In 1978 (or so) I was 12. My Father, my best friends Father and me and my friend went on a sneak in, flash light let, adventure of the inside of many of Fort Travis's buildings. I remember finding giant steel doors, a room with a huge safe and a huge amount of Civil Defense food and water. Thats what happen when two old Marines take their kids on an adventure :)
I remember years ago exploring and finding that there’s a tunnel between the seaside turrets and one of the inner “forts”. It was too muddy to explore but I always wanted to because it is not on any drawings of the place I’ve ever found
1978 I was 12 in Galveston as well. We used to explore fort crocket with torches They had all kinds of rooms in there We even killed a 6 foot rattle snake with rocks and sticks
When I was a kid growing up in Gtown vividly recall going into the WW2 bunkers located by Now the San Luis hotel.. the bunker is still there if you look for it.. great video well done, see you at Red Light sometime
Long before the San Luis hotel was built over them, I hunkered down in the center bunker at Ft. Crockett during a big storm that they reported might turn into a hurricane. Back then all there was stopping me was a chain link fence that had a hole in it, then a small weed/trash-strewn dirt lot to cross quickly to get to them before somebody saw me. I hunkered down in those bunkers quite often because I had found myself homeless now and then. But one dark night, I heard a voice that had seemed to say "Get out.., I live here. This is mine". When I turned on my bright-as-day 9v flashlight to see who I'd be dealing with, all I saw was dirt and some trash scraps. There was nobody else down there, I was sure of it. So I ignore it. That first time I just thought it was the wind, but the second and third time I distinctively knew exactly what I had heard, "Get out..., I live here. This is mine", so I quickly skedaddled. I hunkered at the front of The Buccaneer Hotel facing the gulf out in the open instead, where the strong winds kept blowing me back and forth under their open colonnade. And I never returned to those bunkers either. That was in the mid 70's.
I remember as a kid walking the beaches and asking my mother about the bunkers that used to dot the area. Also, at one point, there used to be a concrete ship that you could see from the coastline as well. This would have been around 1972 or 1973.
Yes! There are 2 concrete ships still visible. The Selma, which is near Pelican Island and the Durham, which is on the east side of the north Jetty! Thanks for watching!!
I understand the Germans wanted Cargo, ships I was told they wanted Oil mostly ships. War is Hell. Thanks, always keep up your efforts to Help All of us.
I’ve been to fort San Jacinto before, those first bunkers always amaze me, I like imagining what it was like being there, and what the soldiers would’ve done during the daily life’s there
Also the Hotel and Resort San Luis is built on an Duel Gun Battery that mounted the 12" guns from a retired US Battleship. This is just on such battery that was on Galveston Island. I can remember when I was a kid my parents driving us down Blue Water Highway and seeing one of the other Large Caliber gun emplacements similar to the ones under the San Luis further down the Island past the seawall. Today there is still a smaller gun emplacement with the gun intact at the Quintana County Park in Quintana/Freeport Tx to the south of Galveston. This emplacement was to protect the entrance to the Brazos River. During WW II The Dow Magnesium Company (What is now Dow Chemical) was located in Freeport and produced the lions share of the magnesium used by the US in WW II by extracting it from the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. A story I was once told by a Freeport resident and Plant worker of that period was that during the war the Army and the company had taken and placed a large number of telephone poles and placed them in a field on the other side of the Brazos from the plant with lights strung up on them. At night they would black out the plant and the city then light up those lights on the poles in the field to confuse enemy planes and submarines as to the location of the harbor entrance, the plant, and the river entrance as the large chemical plant was a known reference point on the enemy maps. He said that one night they had what was believed to have been a sub fired 3 or 4 cannon rounds into the field but didn't do any damage other than scare some cows so they left. That was the story that was told to me.
The gun at Quintana County park is not original to the battery. The original guns were 155MM (6 inch) French guns. The 155mm gun battery replaced a temporary 105mm howitzer field artillery battery on 4 Feb 1942.
