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NR Nomination

LOCATION AND PROPERTY NAME
address: ADDRESS RESTRICTED historic name:US Army Fort Umpqua (35DO990)
ADDRESS RESTRICTED, Douglas County current/other names:
assoc addresses:
block/lot/tax lot:
location descr: twnshp/rng/sect/qtr sect:
PROPERTY CHARACTERISTICS
resource type:site height (stories): total elig resources:1 total inelig resources:0
elig evaluation: eligible/significant NR Status: Individually Listed
prim constr date:c. second date: date indiv listed:05/26/2015
primary orig use: Military Facility orig use comments:
second orig use: RECR/CULTURE: General
primary style: prim style comments:
secondary style: sec style comments:
primary siding: siding comments:
secondary siding:
plan type: architect:United States Army
builder:
comments/notes:
Portions of this file have been redacted to meet Oregon State law (ORS 192.501(11)). More information may be available upon request. Contact the Oregon State Archaeologist at 503-986-0674 for more details.
GROUPINGS / ASSOCIATIONS
Not associated with any surveys or groupings.
SHPO INFORMATION FOR THIS PROPERTY
NR date listed: 05/26/2015
ILS survey date:
RLS survey date:
106 Project(s): None
Special Assess Project(s): None
Federal Tax Project(s): None
ARCHITECTURAL / PROPERTY DESCRIPTION
(Includes expanded description of the building/property, setting, significant landscape features, outbuildings and alterations)
The archaeological remains of U. S. Army Fort Umpqua encompass a 37.56 acre (15.2 hectares) area (REDACTED) in Douglas County (REDACTED) Oregon. It is situated on (REDACTED) THE Siuslaw National Forest (Figure 2). The land immediately adjacent (REDACTED) is wooded (REDACTED). The site boundary (Figure 2) was delineated to include four documented archaeological features and the location of the historic fort buildings. The site boundary includes a 50 meter buffer around the site in order to accommodate any currently unidentified archaeological remains and to include the immediate historic setting. The U. S. Army occupied the site from 1856-1862; although, earlier Euro-American settlement in the immediate vicinity began c. 1850 and continued sparsely through 1868. At its height, in 1859, the fort was comprised of 13 buildings including four officers’ houses, a barracks, blockhouse, hospital, guard house, two laundress buildings, bakery, barn, and sutler store. The buildings were arranged around a rectangular parade ground which fronted the Umpqua River on its east and was bounded by open sand dunes on the north, west, and south sides of the fort (Figure 2). The archaeological remains of the post consist of three surface scatters (in the areas associated with the blockhouse, bakery, and firing range) as well as intact subsurface deposits associated with the southern-most officer’s house and the post hospital. Cultural material recovered from these areas include mid-nineteenth century glass, ceramic, and metal objects including bottles, dinnerware ceramics, nails, brick, window glass, ammunition, buttons, tobacco pipes, and faunal material. The boundary of the proposed National Register site coincides with the original foot print of the post, and is largely defined by the presence of cultural material on the surface in the north, west, and south with the eastern boundary defined by the Umpqua River.
