Fort Recovery is a

fort A fortification is a military construction or building designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is also used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from Latin ''fortis'' ("strong") and ''facere'' ...

on the West End of

Tortola Tortola () is the largest and most populated island of the British Virgin Islands, a group of islands that form part of the archipelago of the Virgin Islands. It has a surface area of with a total population of 23,908, with 9,400 residents in ...

in the

British Virgin Islands ) , anthem = "God Save the King" , song_type = Territorial song , song = " Oh, Beautiful Virgin Islands" , image_map = File:British Virgin Islands on the globe (Americas centered).svg , map_caption = , mapsize = 290px , image_map2 = Bri ...

. In historical records, the fort is often referred to as Tower Fort, and the area around the fort is still referred to as "Towers" today. A hotel is now built around the Tower.

History

The site was originally an earthen fort that was probably built by the Dutch

privateer A privateer is a private person or ship that engages in maritime warfare under a commission of war. Since robbery under arms was a common aspect of seaborne trade, until the early 19th century all merchant ships carried arms. A sovereign or deleg ...

Joost van Dyk in 1620, when the truce, which had existed between the Dutch and the Spanish in

Puerto Rico Puerto Rico (; abbreviated PR; tnq, Boriken, ''Borinquen''), officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico ( es, link=yes, Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico, lit=Free Associated State of Puerto Rico), is a Caribbean island and unincorporated ...

, ended. Somewhere between 1623 and 1630, Fort Recovery may have been used as a barracks for wounded and ill soldiers; this is probably the source of the name "Fort Recovery". The Fort was later abandoned when the Territory fell into decline after the British seized control of the islands in 1672. However, during the turbulent colonial era commencing with the

American Revolutionary War The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...

and extending to the

Napoleonic wars The Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815) were a series of major global conflicts pitting the French Empire and its allies, led by Napoleon I, against a fluctuating array of European states formed into various coalitions. It produced a period of Fren ...

the fort was rebuilt in its current form. When the British rebuilt the fort, the Martello Tower was clearly added to try to compensate for the lack of elevation of the

cannon A cannon is a large- caliber gun classified as a type of artillery, which usually launches a projectile using explosive chemical propellant. Gunpowder ("black powder") was the primary propellant before the invention of smokeless powder ...

at the Fort. The fort fell into disrepair again in the early 19th century when the main theater of conflict moved from the colonies to mainland Europe, and the economies of the islands were insufficient for its upkeep. It may also have been that, if the fort was designed to protect a source of freshwater, when the source dried up (there is no freshwater pond there today) the necessity for the fort disappeared.

Design and location

The fort itself is of a tower structure. The fort is a very early example of a

Martello Tower Martello towers, sometimes known simply as Martellos, are small defensive forts that were built across the British Empire during the 19th century, from the time of the French Revolutionary Wars onwards. Most were coastal forts. They stand u ...

, a type of fortification used extensively along the British south-east coastline during the Napoleonic wars. The location of the fort is somewhat unusual in that it is built close to the sea, on level ground (instead on in an elevated position on the hills rising behind it) and not close to either a port or population source. It has been suggested that the fort was built to protect a freshwater pond that was located near the area. This is plausible; Tortola has no rivers, so wells and freshwater ponds were precious resources. The other possibility is that the fort was built to secure the trail that linked Soper's Hole to Pockwood Pond and

Road Town Road Town, located on Tortola, is the capital of the British Virgin Islands. It is situated on the horseshoe-shaped Road Harbour in the centre of the island's south coast. The population was about 15,000 in 2018. The name is derived from the n ...

as previous Spanish attacks had landed in Soper's Hole and then proceeded overland to Pockwood Pond and Road Town. It would have been difficult to fortify effectively Soper's Hole against Spanish cannon, but a fort on the soldiers' overland route could delay an attack and prevent another massacre of the type that occurred in 1646. The difficulty with this theory is that it still cannot explain why the fort was not elevated. Also, although it is not clear whether the fort was erected before or after the attacks of 1646 and 1647, it seems more likely that it was actually built before.

Sources

* Isaac Dookhan, ''History of the British Virgin Islands'', * Vernon Pickering, ''A Concise History of the British Virgin Islands'',

Footnotes

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