Fort Sumter was constructed in 1829 to defend the city of Charleston and its harbor in partnership with nearby Fort Moultrie. After the War of 1812, the Department of War authorized the construction of a system of brick forts along the southeastern coastline, which included Fort Sumter.

Charleston was a major political, economic, and social center in the antebellum South. A month after the November 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln, delegates from the secession convention gathered in Charleston to sign South Carolina's Ordinance of Secession. At the time, Major Robert Anderson commanded the U.S. defense of Fort Moultrie. Shortly after the Ordinance of Secession was signed, Anderson secretly moved his men and equipment to Fort Sumter under the cover of night and spent the next few months preparing the fort for battle.

Attempts to send supplies to Anderson in early January 1861 were repelled by gunfire from Citadel officers and cadets on nearby Morris Island. A month after Lincoln's inauguration, he sent provisions to Anderson. But before supplies arrived, Confederate forces ordered Anderson to evacuate the fort. When he refused, gun and cannon fire bombarded Sumter in the early morning hours of April 12, 1861. The United States was officially at war with itself.

Fort Sumter again played a role in the Civil War during the Union's Siege of Charleston Harbor from 1863 to 1864. It suffered major damage from Union bombardment. The Confederate soldiers defending Charleston at Fort Sumter, Fort Wagner, and Morris Island withstood the attacks. After a year and a half the Union forces outside the harbor had to turn their attention elsewhere.

Despite Sumter's heavy damage, the fort was never rebuilt. The majority of the rubble remained at the fort until the 1870s, when it was cleared for use as a lighthouse station. In response to the Spanish-American war, a concrete battery was added to the parade ground in 1899 to modernize the outdated fort. After World War II, the United States War Department decommissioned the fort and gave it to the National Park Service, where in 1948 it became a national monument.

Narrative researched and written by University of West Florida graduate student Stephanie Powell.