Ft. Macon Archway
Eastern North Carolina

This series of brick archways at Fort Macon, North Carolina, leads to a dark, mystical portal. What mystery do these walls hold?

This ancient fort has an exterior defensive wall that surrounds a large building, and the building protects courtyard inside of it. This allows for several layers of protection within the fort and a number of defensive positions. The rooms within the interior building are nearly all connected through a series of archways like the ones in this picture. The archways are along the exterior wall, where the windows that looked out onto the exterior fort wall are located.

These windows were a key defensive position – snipers could be fairly well protected here and defend against invaders coming up over the exterior fort wall. The archways served multiple purposes. One was to allow the heat from nearby fireplaces to travel to the soldiers at these defensive posts during colder months – or to allow breezes to travel more freely in warmer months. Another was to allow the soldiers to quickly move to an area if backup was needed.

This architectural photograph shows the details of the wooden floor and the thick brick walls that were the soldiers’ home. It is an excellent example of fine art travel photography.