Sugar Bowl Trip | Fort Pike College - Senior Year www.brianalba.com

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• Pictured in front of the fort are 32-Pounder Cannons. These cannons, and several others mounted around the site were called a 32-punder because of the weight of the cannon ball which it fired. These particular cannons would have been mounted on the top section of the fort called the "parapet". Their range was long enough to reach the other side of the Rigolets, thereby effectively closing it to enemy ships. • The level area between the parapet and the parade face of the fort is known as the terreplein. Cannon like those on the grounds were located all along the terreplein. They were mounted "en barbette" - on high carriages that allowed them to fire over the parapet wall. Soldiers walked on the terreplein behind the guns while on guard duty. Very little of the gun positions remain except the metal bars in the pintles and one piece of iron track on which the carriages once rotated. • A Casemate is a bombproof enclosure under the rampart that housed a cannon. Masonry forts might have one level (like at For Pike) or two levels of casemeates. The archways at Fort Pike are the last of their kind in American Forts. The tall, wide design of the casemates helped with ventilation when the cannon was fired. Later forts had shorter, thinner archways. Some forts even had rectangular archways, giving them the appearance of elongated hallways. The casemates at Fort Pike held 24-pounder cannons. The fire of these cannons was limited by the width of the embrasure (opening) through which the cannon muzzle protruded. An iron tongue anchored the carriage in the wall, while the back of the carriage rested on top of an iron track in the granite blocks of the casemate floor. Casemate carriages were much lower than the barbette carriages on the terreplein above. • The Thing!

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