1820 James Monroe - The Bernard Board Report of 1821 on Coastal Defense

In 1815, Congress appropriated $800,000 for a very ambitious seacoast defensive system.  The first step was to develop a plan, so President Madison appointed a Board of Engineers to visit potential sites and prepare plans for the third seacoast defense system.  The Bernard Board Report of 1821, named after  French engineer Simon Bernard outlined the cost to build a full defense system, prioritized the forts, and outlined the tasks to complete the entire system.  Based upon policy guidance from President James Madison and his successor James Monroe,  the Board Report of 1821 provided a road map for a comprehensive national military policy in America for the next 30 years, guiding the construction the sea coastal fortifications.   But in 1820, Congress was still waiting for the report which President Monroe described as "a well-digested plan, founded on military principles, connecting the whole together, combining security with economy".  Thus, Monroe needed to remind Congress in his State of the Union address of 1820, that building a coastal defense system was not something that could be rushed, and "could not be prepared without repeated examinations of the most exposed and difficult parts".   The nation needed to be patient as the Board collected the materials needed from the report.  But patience would pay off as Monroe reported, "when completed it will afford very great if not complete protection to our Atlantic frontier in the event of another war - protection sufficient to counterbalance in a single campaign with an enemy powerful at sea".

Here is President Monroe's status on the Board Report from his 1820 State of the Union Address.

"Considerable progress has been made during the present season in examining the coast and its various bays and other inlets, in the collection of materials, and in the construction of fortifications for the defense of the Union at several of the positions at which it has been decided to erect such works. At Mobile Point and Dauphin Island, and at the Rigolets, leading to Lake Pontchartrain, materials to a considerable amount have been collected, and all the necessary preparations made for the commencement of the works. At Old Point Comfort, at the mouth of the James River, and at the Rip-Rap, on the opposite shore in the Chesapeake Bay, materials to a vast amount have been collected; and at the Old Point some progress has been made in the construction of the fortification, which is on a very extensive scale. The work at Fort Washington, on this river, will be completed early in the next spring, and that on the Pea Patch, in the Delaware, in the course of the next season. Fort Diamond, at the Narrows, in the harbor of NY, will be finished this year. The works at Boston, NY, Baltimore, Norfolk, Charleston, and Niagara have been in part repaired, and the coast of NC, extending south to Cape Fear, has been examined, as have likewise other parts of the coast eastward of Boston.

Great exertions have been made to push forward these works with the utmost dispatch possible; but when their extent is considered, with the important purposes for which they are intended - the defense of the whole coast, and, in consequence, of the whole interior - and that they are to last for ages, it will be manifest that a well- digested plan, founded on military principles, connecting the whole together, combining security with economy, could not be prepared without repeated examinations of the most exposed and difficult parts, and that it would also take considerable time to collect the materials at the several points where they would be required.

From all the light that has been shed on this subject I am satisfied that every favorable anticipation which has been formed of this great undertaking will be verified, and that when completed it will afford very great if not complete protection to our Atlantic frontier in the event of another war - protection sufficient to counterbalance in a single campaign with an enemy powerful at sea the expense of all these works, without taking into the estimate the saving of the lives of so many of our citizens, the protection of our towns and other property, or the tendency of such works to prevent war."

When the report was delivered to Congress in 1821, it identified six conditions that proposed fortifications needed to meet.

1. Keep enemies out of important harbors - secure them to the U.S. navy.
2. Deprive the enemy of any positions in our territory which may give naval superiority.
3. Cover our great cities against attack.
4. Prevent any blockades against our internal navigation.
5. Protect internal navigation of our coasts. 
6. Protect our naval establishments.

The report highlighted that our current systems of fortifications were inadequate, and helped to prioritize efforts from fortifying the seacoast to constructing a stronger navy.   Fortifications were prioritized into tiers. The first-tier were those that protected a naval yard or critical commercial enter including Chesapeake Bay, New Orleans and New York.  The second-tier were those needed to defend naval stations or secondary commercial centers such as Baltimore and South Carolina.   The third-tier were those that protected waterways around rivers and other major waterways.   The original Board Report called for 50 fortifications to be constructed and by 1831 it was increased to 90, but in the end due to other demands on funds, only 42 were built. 

http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=29462
Coastal Fortifications and National Military Policy, 1815-1835, by MAJ Clinton W. Brown, 49 pages. http://www.dtic.mil/docs/citations/AD1001248
http://www.stateoftheunionhistory.com/2016/12/1815-james-madison-third-seacoast.html
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/3b/Fort_Delaware_Pea_Patch_Island_Showing_Moat_in_2011.jpg