Fort O'Rourke Fair Haven. No visible remains of the fort can be found. Fort O'Rourke Fort O'Rourke is a former Union Army installation now located in the Belle Haven area of Fairfax County in the U.S. state of Virginia. It was the southernmost fort built to defend Washington, D.C. in the American Civil War. Following the surrender of Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina, on April 14, 1861, President Abraham Lincoln declared that "an insurrection existed," and called for 75,000 troops to be called up to quash the rebellion. The move sparked resentment in many other southern states, which promptly moved to
Fort Sumter 135 guns in three tiers of gun emplacements, although it was never filled near its full capacity. On December 26, 1860, six days after South Carolina seceded from the Union, U.S. Army Major Robert Anderson abandoned the indefensible Fort Moultrie, spiking its large guns, burning its gun carriages, and taking its smaller cannon with him to be trained on the city. He secretly relocated companies E and H (127 men, 13 of them musicians) of the 1st U.S. Artillery to Fort Sumter on his own initiative, without orders from his superiors. He thought that providing a stronger defense would delay