Crab Island is a roughly 40 acres (161,874.4 m²) limestone

Limestone

Limestone is a sedimentary rock composed largely of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of calcium carbonate . Many limestones are composed from skeletal fragments of marine organisms such as coral or foraminifera....

 island situated just outside Plattsburgh Bay

Plattsburgh Bay

Plattsburgh Bay was the site of the Battle of Plattsburgh, a naval and land engagement on September 11, 1814. During the battle, U.S. land and naval forces repulsed the last foreign invasion attempt on the northern states during the War of 1812. It was declared a National Historic Landmark in...

 in the town of Plattsburgh

Plattsburgh (town), New York

Plattsburgh is a town in Clinton County, New York, United States. The population was 11,870 at the 2010 census. The town is named after Zephaniah Platt, an early land owner.The Town of Plattsburgh borders the City of Plattsburgh...

  in Clinton County

Clinton County, New York

Clinton County is a county located in the U.S. state of New York. As of the 2010 census, the population was 82,128. Its name is in honor of the first Governor of New York as a state, George Clinton. Its county seat is Plattsburgh.-History:...

 in upstate New York's Lake Champlain

Lake Champlain

Lake Champlain is a natural, freshwater lake in North America, located mainly within the borders of the United States but partially situated across the Canada—United States border in the Canadian province of Quebec.The New York portion of the Champlain Valley includes the eastern portions of...

. During the War of 1812

War of 1812

The War of 1812 was a military conflict fought between the forces of the United States of America and those of the British Empire. The Americans declared war in 1812 for several reasons, including trade restrictions because of Britain's ongoing war with France, impressment of American merchant...

, the island was utilized as a military field hospital

Field hospital

A field hospital is a large mobile medical unit that temporarily takes care of casualties on-site before they can be safely transported to more permanent hospital facilities...

 for convalescent soldiers as well as both British and American casualties of the Battle of Plattsburgh

Battle of Plattsburgh

The Battle of Plattsburgh, also known as the Battle of Lake Champlain, ended the final invasion of the northern states during the War of 1812...

. The island is the site of a mass grave

Mass grave

A mass grave is a grave containing multiple number of human corpses, which may or may not be identified prior to burial. There is no strict definition of the minimum number of bodies required to constitute a mass grave, although the United Nations defines a mass grave as a burial site which...

, believed to contain the remains of roughly 150 of those casualties. The island is infamous locally for its poison ivy

Poison ivy

Toxicodendron radicans, better known as poison ivy , is a poisonous North American plant that is well known for its production of urushiol, a clear liquid compound found within the sap of the plant that causes an itching rash in most people who touch it...

, which grows there heavily. Its name is thought to come from the large amounts of "crabs," ancient fossilized shells, trilobite

Trilobite

Trilobites are a well-known fossil group of extinct marine arthropods that form the class Trilobita. The first appearance of trilobites in the fossil record defines the base of the Atdabanian stage of the Early Cambrian period , and they flourished throughout the lower Paleozoic era before...

s, etc., found along the island's limestone shoreline.

The Naval Battle

Crab Island played an important role during the September 1814 Battle of Plattsburgh, New York. On the morning of September 11th 1814, the tiny island served as the southern end of Commodore

Commodore (rank)

Commodore is a military rank used in many navies that is superior to a navy captain, but below a rear admiral. Non-English-speaking nations often use the rank of flotilla admiral or counter admiral as an equivalent .It is often regarded as a one-star rank with a NATO code of OF-6, but is not always...

 Thomas Macdonough

Thomas MacDonough

Thomas Macdonough was an early-19th-century American naval officer noted for his roles in the first Barbary War, and the War of 1812. He was the son of a revolutionary officer, Thomas Sr. who lived close to Middleton, Delaware. Being the sixth child born, he came from a large family of ten...

's battle line. Macdonough had moored his ships end to end between it and Cumberland Head to the north, forming a line across the entrance to Plattsburgh Bay. Macdonough strategised that this arrangement of his warships would either force the British to engage his anchored squadron

Squadron (naval)

A squadron, or naval squadron, is a unit of 3-4 major warships, transport ships, submarines, or sometimes small craft that may be part of a larger task force or a fleet...

 immediately after rounding Cumberland Head, which would give him the advantage, or force them to sail farther south around Crab Island at his rear. In this case, the British ships would then come within range of the guns of the American fortifications

Old Stone Barracks

The "Old Stone Barracks" is the last remaining structure of a proposed quadrangle of early U.S. Army barracks built at Plattsburgh, New York in 1838. Of the four main buildings initially planned for the Plattsburgh post, only two were ever constructed, an officer's barracks and an enlisted...

 ashore. To assist in this, a battery of two 6 lb (2.7 kg). cannon

Cannon

A cannon is any piece of artillery that uses gunpowder or other usually explosive-based propellents to launch a projectile. Cannon vary in caliber, range, mobility, rate of fire, angle of fire, and firepower; different forms of cannon combine and balance these attributes in varying degrees,...

 were also emplaced by the Americans on the northern tip of Crab island and were manned by a crew of convalescents from the field hospital. During the nearly two and a half hour action, an 11-gun British sloop

Sloop

A sloop is a sail boat with a fore-and-aft rig and a single mast farther forward than the mast of a cutter....