HISTORY
(Chronological, descriptive history of the property from its construction through at least the historic period - preferably to the present)
The U. S. Army Fort Umpqua site is significant at the local and statewide level under Criterion A for its association with events that have made a significant contribution to the broad patterns of local and statewide history. Fort Umpqua is significant for its association with: 1) The military history of Oregon and the Central Oregon Coast; 2) Its association with the ethnographic and scientific exploration of the Central Oregon Coast; 3) Its role as one of the three U. S. Army posts charged with the protection of the Oregon Coast Reservation system; 4) Its role in the creation and improvement of coastal travel corridors and routes leading into the interior of the state which fostered transcontinental transportation and communication. Fort Umpqua also served as a home and duty station for several U. S. Army officers that made significant contributions to the natural, cultural, and photographic histories of western Oregon. These individuals included Brigadier General John J. Milhau who made important scientific and ethnographic documentation of the local climate, flora, fauna, native languages, and cultures and early Euro-American settlement; Colonel Edward P. Vollum who made significant contributions to the field of ornithology as well as to early photography in the Western United States; and Major Lorenzo Lorain who has the distinction of being one of the earliest amateur photographers in the U. S. Army and who produced a series of rare prints of natural landscapes, early settlement and native peoples of the Pacific Northwest. The site is also eligible under Criterion D as it has yielded and is likely to continue to yield information important to local and state history relating to the U. S. Army. Fort Umpqua is significant under Criterion D for its ability to yield important information about: 1) The material circumstances of the U. S. Army in Western Oregon, specifically along the Central Oregon Coast, during the 1850s-1860s. Established as a military post along the Oregon Coast, Fort Umpqua would have had unique environmental and social conditions from other military posts in the state. These conditions necessitated a different material existence in housing, clothing, as well as in subsistence. One example of this is the use of “prefabricated zinc houses” at the site, a type housing that is believed to be unique to Fort Umpqua. 2) The breadth and variation of material culture within the U. S. Army when compared with other sites from the period and region. The artifact assemblage from Fort Umpqua will contribute to understanding the material circumstances of the ninteenth-century U. S. Army in western Oregon. The site has already yielded material culture that is noticeably different from the other two Coast Reservation Forts (Fort Yamhill and Fort Hoskins). Specifically, collections from Fort Umpqua exhibit less variation in firearm projectiles and uniform parts, and considerably higher proportions of non-white ironstone ceramics like Chinese import porcelains/stonewares and English transfer-printed wares in comparison to the other two forts. 3) Variation in U. S. Army supply patterns because Fort Umpqua was supplied, commanded, and garrisoned by troops from a separate military department than the rest of Oregon and the Pacific Northwest (Fort Umpqua was commanded out of San Francisco, C.A. rather than Fort Vancouver, W. T.). This difference in command and supply would have created a source of variation in the material culture of the post that is likely to be observed in the archaeological record. 4) Variations in the material culture of the officers and men as Fort Umpqua was commanded by an officer with the rank of Major (most posts were commanded by officers with the rank of Captain or 1st Lieutenant) and was garrisoned by soldiers from U. S. Artillery regiments (most posts in the region were garrisoned by troops from U. S. Infantry or Dragoon regiments). Differences in military rank often coincide with differences in social and economic status and consequently material culture. The archaeological record at Fort Umpqua provides an opportunity to investigate the material circumstances of an officer with such rank, as well as the material culture associated with soldiers assigned to an U. S. Artillery regiment. 5) Fort Umpqua contains the only known intact mid-19th century U. S. Army target range in the Pacific Northwest. The date of this target range (1856-1862) marks a significant period in the development of military projectile technology when the U. S. Army shifted from round projectiles to the conical-type projectiles used today. A total of 274 projectiles of the elongated ball-type with little variation in projectile type or caliber have been recovered from the site. This contrasts sharply with the projectiles recovered from Fort Yamhill and Fort Hoskins which display significant variation in both projectile type and caliber patterns that might be attributable to the differences in the supply, command, and garrison of these posts.
