Fort Kent: Outpost of an Unfought War

Fort Kent, Maine, a small town in Aroostook County, seems like an unlikely place for a war, and perhaps that’s why the war its blockhouse was built for never happened. But when the blockhouse was built in 1838, that wasn’t obvious.

The Treaty of Paris that ended the Revolutionary War wasn’t exactly a model of clarity about boundaries, and Massachusetts and Maine (which was a part of Massachusetts until 1820) thought they were entitled to a much larger chunk of the north woods than New Brunswick did. The map shows the issue.

For New Brunswick, the main issue was that the Yankee claims went almost to the Saint Lawrence River, essentially cutting New Brunswick in two for the winter months, and possibly leaving the eastern part open to American invasion; this dispute was not yet thirty years after the war of 1812. Both sides set up government offices, and sent in settlers, who were soon in conflict. And, Fort Kent and several others were built.

After British officers arrested a Maine state agent in 1839, Congress authorized raising an army of 50,000 troops and sending it to Maine, and several of the forts, including Fort Kent, were expanded. Fortunately, though, Congress also sent Gen. Winfield Scott to Maine to try to negotiate a settlement and avert what’s been called the Aroostook County War. As it happened, Scott was an old friend of New Brunswick’s Lieutenant Governor, and they agreed to keep everyone peaceful while a solution was worked out.

The Webster-Ashburton Treaty, in 1842, gave most of the area to Maine, but left a wider strip at the top for New Brunswick. With some grumbling the conflict was ended and everyone went back to cutting timber and farming, leaving Fort Kent abandoned. In 1857 it was sold to Mary Page, who lived in it until 1891, when it was bought and donated to Maine as parkland.

From then until the late 1950s, the state did little with it, other than removing the original dormers, which were restored in a renovation in the 1960s after the state finally established it as a historic site.

Today, it’s open but largely unstaffed; we spent an hour on the site without encountering anyone other than a family that looked around for a short while. As a museum, it clearly has some curatorial issues; the general rule appears to be that if something looks like it belongs to the 19th century, why, put it on display.

And that’s a shame, because the opportunity is there to really explain and interpret an unusual and interesting period in American history. There’s far more to it than my brief summary—it’s full of intrigue, with missing maps, a line that Benjamin Franklin may or may not have drawn on a map and a failed attempt by the King of the Netherlands to make sense of the counterclaims.

But still, if you’re passing by, it’s certainly worth a visit!

Despite the odd assortment of exhibits, George G identified this as our One-Clue Mystery site.