Camp Parapet

Camp Parapet Powder Magazine
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
The Camp Parapet powder magazine in 2008
Location	Arlington St., E of Causeway Blvd., Metairie, Louisiana
Coordinates	29°57′39″N 90°9′20″W / 29.96083°N 90.15556°WCoordinates: 29°57′39″N 90°9′20″W / 29.96083°N 90.15556°W
Area	less than one acre
NRHP Reference #	77000671[1]
Added to NRHP	May 24, 1977

Camp Parapet was a Civil War fortification at Shrewsbury, Jefferson Parish, Louisiana, a bit more than a mile upriver from the current city limits of New Orleans.

History

The fortification consisted of a Confederate defensive line about a mile and 3/4 long stretching from the Mississippi River northward to Metairie Ridge. (The area further north from the ridge to Lake Pontchartrain was at the time swampland.) This was intended to protect the city of New Orleans from Union attack from upriver. As the Union fleet took the city by sailing in from below, the fortification was never used. After the capture of New Orleans, U.S. forces garrisoned and expanded the fortifications to defend against a Confederate counter-attack, which never came.

Remains

Powder magazine

The only remaining structure of the fortification is the powder magazine, of brick enclosed in an earth mound. It is located off Causeway Boulevard near the American Legion Post 267, preserved in a small park and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1977.

Cemetery site

Nearby is the historic Shrewsbury (Camp Parapet) Cemetery, the site of the camp's cemetery, where 7,000 Union bodies were once interred before being moved to Chalmette National Cemetery.

See also

• New Orleans in the American Civil War

References

1. Staff (2010-07-09). "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service.

External links

• New Orleans area Forts with information on Camp Parapet.