RESEARCH INFORMATION
Title Records Census Records Property Tax Records Local Histories
Sanborn Maps Biographical Sources SHPO Files Interviews
Obituaries Newspapers State Archives Historic Photographs
City Directories Building Permits State Library
Local Library: University Library:Oregon State University, University of Oregon
Historical Society:Oregon Historical Society Other Respository:US Forest Service
Bibliography:
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Confederated Tribes of the Coos, Lower Umpqua, and Siuslaw Newsletter, February 1, 1983. 1990 Cultural Resource Reconnaissance of the Umpqua River North Spit, Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area, Siuslaw National Forest. Report No. 98. Heritage Resource Associates, Inc., Eugene. 1998 Requiem for a People. Oregon State University, Corvallis. Bowyer, Gary C. 1992 Archaeological Symbols of Status and Authority. Master of Arts Thesis, Department of Anthropology, Oregon State University, Corvallis. Brauner, David and Justin E. Eichelberger 2009 Archaeological Investigations at the Fort Yamhill Site, 35PO75, Fort Yamhill State Heritage Area, Polk County, Oregon: 2008 Field Season. Department of Anthropology, Oregon State University, Corvallis. Brauner, David, Justin E. Eichelberger, and Brooke Boulware 2009 Archaeological Investigations at the Fort Yamhill Site, 35PO75, Fort Yamhill State Heritage Area, Polk County, Oregon: 2007 Field Season. 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Harger, Jane Marie 1972 The History of the Siletz Reservation 1856-1877. Unpublished Master’s Thesis, Department of Anthropology, University of Oregon, Eugene. Hart, Herbert M. 1967 Pioneer Forts of the West. Seattle, Washington. Henry, Guy V. 1869 Military Record of Civilian Appointments in the United States Army. Volume 1. Carleton, Publisher, Madison Square, New York. Hoagland, Alison K. 2004 Army Architecture in the West. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman. Hume, Edgar Erskine 1942 Ornithologists of the United States Army Medical Corps. Surgeon-General’s Office, Washington D. C. Jackson, W. Turrentine 1952 Wagon Roads West: A Study of Federal Road Surveys and Construction in the Trans-Mississippi West, 1846-1869. University of California Press, Berkeley. Lawson, Bvt. Brig. Gen. Thomas 1860 Statistical Report of the Sickness and Mortality in the Army of the United States…from January 1855, to January 1860. George W. Bowman, Printer, Washington D. C. Ledbetter, William Glen 1935 Military History of the Oregon Country, 1804-1859. University of Oregon Thesis Series, No. 21, Eugene. Lewis, David G. and Robert Kentta 2010 Western Oregon Reservations: two perspectives on place. Oregon Historical Quarterly 3(4):476-485. Lyman, R. Lee, Virgina Marie Benz, Linda A. Clark and Ann Bennett Rogers 2009 Prehistory of the Oregon Coast: the effects of excavation strategies and assemblage on archaeological inquiry. Left Coast Press, Walnut Creek. McArthur, Lewis A. 1992 Oregon Geographic Names, 6th Edition. Oregon Historical Society Press, Portland McArthur, Scott 2012 The Enemy Never Came: the Civil War in the Pacific Northwest. Caxton Press, Caldwell. Nelson, Kurt R. 2007 Fighting for Paradise: A Military History of the Pacific Northwest. Westholme Publishing LLC, Yardley, Pennsylvania Palmquist, Peter R. and Thomas R. Kailbourn 2000 Pioneer Photographers of the Far West: A biographical dictionary 1840-1865. Stanford University Press, Stanford. Roberts, Robert B. 1988 Encyclopedia of Historic Forts: The Military, Pioneer, and Trading Posts of the United States, 10th edition. Macmillan, New York. Schwartz, E. A. 1997 The Rogue River Wars and its Aftermath, 1850-1980. Oklahoma University Press, Norman. Sturtevant, William C. (Editor) 1990 Handbook of North American Indians: Northwest Coast, Volume 7. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington D. C. Tate, Michael L. 2001 The Frontier Army in the Settlement of the West. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman. Terrell, Terry M. 2000 The Secondhand Military Fort: Fort Umpqua, July 1856 – July 1862.Unpublished manuscript, Fort Umpqua Collection, Siuslaw National Forest, Corvallis. Thomas, Dean S. 1997 Round Ball to Rimfire. Part 1. Thomas Publications, Gettysburg. Trussel, Timothy D. 1997 Frontier Military Medicine at Fort Hoskins, 1856-1865: an archaeological and historical perspective. Unpublished M.S. thesis, Department of Anthropology, Oregon State University, Corvallis. 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