Blockhouse

“ The enemy cannot hurt you in the blockhouse if you make the least show of fight.' I placed my young brothers on two of the bastions, the old man on the third, and I took the fourth; and all night, in spite of wind, snow, and hail, the cries of 'All's well' were kept up from the blockhouse to the fort, and from the fort to the blockhouse. ”

“ The blockhouse is the first house to be built in an Indian country; the stockade is the first fence to be put up. Within that blockhouse, and a few of them together—a hollow square of blockhouses, two miles long on each side, two hundred yards apart, and enclosing a good field—safe habitations are found for families. ”

“ Surrounded by a stockade fence twelve feet high, with a yard wide walk running around the inside, and with bastions at each corner large enough to contain six defenders, the fort presented an almost impregnable defense. The blockhouse was two stories in height, the second story projecting out several feet over the first. The thick white oak walls bristled with portholes. Besides the blockhouse, there were a number of cabins located within the stockade. Wells had been sunk inside the inclosure, so that if the spring happened to go dry, an abundance of good water could be had at all times. ”

“ There is an opportunity now to secure a typical blockhouse built nearly sixty years ago, one of seventy-five built during the Indian war, all of which will disappear in a few years if left exposed to the elements. ”

“ An abandoned blockhouse.
"If you would save the Yellow Hair, consent to be my squaw!"
"No, no! Rather let us die together!"
"'Tis but a short distance to Fort William Henry—we shall be there before sundown." ”

“ Buildings in the inclosure [128] were set on fire, but the defenders of the blockhouse kept it from catching the flames by tearing off shingles from the roof when they began to burn. The mining party reached the well, and buckets of water were drawn up and passed through the tunnel to the blockhouse. Greatly exhausted, the soldiers held out until next day, when, having surrendered honorably, they were all taken prisoners as they left the scorched and battered log tower. For savages were such capricious and cruel victors that they could rarely be depended upon to keep faith. ”

“ While he spoke we were walking on, and I now distinguished a hillock or mound of earth, with nearly perpendicular sides, on which was erected a blockhouse, formed of unhewn cypress trunks, of a solidity and thickness upon which four-and-twenty pounders would have had some difficulty in making an impression. Its roof rose about ten feet above a palisade enclosing the building, and consisting of stout saplings sharpened at the top, and stuck in the ground at a very short distance from each other, being moreover strengthened and bound together with wattles and branches. ”

“ The English have been constantly boasting in the newspapers about the advantages of their blockhouses, but they have never been able to give an instance of a capture effected by them. On the contrary, when during the last stages of the war it happened, as it often did, that they drove some of our men against one or other of the great blockhouse lines which then intersected the country, and it became necessary for us to fight our way through, we generally succeeded in doing so. ”

“ The blockhouse itself, was divided into a number of rooms, in which the soldiers who were not on guard could sleep, and they had blankets and the skins of the larger animals the hunters killed for beds. Venison jerked in great quantities was stored away in case of siege, and the whole forest was made to contribute to their larder. The work was hard, but it toughened the sinews of the young soldiers, and gave them an occupation in which they were interested. ”

“ Strange to say, however, I was never better able to observe all that passed around me, than during the few hours of bodily debility that succeeded my immersion in the Jacinto. A blow with a reed would have knocked me off my seat, but my mental faculties, instead of participating in this weakness, seemed sharpened to an unusual degree of acuteness.
The blockhouse in which we now were, was of the poorest possible description; a mere log hut, consisting of one room, that served as kitchen, sitting-room, and bedchamber. ”

“ With the door barred by iron or great beams of wood, and food and ammunition stored in the lower room, men could ascend a ladder to the second story of a blockhouse and hold it against great odds, if the besiegers did not succeed in burning them out. ”

