FORT UNION
Historic Structure Report
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HISTORIC BASE MAP: BUILDING LISTINGS
QUATERMASTER DEPOT
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Officers' Quarters (Third Fort Union, p. 58).
The three officers' quarters had several privies, wood houses, and coal
houses in the back yards; most of these still need to be located.
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| 28 |
Officers' Quarters (Third Fort Union, p. 58).
This house had a chicken house in the back yard, measuring 12 feet by 30
feet by 10 feet high.
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| 29 |
Officers' Quarters (Third Fort Union, p. 58).
This house had a brick walk and a patio of brick laid in a herringbone
pattern, as well as several structures. These appear to have include a
frame house with a fireplace in the northeast corner, standing just east
of the entrance gateway on the north wall. The brick walkway may have
extended from a door at the southwest corner of the building. Another
structure stood in the northwest corner of the yard, but its dimensions
could not be determined by ground inspection. Since a photograph of the
building under construction in ca. August, 1865, shows no variation in
the wall lines of the southwest corner, the cellar here seems to have
been added later, perhaps during the rebuilding in 1876-77 after fire
gutted the place in 1871.
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| 30 |
Quartermaster's Office (Third Fort Union, p.
61).
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| 31 |
Commissary's Office (Third Fort Union, p.
63).
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| 32 |
Clerk's Quarters and Post Office (Third Fort
Union, p. 64).
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| 33 |
Cistern (Third Fort Union, p. 66). Brick,
holding 20,000 gallons or more, with a domed brick top. Finished before
June, 1868, and probably built at the same time as the northernmost
storeroom, HS-43, in the summer of 1867.
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| 34 |
Cistern (Third Fort Union, p. 66). Of the same
size and construction as HS-33. Under construction in October, 1869.
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| 35 |
Sun Dial (Third Fort Union, p. 67). The
adjacent Meridian Marker is HS-70, below.
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| 36 |
Mechanics' Shops (Third Fort Union, p.
68-69).
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| 37 |
Steam Engine (Third Fort Union, pp. 11-12,
71). This engine base and engine house were built for the steam engine
moved from the Machine Shop, HS-310 below, after that structure burned
in February, 1876. The new home for the engine was 31 feet long and 20
feet wide, with the engine platform itself measuring 6-1/2 feet by
17-1/3 feet. The building was torn down by 1889.
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| 38 |
Pump House and Well (Third Fort Union, p.
72-73). There are several structures in the group with this HS number;
the actual use of several of them is unclear, and the history of their
construction and change is confused. A careful review of the documents
and an excavation of the area around these structures will be necessary
to work out their probable uses, relationship to each other, and dates
of construction.
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| 39 |
Quartermaster Storehouse (Third Fort Union, p.
74). One of these was apparently begun as early as September, 1862
(Oliva, "Frontier Army," p. 547).
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| 40 |
Quartermaster Storehouse (Third Fort Union, p.
76).
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| 41 |
Quartermaster Storehouse (Third Fort Union, p.
76).
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| 42 |
Quartermaster Storehouse (Third Fort Union, p.
76).
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| 43 |
Commissary Storehouse (Third Fort Union, p.
78). This was a change to the original McFerran design. In the summer of
1867, HS-43 was built using the north wall of the stable yard of HS-42
as its south wall.
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DEPOT CORRAL
The original plan for the Depot Corral was by
McFerran. Construction on the Quartermaster Depot Corral began in
September, 1862, prior to final approval of the new plan in November
(Oliva, "Frontier Army," p. 396). Pitcaithley and Greene (Third Fort
Union, p. 11) state several times that the early corral was larger
than the final version, but this is not true. The overlay demonstrates
that the early corral, at 648 feet north to south and 350 feet east to
west, was significantly smaller than the later. The old plan is still
visible in places, and most of it is still in the ground. The addition
of an enlarged wagon corral yard on the east side about 1870 brought the
outline of the original corral out to 450 feet, forming the eastern edge
location used for the later corral. Photographs of the various
structures of the early corral appear in ill. 47 (Third Fort
Union, pp. 218-19), ill. 48 (Third Fort Union, pp. 220-21). A
new corral was designed by Colonel H. M. Enos and John Lambert in 1867,
but it was not built (Third Fort Union, p. 157, ill. 16),
probably because the Depot felt less need for a revamping of its plan
than did the Post. Instead, the original Depot corrals, stables,
granaries, and sheds continued in use until they were destroyed by fire
on June 27, 1874. The fire was thought to have started in a privy at the
south end of the easternmost granary, almost against the east wall of
the corral.
Construction on replacement buildings began
immediately, and was well under way in the fall of 1874 (Oliva,
"Frontier Army," p. 651). Some of the walls, at least, were of adobe. An
1875 plan shows the repaired Depot Corral, with dimensions of 704 feet
north to south, and 450 feet east to west. A fairly complete redesign of
the Depot corrals was carried out in 1875-76, incorporating the
perimeter walls, keeping the new dimensions and the buildings
constructed along the west side of the Depot Corral in 1874, but
creating a completely new division of space in the remainder; it is
uncertain who designed this final plan (see figure 17, p. 110). It had
been constructed by 1876 and remained relatively unchanged for the rest
of the life of Fort Union.
