Fort Delaware State Park

Fort Delaware State Park is a 248-acre (100 ha), 1-mile-long (1.6 km) Delaware state park on Pea Patch Island in the mid channel of the Delaware River near its entrance into Delaware Bay. It is a low, marshy island in New Castle County, Delaware, facing Delaware City on the Delaware shore and Finns Point on the New Jersey shore. Fort Delaware was built on Pea Patch Island by the United States Army in 1815, near the conclusion of the War of 1812, to protect the harbors of Wilmington, Delaware and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The fort was burned and rebuilt in the years prior to the American Civil War, and soon after the start of the war the fort was converted to a Prisoner of War camp. Fort Delaware continued to protect the mouth of the Delaware River through World War I and II. Pea Patch Island and Fort Delaware was declared surplus land by the United States Department of Defense in 1945.