1628-1649
The Trading Post at Cushnoc
The area known as Cushnoc on the Kennebec River (now Augusta) was an important strategic location for early peoples of the Kennebec Valley. It became an important part of the Abenaki trade route network because it is where tidal water meets the river current. In 1628, the Plymouth Colony built and established a trad- ing post on the bank of the Kennebec River at Cushnoc. This trading post quickly became the center of the fur trade in the Kennebec Valley for the Plymouth Colony and helped the Pil- grims pay off their debt to their London back- ers. The fur trade peaked in 1634, then de- clined until 1649, when evidence suggests the Clark and Lake Company leased it. In 1676, the remains of the trading post burned during King Philip’s War along with the depopulation and burning of English settlements .
1754-1767
Fort Western
In 1660, descendants from the original Plymouth Colony patent holders bought the original Plymouth patent and patents from Clark and Lake. This new patent went from just above Swan’s Island to Norridgewock, 10 or 15 miles on each side of the river. The new company called themselves the Kennebec Proprietors. Unfortunately, the proprietors could not settle the area due to King Philip’s War eruption in 1676. King Philip’s War was the first of a series of French and Indian wars in New England. Further wars inhibited the settlement of the Kennebec River as people were wary of the French and Indian threat. By 1719, resettlement of the Kennebec River region had only made it up the Kennebec as far as Richmond. The Province of Massachusetts was worried that the French would come down the Chaudière Corridor, meet up with the Norridgewock Indians from the north, the Penobscot Indians from the west, and the remaining Kennebec Indians at Teconnet Falls, and then come down the Kennebec River, once again wiping out all English settlements. Any new military installation built by the Province needed to be at Teconnet Falls. The problem was ships could only sail up the Kennebec as far as Cushnoc (present-day Augusta).
The Proprietors approached the Royal Governor, William Shirley, with a proposal. If the Province of Massachusetts built a provincial fort at Teconnet Falls (Fort Halifax), they would build a fortified "storehouse" at Cushnoc (Fort Western) as long as Massachusetts manned both forts. Governor Shirley, on behalf of Massachusetts, quickly accepted this proposal. Construction of Fort Western and Fort Halifax began in July of 1754. The purpose for building these forts was two-fold: to encourage the resettlement of the Kennebec River and to provide necessary stores to Fort Halifax. Provincial stores came up the Kennebec River and were unloaded and stored at Fort Western. When river conditions were right, they were loaded onto flat-bottomed bateaux and portaged 17 miles upriver to Fort Halifax. The captain of Fort Western was Captain James Howard, who commanded 23 men, including his four sons: John, James Jr., Samuel & William. Colonel William Lithgow commanded Fort Halifax with 100 garrisoned men. The English capture of Quebec in 1759 reduced the threat of war in the Kennebec Valley. Within a year, the Province of Massachusetts reduced the number of soldiers at Fort Western to just ten and the number of soldiers at Fort Halifax to thirty. Fort Halifax remained a truckhouse, and Fort Western remained the supply depot to store the Indian trade goods destined for Fort Halifax. The English gained control over the Kennebec Valley by 1767, and Massachusetts shifted its attention to the Penobscot River. Forts Western and Halifax became militarily obsolete and were decommissioned in 1767 and 1766, respectively.
1767-1807
The S & W Howard Store
As early as 1761, the Kennebec Proprietors were selling tracts of land from Fort Western and supplying goods to the settlers. In 1767, Captain Howard purchased the fort for £500. Samuel and William Howard operated a store from the premises for the next forty years. Samuel, a sea captain, was located in Boston and was a broker for his brother William. He also provided goods for settlers living in the greater Kennebec Valley such as the Lithgows in Georgetown and Margaret Patterson, his sister, in Dresden. William lived in the north end of the garrison and operated a store and blacksmith shop out of the south end.
In 1784, the store moved to a new building just north of the garrison and continued operating there until 1807.
Five account books from the Howard Store survive, dating from 1767 until 1807. These books list the accounts of the earliest settlers of the central Kennebec Valley and include goods being purchased and bartered.
1775
Benedict Arnold's March to Quebec
The final military chapter of Fort Western is its use in September 1775 as the staging area for Benedict Arnold and his 1,100 soldiers as they prepared for the assault on Quebec. Arnold stayed at Captain James Howard's Great House upriver from the Fort while his officers, Daniel Morgan and Aaron Burr, stayed with his son, William, in the old garrison.
1767-1850s
The Howard Family Home
Fort Western, known as "the fort" settlement in Hallowell Township in Lincoln County, became Augusta in Hallowell Township in 1797. Two years later, Augusta became part of the newly formed Kennebec County, established on Feb- ruary 20, 1799, from portions of Cumberland and Lincoln Counties.
William Howard, his family and descendants lived in the garrison until the 1750s. Samuel Howard returned to the Fort in the 1780s and died in 1799. The probate inventory done upon his death lists everything in the building at that time. William continued running the store with his son Samuel Jr. until 1807, when he signed over of all active accounts to his son. Unfortu- nately, the Embargo Act of 1807 quickly put the Howard Store out of business.
1850s-1920
Tenement House
When the Howard family descendants moved out of the old garrison building in the mid- 1850s, it became a tenement. At one point, the garrison was divided into up to eight apartments and housed the burgeoning working class working the Augusta and Hallowell mills. The Kennebec Journal often called the Fort the "mean" part of town.
1919-Present
Restoration of Fort Western
The City of Augusta took the Fort through eminent domain in 1919 and turned it over to the Howard descendants, William H. Gannett and Guy P. Gannett, in 1920. The Gannetts renovated the garrison and built two new blockhouses patterned after the original blockhouse that remained at Fort Halifax. They then gifted the building back to the City of Augusta, and it opened as a museum on July 4th, 1922.
In 1976, Fort Western became a National Historic Landmark. Then, in 1983, as part of the project to build the new Augusta City Hall, archaeological investigations were conducted to find evidence of outbuildings and palisades before reconstruction. As part of that process, archaeologists discovered proof of the trading post at Cushnoc. Using written documents such as the probate inventory, account books, and muster rolls in conjunction with the archaeological collection, the Fort was reconstructed and furnished.
Fort Western & Fort Halifax have the distinction of having the two oldest standing French & Indian War-era wooden buildings in the country: the Fort Western garrison and the Fort Halifax blockhouse.