🏛️ Fort Steilacoom

Fort Steilacoom was founded by the U.S. Army in 1849 between Lake Steilacoom and the Town of Steilacoom. It was among the first military fortifications built by the U.S. north of the Columbia River in what was to become the State of Washington. The fort was constructed at that site due to civilian agitation about the massacre in 1847 at the Whitman Mission and because of a Native attack on May 1, 1849, on the nearby British Fort Nisqually, in which an American bystander was killed.