Ethyl Dow in Freeport made Ethylene for Aircraft Fuel in WWII, as well. When I was a kid, we would play in the concrete empty turret for the gun on the Quintana side. I remember a round metal track in the bottom that the turret would pivot on. They later put the deck on top to keep people from falling in, and placed that Howitzer on top.
My grandparents lived in the Denver Court/Ft. Crockett area just east of 51st Street for nearly 50 years. When the troops fired practice rounds from the big guns at Crockett during WWII, the concussion was forceful enough to often crack plaster and break windows in those homes. My grandmother even found numerous fractures in her dining room chandelier!
I loved this. I have explored Ft. Travis, and tried to explore Ft. San Jacinto, but forgot my insect repellant and was literally run off by the swarms of mosquitos. My grandfather as sent to Ft. San Jacinto after basic training at Ft. Sam Houston in San Antonio in 1918. He trained there for a couple of months on the coastal artillery before being assigned to Battery C of the 3rd Trench Mortar Battalion (formed there at Ft. San Jacinto) and shipped off to France. As a child, I toured around Galveston with him and listened to his stories. He said that to his knowledge, the Galveston guns never fired at a hostile target.
In the 70’a there used to be large concrete shore gun bunkers where the Galvez hotel is today, we never went in them as rumor had it they were full of rattlesnakes but they always reminded me of the photos of Normandy and the German gun emplacements.
I knew Galveston was important to our military, and it looks like it's going to be a day trip to see these sights. I know the airport served as an airbase (previous podcast), but were there any airship bases on the Island like the one outside of Hitchcock?
Back around '68 or '69, a few of my buddies took me out to the various forts you showed, but we didn't know the names for them. They were, in order from west to east, what we called the 1st fort, the 2nd fort and "Fort Point." Mostly it was an excuse for us to go out with our BB guns and stomp around in the "wild." We were all about 12 or 13 years old, and spent full days out in "the flats." BB gun "wars", catching rabbits, catching rattle snakes. Endless adventures! Great times! We would enter the flats from the driveway between apartments just east of Barracuda Ave. at the Ferry rd., and walk all day in the flats. We would most times end up at the end of the Seawall getting soft drinks and snacks at "Brown's" concession stand, then head back through the flats because, what fun is walking on the seawall? The last time I was out there was about 7 or so years ago, to scatter one of the guy's ashes where we had so much fun all those years ago.
I visited Fort Crockett, also in Galveston, farther down the seawall, before the San Luis hotel was built on top of it. You can still clearly see the west gun battery today.
Cool! In the early ‘80’s we would sometimes visit Galveston Island when I was in high school and I can barely remember seeing a bunker/emplacement that I thought was visible along Seawall Blvd. I’ve wondered quite often whether any of these still existed; very glad to know that they do.
We used to play army out at Fort San Jacinto and the ROTC used to hold war games out there and May still. The bolivar in placement is an evaluation point for hurricane victims
Hugh Mercer used to be very easy to get to around 10-15 years ago. Now, you’d get very muddy boots but that’s about it. Lots of open rooms to explore and you could even climb and sit on the roof. I often wonder if the city purposely flooded the routes and caused the over grown brush to come in cause like I said it never used to be that way I would go often.
I remember as a kid in the 50s riding in the car and seeing Fort Crockett and signs advertising tours of the fort. You also used to see what looked like empty machine gun pill boxes every so often along the sea wall. I don’t think there’s any of those left nowadays.
Speaking of technology changing. Coastal defense was taken over by patrolling Airships (Blimps). You may want to do a segment on Naval Air Station Hitchcock near Dickenson, TX. You can see the remnants of the HUGH blimp hangar. A sister hangar, located at Marine Corps Air Station Tustin in California, recently burned down but you can see what it looked like.
Through the '60s there were also concrete observation points all along the seawall where lookouts would watch for enemy vessels during the wars. They've all been removed now. It's hard to imagine a naval battle happening on Galveston Bay. With the exception of Bolivar Roads (the water between Galveston and Bolivar) and the ship channel, none of Galveston Bay is over 10 feet deep on a normal tide. West Bay, East Bay and Lower Galveston Bay are much more shallow than that. Only Upper Galveston Bay and Trinity Bay are deep enough for sailboats or larger motor yachts.
