The history of human activity at present day Fort William Henry started as far back as the early 1600’s in terms of English settlements, but actually extends back even further if we include the presence of Native American and seasonal pre-British colonial establishments.

The first fort built on the site present day Mainers call “Fort William Henry” was constructed in 1630 under the supervision of a man named Abraham Shurte, and was aptly referred to as “Shurte’s Fort”, as well as “Fort Pemaquid”.

Abraham Shurte was one of the earliest British settlers to the region and he was heavily involved in the Pemaquid fishing and fur trading industries. He was a single man in his 40’s who was wholly dedicated to establishing his own prosperous business, and was also someone the local native populations found very likeable and trustable.  At the heart of Shurte’s enterprise was his remarkable ability to forge connections, serving as a trusted intermediary between English settlers, Native American tribes, and even French counterparts. His keen sense of diplomacy not only fostered amicable relations but also paved the way for a flourishing trade-network that transformed Pemaquid into a coveted trading post.  Simply put, Abraham Shurte spearheaded the effort that made the Pemaquid Region a highly lucrative Northeastern trading dynasty in the 1600’s.

Abraham Shurte’s leadership helped attract year-round settlers to the area and by 1630 there were 15 faming families permanently residing in the Pemaquid region, all of whom stood to benefit from a community fort. So a fort was erected, mainly by the settlers, and it was named Shurte’s Fort, or Fort Pemaquid.

Fort Pemaquid was a basic palisaded trading post with a very simple blockhouse design. It had a door and gun ports, but no windows.  It offered a safe place to take cover during times of conflict, and also served as a symbol of prosperity and community cohesiveness. It’s because of these very reasons it was also seen as a primary target for destruction when attackers came to town.  Pemaquid was the center of the fur trade industry in the Northeast so it was an attractive place to consider sacking, raiding, and looting.

This might be why pirate Dixie Bull sailed up the coast from Boston Harbor to plunder the Pemaquid region over the course of the summer of 1632.

The Pirate ‘Dixie Bull’ is a legend in the Pemaquid region.  He was born in England in 1611 and entered into a 9 year-long apprenticeship as a “skinner” for his brother in 1627, at the age of 16.  A skinner is someone who works with animal furs; they would perform tasks like skinning an animal, removing, curing, and dressing the fur, .  Historical documents tell us he didn’t finish that apprenticeship, at least not right away, because he arrived in the colonies in 1632 at the age of 21.  He was offered a land grant and was put in charge of a fur trading ship that did business up and down the Northeast coast.  He did a lot of business with different Indian tribes in the area of what is now Maine, and on one of his runs he decided to head further downeast than was likely advisable, where he ran into the French at Castine.  The French and Indians had developed a close working relationship in the region of Castine over the past couple of decades, so it wasn’t entirely surprising that he’d run into French fur trade competitors. The French wound up confiscating Dixie Bull’s ship and taking everything inside; all his furs and trade goods; basically his livelihood.  They took it all and sent him packing.  

He arrived back in Boston with a chip on his shoulder and a bone to pick, but there really wasn’t anyone he could turn to for legal retribution and compensation. So he riled up a good number of local sailors, 25 men in 3 ships, and together they sailed up the coast of Maine to recoup his losses. But instead of bringing his vengeful grievance to the French at Castine, the people who actually stole from him, they all stopped at Pemaquid and began their ransacking there.

They initially attacked Shurte’s Fort with the aim of disabling it so they could freely plunder all the ships in the area.

Pemaquid was a booming economic front, so their attack had much to gain if they could render the settlement defenseless.

After knocking the fort out of commission and rendering it useless for defensive purposes Dixie Bull and his men raided, plundered, and looted ships, farms, and houses throughout the entire summer. They even captured a few ships. In total, they walked away with between £25 and £2,500 before – the New England region’s – very first “Naval Fleet” – so to speak – of 40 men in 4 shallops arrived to render aid. 

To be clear, a shallop is not a war ship, and there was no official “Navy” when the sailors oared their shallops up the coast to take on Dixie Bull and his band of pirates. 

When the fleet arrived at Pemaquid a wind storm kicked up and stuck around for almost an entire month, meaning the boats couldn’t be maneuvered as cleanly as would be necessary to take on Dixie Bull and his men.

However, the mere presence of these shallops in the area was enough to scare Dixie Bull into sailing off into the sunset, never to be seen or heard from again. There is much conjecture about what happened to him; theories range from him never being caught, to him being caught, tried, and hung.  But the historical documentation all but proves he completed his apprenticeship under his brother and was entered into the Worshipful Company of Skinners in 1648 at the age of 37. 

Resident settlers promptly rebuilt the fort and Pemaquid went back to business as usual, remaining generally prosperous and free from attacks until 1676 when the fort was destroyed by Indians in King Philip’s War.

As a result of the destruction of Fort Pemaquid by Indians in 1676 another Fort was built in its place.  The new fort was a wooden redoubt and stockade with 7 strategically located cannons.  It was built by order of Sir Edmund Andros, the Governor of New York, and was named Fort Charles after King Charles II, the current King of England during that time. He also named the settlement around the fort “Jamestown” after King Charles’ younger brother James, the Duke of York.  He would later become King James II.  It’s pertinent because there were many towns, cities, and places named after Charles and James during this period, from the furthest reaches of the Northeast Region straight down the Atlantic coast.  The originally named “Jamestown of Pemaquid” is now called Pemaquid Beach.

Pemaquid was lawless. It had issues.  There was infighting and debauchery among settlers. There was also outside conflict with local Indian tribes, on occasion.

