Tower Dupre

Tower Dupre was a hexagonal Martello Tower constructed between 1827 and 1830 at the entrance to Bayou Dupre in St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana, as part of the Third System of coastal defenses protecting New Orleans and the Mississippi River mouth. Armed with seven cannons including heavy seacoast howitzers and mortars, the tower guarded the inland shore of Lake Borgne for nearly 180 years without seeing military action. During the Civil War, the fortification was garrisoned by Confederate forces until the fall of New Orleans in 1862, after which it was abandoned in 1883. Though Hurricane Katrina destroyed the structure, Tower Dupre remains significant as a landmark in Louisiana's maritime defense history.