Along the seawall driving towards the east end of the seawall and Fort San Jacinto you can still see the concrete remnants of WWII pill boxes (for machine gun nests, I presume) spaced all along that stretch. The round pill boxes stood about 3 or 4 feet high but there were so many deaths from people racing their hot rod autos on that stretch and fatalities from hitting the pill boxes that they had to remove them down to be level with the top of the seawall.
Great video! It's unfortunate that Fort San Jacinto is largely forgotten, but it is hard to access, and the property appears to be owned by the Coast Guard. Trying to convince them to allow improvements and visitor access would probably be very difficult.
that’s so cool yah my dad took me to that bunker one or a few times when i was a kid and I would “play army”😅 when I was in my “army phase” as a youngster and everything everything everything had to be army to me! haha and I wore camo fatigues to school too even. I was about 8 or 9
During the war with Mexico, the Fort on Bolivar was established to protect the bay and beyond. One of it's resident's was called "The first Lady of Texas" as she gave birth to the first non-native child in Texas while she waited for her husband to return from the war. Unfortunately, he was lolled in Mexico. Life was rough, the weather was harsh, and food was scarce.
What is the slanted part of the road where you're parked at 5:20, please? My best guess is to help the seawall redirect storm surge water, but I cannot find this answer anywhere. Thanks so much!
That is an extra elevation which is part of the Seawall extension project in the 1920s-30s. It’s built up like that all the way from (just about) Ferry Road) to the extreme east end ship channel. I’m trying to find the document that explains the reasoning, but I’m having trouble locating it now. Essentially, all of East End past 6th street has been built up by man over the past 100 years. Lots of dredge mud is sitting behind that wall.
Interesting! Thanks so much!! I drove that road a lot to watch the sunrise and never even thought to question what was on the north side of it. I appreciate everything I've learned from your channel and podcast. ❤
What about the casemates in Galveston City proper? The OMNI Hotel on the seawall where IH 35ends is actually built on one! Even though it can be accessed through the basement of the Hotel, the management won't allow it.
Not WW I - No range.....mx Germ range 5000 technically maybe but return trip dodging ships- WWII YES several times... your pic of the sub @ 6:16 is a Germ. WW I sub- Not a WWII as you say. Uboats and submarines? Its the same sir @ 11:22 Great enthusiasm and letting common folk know these exists .the family watch them exercise volleys from 1912-1945 Keep it up but ya gotta get it right sir....
In 1978 (or so) I was 12. My Father, my best friends Father and me and my friend went on a sneak in, flash light let, adventure of the inside of many of Fort Travis's buildings. I remember finding giant steel doors, a room with a huge safe and a huge amount of Civil Defense food and water. Thats what happen when two old Marines take their kids on an adventure :)
I remember years ago exploring and finding that there’s a tunnel between the seaside turrets and one of the inner “forts”. It was too muddy to explore but I always wanted to because it is not on any drawings of the place I’ve ever found
1978 I was 12 in Galveston as well. We used to explore fort crocket with torches They had all kinds of rooms in there We even killed a 6 foot rattle snake with rocks and sticks
When I was a kid growing up in Gtown vividly recall going into the WW2 bunkers located by Now the San Luis hotel.. the bunker is still there if you look for it.. great video well done, see you at Red Light sometime
My Sister and I used to explore the old bunkers,40s and early 50s, long before the San Luis hotel built over them.
