Fort Berkeley was the bulwark of the defensive fortifications protecting English Harbour, Antigua. The preventative nature of its construction was enough to deter direct attack on English Harbour, so the fort never was never used in any combat scenario. The small peninsula acted as a gate for the harbor, permitting entrance and exit of vessels from English Harbour. Ships were forced to sail directly at the fortifications of Fort Berkeley, where the winds would force them to drop their sails and be pulled into English Harbour by ropes from Fort Berkeley.
The first fortifications on the peninsula were originally constructed in 1704, 21 years before the Royal Navy’s presence in English Harbour (Waters 2018:158). This consisted of a small square redoubt built near the tip of the jutting peninsula, constructed by the local enslaved population (Waters 2018:155).
The first addition to the fortification was the guardhouse, constructed in 1726 (Waters 2018:155). The guardhouse provided soldiers with shelter from sea winds and windows to observe the mouth of the harbour and Fort Charlotte to the East, and the Atlantic Ocean to the South. It also served as a storehouse for gunpowder at Fort Berkeley before the construction of the bombproof magazine in 1811 (Waters 2018:156).
The most extensive construction of Fort Berkeley occurred in the 1740s under the command of Commodore Charles Knowles. Knowles constructed a linear defensive wall with embrasures for cannons at Fort Berkeley (Waters 2018:157-58). This construction was completed with the funding and professional engineering of the Royal Navy, indicated by the uniformity and alignment of its construction. Fort Berkeley was armed with 29 cannons at the peak of its use (Waters 2018:155). Originally, the fortification was occupied by locally trained Antiguan gunners. It was only in 1783 that Fort Berkeley was occupied and staffed by British soldiers.
The bombproof gunpowder magazine was constructed in 1811, during the peak of the Napoleonic Wars. The significantly increased traffic of British Royal Navy ships into English Harbour at this time likely prompted its construction (Waters 2018:155). The structure was built to hold approximately 300 barrels of gunpowder (Etherington 2002:199), and contained a cooperage and sifting room for packing explosives.
The wooden guardhouse roof has has deteriorated from wind and rain exposure, with portions of the roof missing. The bombproof magazine is largely intact, with some historic and modern graffiti carved on the inside walls. The inside ceiling of the magazine shows signs of water intrusion, such as the discoloration of the mortar on the top sections. One cannon remains, forged in 1805 and stamped with a King George III seal (Oliver 1894:5). The most significant erosion at the fort is located at the edge of the crenelated wall built by Royal Navy. On the windward side of the fortification, wave action has caused a 5.5m section of the wall to collapse into the ocean. Almost 3m of the stone walkway has also eroded either when the wall broke apart or after that event (Figure 3.2). The cliff immediately below the broken section is significantly eroded so more damage is likely to occur with increasing storm activity in the Caribbean.
Figure 2: Aerial view of the eroded wall of Fort Berkeley and underlying cliffside (Photo by DJ Schaefer, ECU, 2022).