SW098 Fort Cooper Days Replays 16-day Skirmish Between Militia/Seminole on Withlacoochee Cove

 

In the spring of 1836, U.S. Army Major General Winfield Scott unleashed his three-prong campaign to subdue Seminole, end the war, and ship the defiant tribe to the Oklahoma territory. The task of erecting a blockhouse and pickets for defense and observation fell to Georgia Volunteer Major, Mark Anthony Cooper. He built his namesake fortification in the Cove of the Withlacoochee River. The square palisade fort included two redoubts and a two-story blockhouse with a 6-pounder cannon mounted in it. The post was used as an observation and dispatch site, a horse depot, a scouting post, a makeshift infirmary, a watering hole – and a safe spot from which Cooper’s militiamen could venture outside the main gate to repulse the Seminole siege.

Under constant attack for more than two weeks, Major Cooper’s command held its defensive position. It turned out to be the longest single continual battle of Scott’s 1836 campaign.

On March 12 and 13, Fort Cooper State Park holds its annual Fort Cooper Days to commemorate this engagement. The long siege is condensed into a battle spectacle demonstrated twice each weekend day. Living historians – militia and Seminole -- demonstrate their wares and crafts and costumed attires. The park is located near Inverness, Florida.

Joining us to recount a bit of the battle and how the park is commemorating it is Jeanne Messersmith. Jeanne is the treasurer for The Friends of Fort Cooper. The Friends is a citizen support organization that aids the park rangers in carrying out their mission in presenting the park in a family friendly setting with historical accuracy.

 

Fort Cooper Days photos by Andrew Foster

 

 

Host Patrick Swan is a board member with the Seminole Wars Foundation. He is a combat veteran and of the U.S. Army, serving in Iraq, Afghanistan, Kuwait, and Kosovo, and at the Pentagon after 9/11. A military historian, he holds masters degrees in Public History, Communication, and Homeland Security, and is a graduate of the US Army War College with an advanced degree in strategic studies. This podcast is recorded at the homestead of the Seminole Wars Foundation in Bushnell, Florida. 

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