Long before the first shots of the American Revolution echoed at Lexington and Concord, Crown Point occupied a place of outsized strategic importance in the geography of North American warfare. Perched on a narrow peninsula jutting into Lake Champlain, roughly ten miles north of Fort Ticonderoga, this windswept promontory controlled the great water highway connecting the St. Lawrence River valley to the Hudson. Whoever held Crown Point held the key to movement between Canada and the American colonies. During the French and Indian War, the British had recognized this fact by constructing one of the largest fortifications in North America there — His Majesty's Fort at Crown Point, a massive star-shaped work of limestone and earth that cost the Crown a fortune and garrisoned hundreds of troops. But on April 13, 1773, a catastrophic fire swept through the fort's interior, gutting barracks, storehouses, and defensive works, and leaving the once-imposing stronghold a ruin. By the time revolution came, Crown Point was a shell of its former self — and yet it would prove indispensable to the American cause, serving alternately as a staging ground, a refuge, a shipyard, and a strategic pivot upon which the fate of the northern theater turned.
PEOPLE
Ethan Allen
Green Mountain Boys Commander, Vermont Land Speculator, Patriot Leader
Henry Knox
Continental Army General, Chief of Artillery, Bookseller
Colonel Seth Warner
Green Mountain Boys Colonel, Continental Army Officer, Vermont Militia Leader
Benedict Arnold
Continental Army General, Lake Champlain Fleet Commander, Traitor
KEY EVENTS
Saratoga Campaign Ends at British Surrender
Oct 1777
Battle of Valcour Island: Arnold's Fleet Destroyed
Oct 1776
Knox Transports Crown Point and Ticonderoga Cannon to Boston
Dec 1775
Seth Warner Seizes Crown Point
May 1775
Arnold Builds the American Lake Champlain Fleet
Jul 1776
French Alliance Reshapes the Northern Theater
Feb 1778
STORIES
MODERN VOICE
The Door Between Continents
Most visitors are surprised by how complete the ruins are. The stone walls of the 1759 British fortification are still standing, still enormous, still commanding the narrows. The lake narrows here to ...
HISTORICAL VOICE
The Battle He Lost on Purpose
Benedict Arnold understood something about the battle he was sailing into on October 11, 1776 that is easy to miss if you only look at the casualty figures: he was not trying to win. The British fleet...