Fort Frederica National Monument
| Fort Frederica National Monument | |
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IUCN category V (protected landscape/seascape)
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| Location | St. Simons Island, Georgia, USA |
| Nearest city | Brunswick, Georgia |
| Coordinates | 31°13′26″N 81°23′36″W / 31.22384°N 81.39324°WCoordinates: 31°13′26″N 81°23′36″W / 31.22384°N 81.39324°W |
| Area | 284.49 acres (115.13 ha) |
| Authorized | May 26, 1936 |
| Visitors | 293,041 (in 2011) |
| Governing body | National Park Service |
| Website | Fort Frederica National Monument |
Fort Frederica in 2005
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| Nearest city | Brunswick, Georgia |
| Area | 218 acres (88.2 ha) |
| Built | 1736 |
| NRHP Reference # | 66000065 |
| Added to NRHP | October 15, 1966 |
Fort Frederica National Monument, on St. Simons Island, Georgia, preserves the archaeological remnants of a fort and town built by James Oglethorpe between 1736 and 1748 to protect the southern boundary of the British colony of Georgia from Spanish raids. About 630 British troops were stationed at the fort.
A town of up to 500 colonial residents had grown up outside the fort; it was laid out following principles of the Oglethorpe Plan for towns in the Georgia Colony. The town was named Frederica, after Frederick, Prince of Wales, son of King George II. The monument was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 15, 1966.
In the early 18th century, Europeans called the land lying between British South Carolina and Spanish Florida the "Debatable Land". Today's state of Georgia was then the center of a centuries-old imperial conflict between Spain and Britain. After the philanthropist James Oglethorpe founded the colony of Georgia in 1733, to provide a place where poor debtors could settle, colonists from England and Scotland, and refugees from the German Electorate of the Palatinate built Fort Frederica in 1736 to defend their new territory. They named Frederica for Frederick, Prince of Wales, (1707–1751). The name was feminized to distinguish it from Fort Frederick in South Carolina.
In the 1742 battles of Bloody Marsh and Gully Hole Creek, forces under Oglethorpe successfully repulsed Spanish attempts to invade St. Simons Island. Afterward the Spanish no longer threatened the colony; in 1749 the government disbanded the garrison at Frederica. Soon the village fell into economic decline, and by 1755 it was mostly abandoned. The town survived a fire in 1758, but after a few more years, it was abandoned. Naturalist William Bartram visited the site in March, 1774. Though it was in ruins he noted that there was still a small garrison there.
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Wikipedia