Long before the San Luis hotel was built over them, I hunkered down in the center bunker at Ft. Crockett during a big storm that they reported might turn into a hurricane. Back then all there was stopping me was a chain link fence that had a hole in it, then a small weed/trash-strewn dirt lot to cross quickly to get to them before somebody saw me. I hunkered down in those bunkers quite often because I had found myself homeless now and then. But one dark night, I heard a voice that had seemed to say "Get out.., I live here. This is mine". When I turned on my bright-as-day 9v flashlight to see who I'd be dealing with, all I saw was dirt and some trash scraps. There was nobody else down there, I was sure of it. So I ignore it. That first time I just thought it was the wind, but the second and third time I distinctively knew exactly what I had heard, "Get out..., I live here. This is mine", so I quickly skedaddled. I hunkered at the front of The Buccaneer Hotel facing the gulf out in the open instead, where the strong winds kept blowing me back and forth under their open colonnade. And I never returned to those bunkers either. That was in the mid 70's.
I have odd memories of some kinda structure i couldnt figure out what it was now i know lmao
Another great episode!
Thanks Johnny!!
As an islander, these are some of my favorite spots to hike out to. Old forts are amazing.
I remember as a kid walking the beaches and asking my mother about the bunkers that used to dot the area. Also, at one point, there used to be a concrete ship that you could see from the coastline as well. This would have been around 1972 or 1973.
Yes! There are 2 concrete ships still visible. The Selma, which is near Pelican Island and the Durham, which is on the east side of the north Jetty! Thanks for watching!!
I understand the Germans wanted Cargo, ships I was told they wanted Oil mostly ships. War is Hell. Thanks, always keep up your efforts to Help All of us.
I’ve been to fort San Jacinto before, those first bunkers always amaze me, I like imagining what it was like being there, and what the soldiers would’ve done during the daily life’s there
Also the Hotel and Resort San Luis is built on an Duel Gun Battery that mounted the 12" guns from a retired US Battleship. This is just on such battery that was on Galveston Island. I can remember when I was a kid my parents driving us down Blue Water Highway and seeing one of the other Large Caliber gun emplacements similar to the ones under the San Luis further down the Island past the seawall. Today there is still a smaller gun emplacement with the gun intact at the Quintana County Park in Quintana/Freeport Tx to the south of Galveston. This emplacement was to protect the entrance to the Brazos River. During WW II The Dow Magnesium Company (What is now Dow Chemical) was located in Freeport and produced the lions share of the magnesium used by the US in WW II by extracting it from the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. A story I was once told by a Freeport resident and Plant worker of that period was that during the war the Army and the company had taken and placed a large number of telephone poles and placed them in a field on the other side of the Brazos from the plant with lights strung up on them. At night they would black out the plant and the city then light up those lights on the poles in the field to confuse enemy planes and submarines as to the location of the harbor entrance, the plant, and the river entrance as the large chemical plant was a known reference point on the enemy maps. He said that one night they had what was believed to have been a sub fired 3 or 4 cannon rounds into the field but didn't do any damage other than scare some cows so they left. That was the story that was told to me.
The gun at Quintana County park is not original to the battery.
The original guns were 155MM (6 inch) French guns. The 155mm gun battery replaced a temporary 105mm howitzer field artillery battery on 4 Feb 1942.
Ethyl Dow in Freeport made Ethylene for Aircraft Fuel in WWII, as well. When I was a kid, we would play in the concrete empty turret for the gun on the Quintana side. I remember a round metal track in the bottom that the turret would pivot on. They later put the deck on top to keep people from falling in, and placed that Howitzer on top.
My grandparents lived in the Denver Court/Ft. Crockett area just east of 51st Street for nearly 50 years. When the troops fired practice rounds from the big guns at Crockett during WWII, the concussion was forceful enough to often crack plaster and break windows in those homes. My grandmother even found numerous fractures in her dining room chandelier!
Born and raised in Galveston. You provided some fact I never new.
Great history and research By the way
Enjoyed learning about this forgotten history!
Thank you!! Glad you enjoyed!!!
Thanks!!!
Thanks! I might see what exploring I can do when I come down this fall. Very interesting!!
Excellent video, young fella! Well done. Cheers, mate.
Thanks for a fascinating trip to the past. I live in Galveston, so I'll check them out.
