America's Fortress : A History of Fort Jefferson, Dry Tortugas, Florida /
"America's Fortress is the history of a little-known military outpost and prison that has stood at the western extreme of the Florida Keys for over 150 years. Once known as the "American Gibraltar," Fort Jefferson on Garden Key was the most heavily armed coastal defense fort in U...
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| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic eBook |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Gainesville :
University Press of Florida,
2006.
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| Series: | Florida history and culture series.
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | CONNECT |
| Summary: | "America's Fortress is the history of a little-known military outpost and prison that has stood at the western extreme of the Florida Keys for over 150 years. Once known as the "American Gibraltar," Fort Jefferson on Garden Key was the most heavily armed coastal defense fort in United States history. When new naval guns made the massive but still incomplete fort obsolete, Fort Jefferson became the nation's leading maximum-security prison, holding several of the accused conspirators in the Lincoln assassination." "Historian Thomas Reid chronicles the threats and challenges Fort Jefferson's troops faced, which were unlike any faced by soldiers serving elsewhere during the Civil War. Tales of epidemic disease, hurricanes, shipwrecks, prisoner escapes, and Confederate attack stand in stark contrast to "the beauty of the sunsets and the surrounding panorama of nature." Reid offers keen insight into white northerners' perceptions of slaves, slavery, and the emerging free black soldiers of the latter years of the war. He also draws on the writings of Emily Holder, wife of Fort Jefferson's resident surgeon, to offer the first female perspective on life at the fort."--BOOK JACKET. |
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| Item Description: | Project MUSE Universal EBA Ebooks |
| Physical Description: | 1 online resource (xii, 163 p.) : ill. |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references (p. 151-155) and index. |
| ISBN: | 9780813030197 9780813080048 0813080045 9780813070407 0813070406 0813030196 |
