Ship Island is a barrier island about twelve miles off the Mississippi coast, reached only by boat, with a seasonal ferry from Gulfport's Jones Park. It held the only deep-water harbor between New Orleans and Mobile, and the French anchored here in February 1699 before building Fort Maurepas on Biloxi Bay. The brick fort came much later. Construction began in 1857, Confederate troops burned the unfinished works when they left in September 1861, and the Union finished it in 1866 with paid labor from New York and prisoners of war. It holds about a million bricks and is shaped like a D.
The Union used the island as a staging ground, and more than fifteen thousand men gathered here in April 1862 for the attack on New Orleans. It became a prison camp, too, holding more than 4,200 Confederate prisoners by the war's end. Plaques at the fort entrance name 153 of them who died and were buried on the island, along with 232 Union soldiers. Most of the graves washed out to sea over the years.
In January 1863 the 2nd Louisiana Native Guard, a regiment of Black soldiers, arrived for garrison duty. A dispute with white troops from Maine broke out within a week, General Banks ordered the white troops withdrawn, and the Native Guard held the island until the war ended. Gulfport native Natasha Trethewey wrote her poem "Elegy for the Native Guards" about them. Bring shoes for walking and expect little shade.
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