I loved this. I have explored Ft. Travis, and tried to explore Ft. San Jacinto, but forgot my insect repellant and was literally run off by the swarms of mosquitos. My grandfather as sent to Ft. San Jacinto after basic training at Ft. Sam Houston in San Antonio in 1918. He trained there for a couple of months on the coastal artillery before being assigned to Battery C of the 3rd Trench Mortar Battalion (formed there at Ft. San Jacinto) and shipped off to France. As a child, I toured around Galveston with him and listened to his stories. He said that to his knowledge, the Galveston guns never fired at a hostile target.
Well done. Always knew these forts were out there but never made the trek. Thanks!
In the 70’a there used to be large concrete shore gun bunkers where the Galvez hotel is today, we never went in them as rumor had it they were full of rattlesnakes but they always reminded me of the photos of Normandy and the German gun emplacements.
I knew Galveston was important to our military, and it looks like it's going to be a day trip to see these sights. I know the airport served as an airbase (previous podcast), but were there any airship bases on the Island like the one outside of Hitchcock?
I’m actually not sure! I’ll have to dive in and do some research!!
Back around '68 or '69, a few of my buddies took me out to the various forts you showed, but we didn't know the names for them. They were, in order from west to east, what we called the 1st fort, the 2nd fort and "Fort Point." Mostly it was an excuse for us to go out with our BB guns and stomp around in the "wild." We were all about 12 or 13 years old, and spent full days out in "the flats." BB gun "wars", catching rabbits, catching rattle snakes. Endless adventures! Great times! We would enter the flats from the driveway between apartments just east of Barracuda Ave. at the Ferry rd., and walk all day in the flats. We would most times end up at the end of the Seawall getting soft drinks and snacks at "Brown's" concession stand, then head back through the flats because, what fun is walking on the seawall? The last time I was out there was about 7 or so years ago, to scatter one of the guy's ashes where we had so much fun all those years ago.
I visited Fort Crockett, also in Galveston, farther down the seawall, before the San Luis hotel was built on top of it. You can still clearly see the west gun battery today.
Cool! In the early ‘80’s we would sometimes visit Galveston Island when I was in high school and I can barely remember seeing a bunker/emplacement that I thought was visible along Seawall Blvd. I’ve wondered quite often whether any of these still existed; very glad to know that they do.
Thank you, very informative
Pretty cool 😎... Native born Houstonian and today is the first time I've heard of these fortifications 🎉
Thanks for watching!!!
We used to play army out at Fort San Jacinto and the ROTC used to hold war games out there and May still. The bolivar in placement is an evaluation point for hurricane victims
Hugh Mercer used to be very easy to get to around 10-15 years ago. Now, you’d get very muddy boots but that’s about it. Lots of open rooms to explore and you could even climb and sit on the roof. I often wonder if the city purposely flooded the routes and caused the over grown brush to come in cause like I said it never used to be that way I would go often.
Yes! I remember walking out there about 2010 and it wasn’t so muddy. It was purposely filled with dredge mud sometime since then as I understand!
I remember as a kid in the 50s riding in the car and seeing Fort Crockett and signs advertising tours of the fort. You also used to see what looked like empty machine gun pill boxes every so often along the sea wall. I don’t think there’s any of those left nowadays.
Just discovered your channel. Great work!
Thanks! I appreciate you joining us on the channel!!
Speaking of technology changing. Coastal defense was taken over by patrolling Airships (Blimps). You may want to do a segment on Naval Air Station Hitchcock near Dickenson, TX. You can see the remnants of the HUGH blimp hangar. A sister hangar, located at Marine Corps Air Station Tustin in California, recently burned down but you can see what it looked like.
Through the '60s there were also concrete observation points all along the seawall where lookouts would watch for enemy vessels during the wars. They've all been removed now.
It's hard to imagine a naval battle happening on Galveston Bay. With the exception of Bolivar Roads (the water between Galveston and Bolivar) and the ship channel, none of Galveston Bay is over 10 feet deep on a normal tide. West Bay, East Bay and Lower Galveston Bay are much more shallow than that. Only Upper Galveston Bay and Trinity Bay are deep enough for sailboats or larger motor yachts.