“ From the East-gate, westward, there was, at the same time, a wall built about fifteen feet high, and four hundred feet long, where the Cliff was most easy of ascent: and, from the termination of that wall, a parapet, three feet high, was continued on the verge of the Cliff to the West-gate, with embrasures for cannon. The Blockhouse was built at the expense of the mariners of the town ”

“ Where blockhouses have to be constructed among hostile or doubtful Indian tribes, who are not the possessors of artillery, the fascine and earth roof and double rows of piles may be easily and safely dispensed with.
Logs, squared with the axe and laid on each other, may be substituted for piles with advantage, as the labour of planting firmly in the earth so many ponderous beams of wood is considerable. It is well, in building a blockhouse, to construct a raised breastwork of small logs round the margin of the roof ”

“ The settlement at Castle Dangerous consisted of the blockhouse, a strong building made of timbers; of the house of the Seignior; some rude shacks, and the fort itself, which was connected with the blockhouse by a covered way. All the settlers lived in these 101buildings for safety, since their pitiless enemy the Iroquois had always to be guarded against. There were as well bands of wandering Indians that were constantly passing up and down the trail that lay along the St. ”

“ And to Cause either two strong Blockhouses (or small Forts) capable of holding 100 Men each to be Built, one in Menis & the other in Schiegnecto, which may be Garrison’d out of Phillip’s Regiment when Compleated, or else that at least one Blockhouse (or small Fort) should be Built at Menis capable of holding 150 men ”

“ Stone blockhouses have long been used in the Balkans for frontier outposts; they are sometimes built cruciform, so as to get some flanking defence. In the form of bullet-proof log-cabins they have played a great part in warfare between pioneer settlers and savages.
In the 19th century blockhouses were usually designed to give partial protection against field artillery; the walls being built of two thicknesses of logs with earth between them, the roof flat and covered with 2 or 3 ft. of earth, and earth being piled against the walls up to the loopholes. ”

“ The farm-houses were built like forts, and in all the villages were strong buildings called blockhouses, to which everybody could run in times of danger. In these the second story spread out over the first, and there were holes in the floor through which the men could fire down on the Indians below. ”

“ The Wyandots had hurried out of the building before the flames were fairly going, so as not to expose themselves to the rifles of the Kentuckians; but as the flames spread and the circle of illumination widened, the dusky foes were seen skulking behind the other cabin, along the stockade, and in the clearing, watching the destruction, and the massive block-house, whose heavy logs, steep overhanging roof, rude chimney and rugged outlines loomed up in the crimson glow against the background of blank darkness. ”

“ In the roomy upper story of the block-house was always kept a barrel of water, blankets, a few chairs, a number of axes, shovels, spades, picks, and utensils useful in a new settlement. Fort Bridgman at one time promised to become an important town in Kentucky; but a fierce raid by a band of red men, one tempestuous night in mid-winter, destroyed every cabin except the block-house, in which only a few settlers found safe refuge from the vengeful warriors. ”

“ Nowadays they are employed only in positions where it is not likely that artillery will be brought against them: but they may be made tenable for a while even under artillery fire if they are surrounded by a trench and parapet.
Blockhouses are especially useful for small posts protecting such points as railway bridges, which the enemy may attempt to destroy by cavalry raids. The essential feature is a bullet-proof loopholed wall, arranged for all-round fire, with enough interior space for the garrison to sleep in. The roof may be simply weatherproof. ”

“ When the eye gazes steadily at the Pleiades, in the midnight splendor of the starlit sky, one of the blazing orbs shrinks modestly from view and only six remain to be admired by the wondering gazer below: it is the quick, casual glance that catches the brilliant sister unawares, before she can hide her face.
So, when the pioneers within the block-house looked intently at the stockade, they saw nothing but the wall of shadow and the outline of the sharp pickets above ”

