Fort Sumter Fort Sumter Fort Sumter is a sea fort in Charleston, South Carolina, notable for two battles of the American Civil War. It was one of a number of special forts planned after the War of 1812, combining high walls and heavy masonry, and classified as Third System, as a grade of structural integrity. Work started in 1829, but was incomplete by 1860, when South Carolina seceded from the Union. The First Battle of Fort Sumter began on April 12, 1861, when Confederate artillery fired on the Union garrison. These were the first shots of the war and continued all day,
Fort Sumter Hotel in 1946. In April 1947, Tennessee Williams and agent Audrey Wood met with Irene Selznick at the Fort Sumter Hotel to discuss her producing his newest play A Streetcar Named Desire (just recently renamed from the original title Poker Night). Tennessee Williams: Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh by John Lahr, 2014, p. 127. In 1956, the hotel considered an expansion of 60 to 100 rooms to accommodate the increase in convention business seen in Charleston. In 1973, the hotel, then operated by Sheraton Hotels, was purchased for $850,000 with plans to convert the building into a condominium project with about