, the H.M.S. Finch, commanded by Lieutenant William Hicks, ran hard aground on a reef

Reef

In nautical terminology, a reef is a rock, sandbar, or other feature lying beneath the surface of the water ....

 just to the north-east of the island and became engaged in a fierce cannon duel with the Crab Island battery. Lieutenant Hicks would later recall that his crew "had the pleasure of killing or wounding every man at the guns on shore and silence them."

The Hospital

The military hospital on Crab Island was first established around September 6th 1814, just prior to the Battle of Plattsburgh. The hospital consisted mainly of rows of "tents" quickly constructed of boards and canvas and several hastily built log structures. Convalescent or invalid soldiers who were unable to fight were initially evacuated to the island before the commencement of hostilities to prevent them from becoming caught up or overrun by the fighting ashore. Many of these were later transported in bateau

Bateau

A bateau or batteau is a shallow-draft, flat-bottomed boat which was used extensively across North America, especially in the colonial period and in the fur trade. It was traditionally pointed at both ends but came in a wide variety of sizes...

s from Crab Island to a larger hospital at Burlington, Vermont

Burlington, Vermont

Burlington is the largest city in the U.S. state of Vermont and the shire town of Chittenden County. Burlington lies south of the U.S.-Canadian border and some south of Montreal....

, 25 miles (40.2 km) across the lake. The Island's hospital was placed under the direction of a U.S. Army surgeon

Surgeon

In medicine, a surgeon is a specialist in surgery. Surgery is a broad category of invasive medical treatment that involves the cutting of a body, whether human or animal, for a specific reason such as the removal of diseased tissue or to repair a tear or breakage...

, Doctor James Mann. At the time, the number of invalids on the general hospital reports alone numbered 720 men. Following the naval battle, as the nearest point of land to it, the Crab Island hospital absorbed the dead and wounded of both fleets. The dead, including those that died on the island and those that washed ashore, numbered 150. They were buried shoulder to shoulder in three long trenches to the south of the hospital. The bodies of officers killed in the battle, including one initially buried on Crab Island, all received military burials in Plattsburgh's Riverside Cemetery, while the enlisted men were left in the mass graves out on the island. The actual site of the graves on Crab Island was never marked.

Aftermath

Following years of effort by numerous Plattsburgh citizens, money for a proper memorial on the Island was appropriated by Congress

United States Congress

The United States Congress is the bicameral legislature of the federal government of the United States, consisting of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The Congress meets in the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C....

 in the early 1900s. In 1903, a 100 feet (30.5 m) iron flagstaff, designed to be reminiscent of a ship's mast, was erected and in 1908, a 50 feet (15.2 m) granite obelisk

Obelisk

An obelisk is a tall, four-sided, narrow tapering monument which ends in a pyramid-like shape at the top, and is said to resemble a petrified ray of the sun-disk. A pair of obelisks usually stood in front of a pylon...

, known as the Crab Island Soldiers and Sailors Monument and mounting a commemorative bronze

Bronze

Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal...

 plaque on each face, was constructed. A series of inter-connecting gravel paths were cleared allowing access for visitors and a wharf

Wharf

A wharf or quay is a structure on the shore of a harbor where ships may dock to load and unload cargo or passengers.Such a structure includes one or more berths , and may also include piers, warehouses, or other facilities necessary for handling the ships.A wharf commonly comprises a fixed...

 was built to accommodate boats. A full time caretaker was hired to live in a small cottage on the island and in 1909, by act of Congress, the island was officially re-named Macdonough National Military Park.

This however, was not to last. By 1930, the island had been mostly abandoned. The one and only caretaker had left in 1915 and the caretaker's cottage burned in 1929. The island remained mostly devoid of activity until the 1950s, when United States Air Force

United States Air Force

The United States Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the American uniformed services. Initially part of the United States Army, the USAF was formed as a separate branch of the military on September 18, 1947 under the National Security Act of...

 personnel stationed at nearby Plattsburgh Air Force Base

Plattsburgh Air Force Base

Plattsburgh Air Force Base is a former United States Air Force Strategic Air Command base covering 3,447 acres in the extreme northeast corner of New York, 20 miles south of the Canadian border...

 began a project of clearing portions of the island for a base recreational area. This initiative also proved short lived. In 1967, the Government auctioned the island off, graves, monument, and all, a National Military Cemetery, as surplus property. Crab Island changed private hands several times throughout the proceeding decades and was only saved from development by the efforts of a vigilant few who succeeded in changing the islands zoning regulations.

In 1988, New York State finally recognized the historic significance of the Island and took it via eminent domain

Eminent domain

Eminent domain , compulsory purchase , resumption/compulsory acquisition , or expropriation is an action of the state to seize a citizen's private property, expropriate property, or seize a citizen's rights in property with due monetary compensation, but without the owner's consent...

. Since that time, much progress has been made in returning the Island to its former glory. The long overgrown 1908 trail system has been cleared. In August, 2003, a dedicated group of volunteers restored and re-erected the unique iron flagpole, which had fallen in a windstorm in 1996. A bronze plaque placed at the foot of it memorializes the names of the American dead buried on the island. Crab Island is purported to be one of the only places in the World where both British and American soldiers were buried indiscriminately in the same graves. The actual site of their graves has never been established.