Along the seawall driving towards the east end of the seawall and Fort San Jacinto you can still see the concrete remnants of WWII pill boxes (for machine gun nests, I presume) spaced all along that stretch. The round pill boxes stood about 3 or 4 feet high but there were so many deaths from people racing their hot rod autos on that stretch and fatalities from hitting the pill boxes that they had to remove them down to be level with the top of the seawall.
Great video! It's unfortunate that Fort San Jacinto is largely forgotten, but it is hard to access, and the property appears to be owned by the Coast Guard. Trying to convince them to allow improvements and visitor access would probably be very difficult.
I wish atleast one of the batteries could become a landmark, similar to Fort Travis.
that’s so cool yah my dad took me to that bunker one or a few times when i was a kid and I would “play army”😅 when I was in my “army phase” as a youngster and everything everything everything had to be army to me! haha and I wore camo fatigues to school too even. I was about 8 or 9
Hahaha that’s awesome!
During the war with Mexico, the Fort on Bolivar was established to protect the bay and beyond. One of it's resident's was called "The first Lady of Texas" as she gave birth to the first non-native child in Texas while she waited for her husband to return from the war. Unfortunately, he was lolled in Mexico. Life was rough, the weather was harsh, and food was scarce.
Will Galveston Bay Freeze Over...Again?
ruclips.net/video/xmWF8Gvisvs/видео.html
I mention her in the video. Crazy weather indeed!
I would love to see Galveston County or Texas (TPWD) place replicas of the now-gone artillery pieces at Travis, Fort San Jacinto and Crockett
I agree!!!
What is the slanted part of the road where you're parked at 5:20, please? My best guess is to help the seawall redirect storm surge water, but I cannot find this answer anywhere. Thanks so much!
That is an extra elevation which is part of the Seawall extension project in the 1920s-30s. It’s built up like that all the way from (just about) Ferry Road) to the extreme east end ship channel. I’m trying to find the document that explains the reasoning, but I’m having trouble locating it now.
Essentially, all of East End past 6th street has been built up by man over the past 100 years. Lots of dredge mud is sitting behind that wall.
Interesting! Thanks so much!! I drove that road a lot to watch the sunrise and never even thought to question what was on the north side of it. I appreciate everything I've learned from your channel and podcast. ❤
Anyone else notice something walking out of the brush at the 2:45 mark above his left shoulder.
There are lots of critters, questionable people, and cryptids roaming around the east end. Def one of the 3.
Back before Off we used a boiled bear grease as a repellant
That’s what I’m talking about, Hugh Glass
My 96 yr old uncle said a uboat was sighted off galveston during ww2
ruclips.net/video/3rLQODjyP8c/видео.htmlsi=aphmhPUFkkXZ3Zsw
love your program..too bad people drop their trash where ever,,come on people !
o my
What about the casemates in Galveston City proper? The OMNI Hotel on the seawall where IH 35ends is actually built on one! Even though it can be accessed through the basement of the Hotel, the management won't allow it.
Not WW I - No range.....mx Germ range 5000 technically maybe but return trip dodging ships- WWII YES several times... your pic of the sub @ 6:16 is a Germ. WW I sub- Not a WWII as you say. Uboats and submarines? Its the same sir @ 11:22 Great enthusiasm and letting common folk know these exists .the family watch them exercise volleys from 1912-1945 Keep it up but ya gotta get it right sir....
I make “common folk” videos, sir.
And today an enemy could just boat in and land troops without any resistance
Bolivar. BOLIVAR. Not "bolliver".
Lol
bugs, hurricanes and probably alligators. I would not want to be stationed there.
It would be wild
You forgot to mention rattlesnakes and wolves. Or are they coyotes?
@@BeeFunKnee
Probably coyotes. Wolves went extinct in Texas by ranchers and farmers.
Where would you want to be stationed? Hawaii, California…?