Tower Dupre, 1828 (CP No. 34) N29 56.709 W89 50.123 04.26.2015

A tower no more - Tower Dupre is nothing more than a pile of b

Originally constructed on land and standing two stories tall, Louisian was home to one of only  about a dozen such "Martello" towers in the western hemisphere.  Parkerson states the name as "originating from a round watch tower on Martella Point in the Gulf of San Fiorenzo in the Corsican Islands.  This tower held off the British navy for two days in 1794." Impressed with it's design, the Martello tower became popular due to the small number of hands needed to man the three-gun garrison.  Although modified or improved the tower was copied the world over.  Specific to Dupre, this tower at one time housed as many as a dozen guns.

Solid walls four feet thick were no match for Katrina's wind and surf

Tower Dupre, guarding the inland shore of Lake Borgne, stood as a sentinel for nearly 180 years without seeing any action.  It changed hands during the War of Northern Agression and, like most Martellos, eventually became abandoned - the towers became outdated as military technolgy advanced the power and range of larger guns.

Sadly, like many assets that once protected the NOLA area, Hurrican Katrina destroyed Tower Dupre.  Today, the site is nothing more than an island of breakdown and piles of brick.  The area can use the term island only very loosely - once you step off the brick, you're wet.  Like many of the "must see" places I intended to visit, I waited too late to visit Tower Dupre. 

A possible hub for a rotating cannon?

Inside the pile were a few notable items: a couple of metal bed frames and a steel line for piping gas or water  Of particular interest, and lying just under the water's surface was a large spoked wheel.  After a brief inspection we concluded that perhaps it was part of a hub mount for a rotating gun.