“ There came seconds, and sometimes minutes, when no one spoke, and the silence within the 218 block-house was so profound that the faint sifting of the snow on the roof was heard. Then an eddy of wind would whirl some of the sand-like particles through the loopholes into the eyes and faces of those who were peering out. Men and boys gathered their blankets closer about their shoulders, and set their muskets down beside them, where they could be caught up the instant needed, while they carefully warmed their benumbed fingers by rubbing and striking the palms together. ”

“ Of all our people being cooped up in the block-house for weeks, and perhaps months, until the trouble with the Indians is over. We stopped there the other day when we were coming down the river. It is a large, roomy structure, but there is nothing beside the single building. A good many men make their homes there at different times, and though they are all as kind as they can be, it will be anything but pleasant when your folks and ours are added to them. ”

“ Besides these interior buildings, two block-houses were built, each constructed so that the second story overhung the first, one of them, standing at the southeast and one at the northwest corner of the palisaded walls. A narrow wooden support, or walk, accessible only from one or the other of these block-houses, enabled its defenders to stand within the enclosure and look out over the row of sharpened logs. ”

“ Because it keeps the eyes so busy, seeing all the people that pass, one block of buildings seems very much like another the first few times the new-comer takes this walk, except, of course, for conspicuous landmarks like that of the new library on the site of the late reservoir or the Arcade on the site of the old Windsor Hotel, with its ghastly memories; but after awhile all the blocks begin to seem very different; not only the one where you saw a boy on a bicycle run down and killed, or where certain well-known people live, but the blocks formerly considered monotonous. ”

“ But Block and his men very soon built houses for themselves; rude and clumsy buildings to look at, but warm and comfortable within. They were the first houses of white men on the Island of Manhattan. If you wish to see where they stood, take a walk down Broadway, and just before you reach the Bowling Green, on a house which is numbered 41, you will find a tablet of brass which tells that Block's houses stood on that self-same spot. ”

“ The precise conversation between the maddened red men, of course, can never be known to the historian, and it is not desirable that it should be; but the parties concerned were so interested in the words that they were close to the stockade of the block-house before it was recalled that the long valuable bow taken from Deerfoot was left lying on the ground where the new owner threw it when ready to join in the chase. ”

“ Five years are an eventful space in the history of blocks, as of men. Within that period, they may be burnt down, blown down, or torn down to make room for grander blocks. In quick-growing American cities, the average life of blocks is less than that of the human generation that tenants them. First wood, then brick, then brownstone or marble--these are the successive forms of block life, before anything like stability is reached. Marble is the only real type of the permanent in American architecture. Nobody pulls down marble.
But five years had made little change in the exterior of our block. ”

“ The banks of the Licking were from four to six feet above the surface, while along the eastern shore, in front of the block-house, was a fringe of bushes and undergrowth, which offered a tempting hiding-place to a foe. ”

“ For protection against the Indians, who were at that time very troublesome and treacherous, it became necessary for the whites to construct block-houses at convenient distances. These block-houses were built by the united exertions of the settlers, who began to gather from all quarters since the "Jefferson Purchase" had been effected from the French Government. The settlers or inhabitants of four adjoining sections would unite and build a block-house in the centre of their possessions, so that in case of alarm they could all repair to it as a place of refuge from the savages. ”

“ In them, for the most part, each block is a complete structure and not a conglomeration of little buildings of all shapes and sizes, a two-storey house next to a four-storey one, and so on. Thus, among a number of blocks a pleasing harmony in architectural styles is obtained, which is a golden mean between the rigid uniformity of some new cities and the antique irregularity of old ones. ”

“ Only a block from here, on Seventh Avenue, is a highly picturesque survival, a long block of three-story dwellings all so uniformly balconied, from first floor to roof-line, across the entire fronts, that you see nothing but balconies, with their three stories fronted with eyelet-pattern balustrades. In front of all the houses is an open grassy space, and up the face of the balconies run old wistaria-vines. Each house, through the crisscrossing of upright and lateral lines, is fronted with nine open square spaces, like Brobdingnagian pigeon-holes. ”