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Civil War Defenses of Washington
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Civil War Defenses of Washington
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On forested hills surrounding the nation's capital are the remnants of a complex system of Civil War fortifications. These strategic buttresses transformed the young capital into one of the world's most fortified cities. By 1865, 68 forts and 93 batteries armed with over 800 cannons encircled Washington, DC. Today, you can visit 18 of the original sites now managed by the National Park Service.
Activities: Arts and Culture · Biking · First Person Interpretation · Food · Guided Tours · Hiking · Junior Ranger Program · Living History · Mountain Biking · Park Film · Picnicking · Road Biking · Self-Guided Tours - Auto · Self-Guided Tours - Walking · Theater · Wildlife Watching
Monthly recreation visits · 2025
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Annual recreation visits · 1979–2025
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Published entrance fees
No fee entries were supplied in this snapshot. Check the official park page.
Published passes
No fee entries were supplied in this snapshot. Check the official park page.
Published operating hours
Rock Creek Park sites · The park grounds at Battery Kemble, Battleground National Cemetery, Fort Bayard, Fort Bunker Hill, Fort DeRussy, Fort Reno, Fort Slocum, Fort Stevens, and Fort Totten are managed by Rock Creek Park These sites are open daily from dawn to dusk.
National Capital Parks — East sites · The park grounds at Fort Carroll, Fort Chaplin, Fort Davis, Fort Dupont, Fort Foote, Fort Greble, Fort Mahan, Fort Ricketts, and Fort Stanton are managed by National Capital Parks — East. These sites are open daily from 6:00 am to 10:00 pm.
George Washington Memorial Parkway site · The park grounds at Fort Marcy are managed by George Washington Memorial Parkway. This site is open daily from 6 am to 10 pm.
Fees, facilities and activities are the 2026-10-03 NPS snapshot. Historical visitation describes recorded visits, not crowding forecasts or present conditions.
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Official directions ↗Campgrounds (0)
Official NPS information and current conditions ↗
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SOURCES & DEFINITIONS
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Source: National Park Service API for sites, facilities, campground locations and published fee entries; NPS Public Use Statistics for monthly recreation visits, 1979–2025. Snapshot retrieved 2026-10-03. 474 NPS site records include 62 national-park API records; Sequoia and Kings Canyon share one API record. These record counts are not the official count of individually designated parks. 392 API site records have matched visitation history, including the separately reported Sequoia and Kings Canyon visit totals combined for their shared API record. 665 campgrounds are included.
Complete monthly series reconcile with the source’s annual totals. Published annual totals remain available for years with partial monthly reporting. Four monthly entries contain negative accounting corrections. They remain in the archived data and annual totals, and are unavailable as ordinary monthly visit counts. Blank data is not zero. Recreation visits are visits, not unique people. Month as percent of annual peak = selected month visits ÷ largest monthly count that year × 100, requiring twelve nonnegative monthly values. This helps compare recorded seasonality; it is not a crowding forecast, reservation forecast, or present-condition report.
Activities and amenities reflect published NPS entries, rather than a guarantee of access on a particular day. Fees and pass categories are dated 2026-10-03; official site and reservation links provide current conditions and rules. Campground points are published NPS coordinates. Offshore sites can be viewed on the world extent. Broader public-land agencies are outside this reviewed NPS snapshot.
World outlines: Natural Earth 1:50m map units, public domain. U.S. state outlines: Census via us-atlas. Source licenses apply to their respective inputs and derived data. Download the derived parks snapshot · Source manifest, retrieval dates and SHA-256 hashes.
Archived inputs and attribution (14)
- nps-parks.json · National Park Service · NPS federal data; media rights vary by credit · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 3,921,936 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: 29b719dea3c3361c4ef1d7c0f068da09ee366e5335907442453b08db7737072b - nps-campgrounds.json · National Park Service · NPS federal data; media rights vary by credit · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 3,464,748 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: 9762634332c69e5ed729fbe4751a163cab534722c07c7e595b857e9a372b75e3 - nps-campgrounds-500.json · National Park Service · NPS federal data; media rights vary by credit · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 967,966 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: 4160009fb0ddc173680428bba03b765398deeca9d303a518821967c7db5fea20 - nps-visitation-2025-2025.csv · National Park Service · NPS federal data · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 1,071,221 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: 878c51940ae94a29c7e47518d2321713e6d48ad9b008408530723745ca5fab5a - nps-visitation-2021-2024.csv · National Park Service · NPS federal data · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 4,209,731 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: 508548d54089885eb78af5a81c63856ba289c01ee8f39c2d096267b3cf9ce243 - nps-visitation-1979-1983.csv · National Park Service · NPS federal data · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 3,868,488 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: 494795b9ffb6da1f00e10614cde87ef8b18aca67e9c504c2196ba0346c21ddd7 - nps-visitation-1984-1988.csv · National Park Service · NPS federal data · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 4,171,732 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: cd6e3b86c83ecc9ab11d123ea8f560f0590446020fe66eea21e272eb8d931eb7 - nps-visitation-1989-1993.csv · National Park Service · NPS federal data · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 4,393,574 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: 22960690990cec0c7af0e7a55d87ef7ee3d8a116afd81bf753c821f65e50ad00 - nps-visitation-1994-1998.csv · National Park Service · NPS federal data · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 4,538,236 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: c021fdd6108c9d3e1047b954376cf8e01c4f8abf0f327dfe081596dff7939e48 - nps-visitation-1999-2003.csv · National Park Service · NPS federal data · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 4,704,673 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: da3f808031e6f26e1e36c42cc11403b415e24e67844762ac51f33998d2c1cd5f - nps-visitation-2004-2008.csv · National Park Service · NPS federal data · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 4,844,655 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: 373f1d9ae9eff33e2e73b3bfc26d26c6504d2f831fc5b41c5c1e3df7bade6047 - nps-visitation-2009-2013.csv · National Park Service · NPS federal data · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 4,928,350 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: 968591a7dd40985cc44fea48568b8a0880953c7b982b328a6c88077d064c12c2 - nps-visitation-2014-2018.csv · National Park Service · NPS federal data · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 5,057,268 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: 76f1e2173bee73eee3550e4e2e3a987e19d67d4f6841c9c726fa412360a3fb20 - nps-visitation-2019-2020.csv · National Park Service · NPS federal data · retrieved 2026-10-03 · 2,028,678 uncompressed bytes. Published source · Archived input (gzip)
SHA-256: 661d426529aa1b5771d52e29c90758b943edf883fa8e1f9c53f76851e450e5f1