“Jamestown of Pemaquid” had a customs house and a thriving village.  It was a booming metropolis, the only one in New England, and due to constantly shifting geographical boundaries, was the only settlement in New England ever governed from New York.

There were a ton of political maneuverings going on during these early colonial years, with boundary lines being drawn and redrawn, and entire regions being reordered and remapped.  

A large hunk of Maine, which had previously been wrapped up in the New York region was, by the late 1690’s, clumped in with Massachusetts. Settlers in the booming economic front of Pemaquid were worried Boston would replace its importance in the Northeast Region.  Pemaquid was recognized in all levels of colonial government, straight up to the Royal Court, as being an economic hub of promise and prosperity. There was a lot of personal and business investment at stake here, and the concern was palpable. 

Sir Edmund Andros, who’d been the governor of New York from 1674-1680 was somewhat unpopular so he was recalled in 1680. In 1686 he was promoted to the position of Governor of the Dominion of New England, which included all lands from New Jersey through Maine, except Delaware and Pennsylvania.  This did nothing to improve his popularity because the Dominion of New England wasn’t popular, so he was deposed 3 years later, in 1689, at the request of a local born, and legendary Mainer, William Phips, along with another historical character, Dr. Increase Mather.  Andros was imprisoned at Castle Island in Boston before being shipped back to England.

The removal of Edmund Andros gave way to political division and instability in all of New England, and definitely in the Pemaquid region. 

The soldiers garrisoned at Fort Charles abandoned it. 30 agreed to stay, but only if they were promised guaranteed pay for doing so.  During this time the fort was defensively weak and highly open to assault.  This is when it was attacked and destroyed by Indians from Castine in August of 1689.

Their reasons for attacking the fort were many, but they carried out the attack on the orders of the Baron de Saint-Castin, a legendary figure in Maine’s history who was born in France, but immersed himself so deeply within Wabanaki culture that he actually became an Abenaki chief.  He is thickly associated with the history of the Penobscot Region of Maine.   

British boundary issues with the French plagued the entire region of Maine for 150 years and in these earliest of colonial times it really was, to a large degree, an ongoing proxy war between French Catholics and English Protestants. The French had allied with the local Wabanaki Indians by way of proselytizing Catholicism, which the Natives weren’t averse to, and then attaching political and economic ideologies into the mix.  This had been going on for almost 100 years by this point, so the foundation of trust between the French and Indians ran as deep as the Indians’ distrust for all things British. 

The Indians had been taken advantage of by British merchants many times in the past and had a long list of reasons to be aggressive, distrustful and violent towards the English – on their own – without religious reasons or French ideological influence.

A few short months before the attack that destroyed Fort Charles, the English had fired Governor Andros and essentially redrawn the map in a way that seemed to favor Boston over Pemaquid. The English also forbade settlers from bartering or trading with the French or Penobscot Indians.  Violators were dealt with harshly.  The Baron de Sainte-Castin, who was the French version of Governor Edmund Andros, was warned by the British to stop with the ongoing violence, killing, and debauchery or face stark consequences. The British also enticed local Pemaquid area tribes with bounties of “8 pounds per head” for the scalps of their enemies, so – from the viewpoint of the French and Indians residing in the Penobscot Region – this made Pemaquid a target, and anyone living there an enemy of the highest concern.

10 days before the attack on Fort Charles Lieutenant Weems, the commander of the fort, requested to be supplied with 12 more soldiers. He was acutely aware of the widespread political tension brewing its way toward an eventual conflict, and he knew Fort Charles was in no condition to defend itself, nor the people who needed it.

On August 2, 1689 a force of 200-300 Indians descended into Pemaquid, destroyed Fort Charles and all the nearby houses around it, taking prisoners and killing resistors. They completely routed the village nearest the fort.  The Indians shielded themselves behind a really big rock that was perfectly positioned as a defensive point while they volleyed their attack for roughly 2 straight days. When it was over Pemaquid was gutted and England was forced to abandon the mid-coast region in favor of the Casco Bay region for the next 3 years.

In 1692 the British returned to Pemaquid and erected Fort William Henry; the first stone fort and, at the time, the largest of its kind in New England. Fort William Henry was built by order of Massachusetts Governor Sir William Phipps, local Maine native and “the first American chosen to rule over the colonies”.

The fort was as monstrous as it was expensive. It had walls that were between 10 and 22 feet high, built by more than 2,000 cartloads of stone.  It had a bastion, more commonly referred to as “the castle tower”, 29 feet tall with 28 gun ports which was built around the same large rock the Indians used as a shield during their siege on Fort Charles 3 years earlier. Where previously, Fort Charles had housed 7 cannons, Fort William Henry now housed 20.  It also garrisoned up to 60 soldiers.  The price point for the building of Fort William Henry in 1692 was around £20,000, which equated to roughly two-thirds of the colony’s budget.  It was a hugely significant investment that would ultimately face destruction just 4 years later when the French and Indians attacked from land and sea.  The entire fortification was surrendered, destroyed, and abandoned for the next 30 years.

In 1729 colonial-era settlers requested a fort be built for their safety and protection against raiding Indians, so England responded by building Fort Frederick.

Fort Frederick was comparable in size to its predecessor, Fort William Henry.  It had 28 gun ports, 14 cannon, and room enough to garrison 100 men.  It was the only fort constructed at historic Fort Pemaquid that never saw battle and was eventually destroyed by the same citizenry of Pemaquid who requested it be built on their behalf – because they were afraid the British would use it against them during the Revolutionary War.