Columbus, presumably for explorer Christopher Columbus. Today, the National Park Service administers Fort Jay and Castle Williams as the Governors Island National Monument.
Fort Preble was a military fort in South Portland, Maine, United States, built in 1808 and progressively added to through 1906. The fort was active during all major wars from the War of 1812 through World War II. The fort was deactivated in 1950. It is now on the campus of Southern Maine Community College.
The Royal Canadian Rifle Regiment of the British Army was raised in 1840 for service in Canada. Its members were veterans of service in other regiments of the British Army.
Moose Island is an island in Eastport, Maine, located at the entrance to Cobscook Bay from Passamaquoddy Bay in the Bay of Fundy. Shackford Head State Park is on Moose Island.
Fort O'Brien State Historic Site, also known as Fort Machias, preserves the remains of a fort located in Machiasport, Maine that was built and destroyed three times over a 90-year period. It was involved in military actions during the American Revolutionary War and the War of 1812, and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It is now managed by the Maine Department of Conservation's Bureau of Parks and Lands, and is open between Memorial Day and Labor Day.
HMS Ramillies was a 74-gun third rate ship of the line of the Royal Navy, launched on 12 July 1785 at Rotherhithe.
The Battle of Hampden was an action in the British campaign to conquer present-day Maine and remake it into the colony of New Ireland during the War of 1812. Sir John Sherbrooke led a British force from Halifax, Nova Scotia to establish New Ireland, which lasted until the end of the war, eight months later. The brief life of the colony yielded customs revenues which were subsequently used to finance a military library in Halifax and found Dalhousie College.
Fort George was a palisaded earthwork fort built in 1779 by Great Britain during the American Revolutionary War in Castine, Maine. Located at a high point on the Bagaduce Peninsula, the fort was built as part of an initiative by the British to establish a new colony called New Ireland. It was the principal site of the British defense during the Massachusetts-organized Penobscot Expedition, a disastrous attempt in July and August of 1779 to retake Castine in response to the British move. The British re-occupied Castine in the War of 1812 from September 1814 to April 1815, rebuilding Fort George and establishing smaller forts around it, again creating the New Ireland colony. The remains of the fort, now little more than its earthworks, are part of a state-owned and town-maintained park.
The state of Maine organized seven companies of militia infantry for coast guard duties in the Union Army during the American Civil War. They primarily served to garrison coastal fortifications in Maine, with two companies sent to the Defenses of Washington, DC. Very little is known about the organization or command structure of these companies, beyond their commanding officers at the usual rank of captain. Over 800 men served in the seven companies. A New York Times article in 1864 stated that Vice President Hannibal Hamlin served at Fort McClary as a private in the Maine State Guard; some subsequent citations erroneously confuse this with the Maine Coast Guard.
Hancock Barracks was a 19th-century fortification near Houlton, Maine. It was an active United States Army post from 1828 to 1847.
New Ireland was a Crown colony of the Kingdom of Great Britain twice established in modern-day Maine after British forces captured the area during the American Revolutionary War and again during the War of 1812. The colony lasted four years during the Revolution, and eight months during the War of 1812. At the end of each war the British ceded the land to the United States under the terms of the Treaty of Paris and the Treaty of Ghent, respectively.
Fort Sumner was a coastal defense fortification on Munjoy Hill in Portland, Maine, United States. It was built in 1794 as part of the first system of coastal fortifications built by the United States. It was reportedly originally named Fort Allen after the nearby Revolutionary War battery that probably became part of Fort Sumner, but was renamed in 1797 after Increase Sumner, the incumbent Governor of Massachusetts, of which Maine was then a part. The location is now Fort Sumner Park.
General Gerard Gosselin was a British Army officer of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. After a short stint in the Marines, he joined the British Army in 1787 in the 34th Regiment of Foot. Having been promoted to lieutenant in 1791 he transferred to the 2nd Regiment of Life Guards in the same year, where he initially served as adjutant. Gosselin was promoted to captain in 1794 and almost immediately purchased his majority as well, transferring to the 130th Regiment of Foot. He travelled with this regiment to Jamaica where they served as garrison troops until returning home in 1796.
Lieutenant-General Sir Andrew Pilkington was a British Army officer who served through the Napoleonic Wars and War of 1812. He saw initial service fighting as a marine at the Glorious First of June in 1794 where he was wounded twice, and subsequently served with his regiment, the 2nd Regiment of Foot, at the Invasion of Trinidad in 1795. Having returned to Britain Pilkington helped defeat the Irish Rebellion of 1798 and in the following year was part of the Anglo-Russian invasion of Holland.
