Fort Dawes

Fort Dawes was a Coast Artillery fort located on Deer Island in Winthrop/Boston, MA. It was part of the defenses of Boston Harbor. During WW2, it was the site of a target detection radar for the harbor defenses, a 2-gun battery of 90mm anti-motor torpedo boat artillery, and the Harbor Entry Control Post (HECP) for Boston Harbor--the installation that kept track of all vessels entering and leaving the harbor.

Fort Dawes can also lay claim to the largest collection of "artillery that never was" in the harbor defenses of Boston. Construction 105 was planned as a massive casemate containing two 16-inch guns, like those at Btty Murphy in Nahant and at Btty Long at Fort Duvall. By the time the emplacements had been finished, however, WW2 was being won, and the need for the battery was deemed to have passed. The nearby battery of twin 6-inch guns, Battery 207, was also never equipped with guns, for the same reason.

Then, in the early 1990s, all of the military facilities on Deer Island were demolished and the earth stripped away for the construction of the Deer Island Waste Water Treatment Plant. All vestiges of Fort Dawes were destroyed.