April 22, 2022

OSWEGO – Friends of Fort Ontario-funded Oswego County AmeriCorps member Jonathan Kobelia presents a free public walking tour on the Fort Ontario Military Reservation National Register District. The 1-1/2 hour tour begins at 3 p.m. on Saturday, April 30 with a short PowerPoint presentation inside the old stone fort in the Enlisted Men’s Barracks.  

The event, “Murder, Mysteries, Mishaps, Maladies and Mayhem at Fort Ontario 1755-Yesterday,” features various locations on the historic site where unusual, bizarre, disturbing, gruesome, grisly – sometimes amusing, and often sad – incidents happened.

Tour highlights will include stories about a conspiracy to blow up the fort, friendly-fire incidents, accidents, crimes, murders, shootings, and an attempted murder stemming from a “fragrant” hog’s head boiling on barracks kitchen stove.

The site of five battles and four forts, a U.S. Army Infantry Training Post, a U.S. Army General Hospital, a New York National Guard Training Camp, a Special Unit Training Post, an Emergency Refugee Shelter, and a Veterans Housing Project, Fort Ontario has also been the scene of many unpleasant and unusual incidents over its 267-year history.

Participants are asked to wear shoes appropriate for walking on uneven ground and to dress for the weather – it is always cooler and windier by the lake. Fort Ontario State Historic Site is located at 1 E. Fourth St., Oswego, NY.

For more information on “Murder, Mysteries, Mishaps, Maladies and Mayhem at Fort Ontario, 1755-Yesterday” contact AmeriCorps member Jonathan Kobelia at 315-343-4711 or at jonathan.kobelia@parks.ny.gov.

 LOVE AND DUTY – Private James King of Fort Ontario fell in love with and married Rose Anne Welch of Oswego in 1850 and deserted the Army. A few years later, he turned himself in and rejoined the Army. James, represented here by Michael Kelso, and Rose, represented by Christina Goettel, went on to live happily together in Oswego until their deaths in the early 1900s. Unfortunately, some romances at Fort Ontario did not have happy endings. Learn more during the “Murder, Mysteries, Mishaps, Maladies and Mayhem, 1755–Yesterday” event at Fort Ontario on Saturday, April 30 at 3 p.m.