Fort Chadbourne Fort Chadbourne Fort Chadbourne was a fort established by the United States Army on October 28, 1852, in what is now Coke County, Texas, to protect the western frontier and the Butterfield Overland Mail route. It was named after Lt. T.L. Chadbourne, who was killed in the Battle of Resaca de la Palma. It was manned by Companies A and K of the 8th U.S. Infantry. During the early days of the American Civil War, the fort surrendered to the Confederates on February 28, 1861, even before the Confederate shelling of Fort Sumter, South Carolina, but was reoccupied by federal
Battle of Fort Sumter arrival of his warships. The next day, heavy seas made it difficult to load the small boats with men and supplies and Fox was left with the hope that Anderson and his men could hold out until dark on April 13. Although Sumter was a masonry fort, there were wooden buildings inside for barracks and officer quarters. The Confederates targeted these with Heated shot (cannonballs heated red hot in a furnace), starting fires that could prove more dangerous to the men than explosive artillery shells. At 7 p.m. on April 12, a rain shower extinguished the flames and at the