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Corral Sheds (Third Fort Union, p. 80).
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| 45 |
Corral Sheds (Third Fort Union, p. 81).
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| 46 |
Teamsters' Quarters (Third Fort Union, p. 83).
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| 47 |
Wagon Master's Office (Third Fort Union, p. 85).
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| 48 |
Granary (Third Fort Union, p. 86-87).
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| 49 |
Granary (Third Fort Union, p. 86-87).
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Civilian Employees' Quarters (Third Fort Union, p. 89).
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| 51 |
Corral and Sheds (Third Fort Union, p. 91).
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| 52 |
Well (Third Fort Union, p. 93).
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| 53 |
Ice House, First Depot Corral. This structure was
listed as "Unidentified" in Greene and Pitcaithley (Third Fort Union,
p. 94), while the early ice house was described on page 95,
where it was assumed to have been at about the same location as the
later ice house (HS-55, below). However, a careful plotting of the two
plans of the Depot Corrals reveals that HS-53 was the first ice house,
offset from the later building by about 30 feet. This ice house was
built in 1868 and destroyed in the fire of 1874. It can be seen in early
photographs (Third Fort Union, pp. 218-19, ill. 47), and in the
aerial photographs.
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| 54 |
Lime (Gesso) Mill, First Depot Corral (Third
Fort Union, p. 94). Built ca. 1867, destroyed in the fire of 1874.
The massive circular stone base of the mill remains in place (Third
Fort Union, pp. 218-19, ill. 47).
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| 55 |
Ice House, Second Depot Corral (Third Fort
Union, p. 95). The outline of this structure, although blanketed in
mounds of melted adobe, is easily identified in aerial photographs and
on the ground at this location.
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| 56 |
Depot Transportation Corral (Third Fort
Union, p. 96).
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HOSPITAL
Construction began on the Hospital complex in 1863.
The major construction was completed by early 1864, and the group was
enlarged sometime soon after November, 1866. The enlargement apparently
consisted of the construction of the Enclosing Wall (HS-65), the Dead
House (HS-66), the Hospital "Sink" (HS-67), and the probable second
latrine (HS-68).
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Hospital (Third Fort Union, p. 97).
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| 58 |
Hospital Steward's Quarters (Third Fort Union, p. 99).
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Hospital Latrine (Third Fort Union, p. 100).
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Hospital Wood House (Third Fort Union, p. 101).
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Hospital Cistern (Third Fort Union, p. 102).
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| 62 |
Hospital Cistern (Third Fort Union, p. 102).
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| 63 |
Hospital Matron's Quarters and Laundry (Third Fort Union, p.
103).
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| 64 |
Hospital Bathhouse (Third Fort Union, p. 104).
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| 65 |
Hospital Dead House (Third Fort Union, p.
105). This building was begun in November, 1866, and finished in early
1867 (Oliva, "Frontier Army," p. 576). It was adobe on a stone
foundation, 52 x 13 feet, with walls ten feet high and six windows.
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| 66 |
Enclosing Wall (Third Fort Union, p. 105).
This wall around the main Hospital complex (135 feet by 330 feet) was
constructed in late 1866, at the same time as the Dead House (HS-66,
below) and additional latrines, HS-67, 68, Hospital Latrines,
below).
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| 67 |
Hospital Latrine. Probably built late 1866-early
1867, 35 feet by 10 feet. Described as "sink" on 1883 map.
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| 68 |
Hospital Latrine. This is an assumed use, based on
the appearance of the structure on the maps; 44 feet by 14 feet.
Probably built late 1866-early 1867.
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| 69 |
Hospital Compound. This enclosed compound is shown
on the 1866 and 1868 maps, but does not appear on the 1877 plan of the
Third Fort, and is certainly gone by 1882. The compound consisted of two
principal buildings facing into an enclosed corral. These were probably
the "pens of cattle (cows) hogs, chickens, etc.," and "a stable with
private horses, one of them the [Hospital] Steward's," mentioned in the
inspection of June, 1868 (Oliva, "Frontier Army," p. 612). Although the 1866
map shows the two buildings as about 60 feet by 20 feet, the survey
found only a 20 foot by 20 foot building on the west. However, the
appearance in the 1984 aerial photographs suggests that the building
extended 40 feet further east than is visible on the ground;
archeological investigation would be necessary to confirm this. The
building on the south was 60 feet north to south by 20 feet east to
west, with a stone chimney base centered on the south end. A portion of
the stone foundation of an enclosing wall is visible at ground surface
on the south side of the compound between the two buildings. The 1866
map shows the corral dimensions as 150 feet east to west, and 60 feet
north to south. The aerial photographs support these general dimensions,
and suggest a main gate in the southeast corner. The building
foundations are of fieldstone and about one foot thick; the area around
them is littered with ash, coal, broken ceramics, and broken glass. The
lack of adobe mounding suggests that the structures were of wood.
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foun/hsr/hsrmc.htm
Last Updated: 13-Feb-2006
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