Details for Fort McKavett, C.S.A.

Historical Marker — Atlas Number 5327001998

Data

Marker Number 1998
Atlas Number 5327001998
Marker Title Fort McKavett, C.S.A.
Index Entry Fort McKavett, C.S.A.
Address Canal and Gay St., on Courthouse lawn
City Menard
County Menard
UTM Zone 14
UTM Easting 424955
UTM Northing 3420386
Subject Codes forts; livery stables; military topics
Marker Year 1963
Recorded Texas Historic Landmark No
Marker Location Courthouse lawn (corner of Canal and Gay Streets) Menard
Private Property No
Marker Condition In Situ
Marker Size Civil War Memorials - (pink granite)
Marker Text Located 21 miles west. Upon secession, Confederate cavalry occupied this post to give protection against Indians. Early in 1862 this fort confined group of Union troops from surrendered U.S. forts who were seeking to leave the state at start of Civil War. Permanent personnel left the post in April 1862 when the frontier defense line was pulled back more than 60 miles east. However scouting parties and patrols of confederate and state troops used the fort intermittently in aggressive warfare to keep Indians near their camps and away from settlements and to check on invasion by Union forces. Usually supplying their own mounts, guns and sustenance, these men guarded the frontier until war's end. Texas had 2000 miles of coastline and frontier to defend from Union attack, Indian raids, marauders. Defense lines were set to give maximum protection with the few men left in the state. One line stretched from El Paso to Brownsville. Another had posts set a day's horseback ride apart from Red River to the Rio Grande. Fort McKavett and other U.S. forts used by scouting parties lay in a line between. Behind these lines and to the east organized militia, citizens' posses from nearby settlements backed the Confederate and state troops to curb Indian raids. A memorial to Texans who served the confederacy Erected by the State of Texas 1963

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