Fort Casey is one of three coastal defenses built to defend the Puget Sound Harbor in northwest Washington and the naval shipyard there. Fort Casey, together with Fort Flagler and Fort Worden, formed what was known as the "Triangle of Death".

The cannon on their disappearing carriages are famous the world over; the two now at Fort Casey were found in the Phillipines and restored in 1968.

Fort Casey's total armament included:

• 7 10" rifles on disappearing carriages
• 16 12" mortars
• 6 6" rifles on disappearing carriages
• 2 5" rifles
• 4 3" rapid-fire rifles

Pictures from the fort

	A map of the main battery.
	A picture of the main battery from the rear.
	Looking into the storage rooms, seen on the map as the areas in front of the guns (2 & 1).
	Info plaque on the Oil Room wall.
	A pass-through from a storage room into the hall next to the projectile & powder lifts.
	A close-up: The door is metal over wood.
	Where a 10" gun on a disappearing carriage once stood. The guns that weren't removed for use in the Phillipines (where the two at Fort Casey were recovered from) were recycled into scrap metal during WW II.
	The hole for the huge counterweight has been filled in...
	Carl by one of the two guns; this one is in the loaded and ready to fire position.
From the plaque at Fort Casey:	A lever was pulled, the original lead counterweight dropped, and the barrel rose to firing position. After a shot the weapon recoiled behind the thick concrete wall. This made the gun invisible to enemy ships and protected the crew during loading.
	The stairs up to the gun.
	Carl standing beside the 10" projectile. It weighs 571 lbs and has a range of 8 miles. This type of weapon became obsolete because of longer range guns and metal clad ships.
	Close-up of the projectile.
	Me on the gun which has recoiled after firing.
	The enormous hydraulic recoil rams.
	Looking up at the gun from a storage room.
	Looking down at the storage room from the gun level.
	Door from storage area (above) into another room. All the doors were thick plates of steel; some are rusted to lace on the bottom, and many of the hinges and catch mechanisms no longer work.
	Many of these access ladders have been removed and the holes cemented over, but they were a space-saving way of getting from one level to another.
	Looking up the access hole to the roof above.
	Here's a blocked access ladder, from on the roof.
	Me waaay up on one of the two watch towers. There is a concrete pillar in the center of the roughly 6' square room, with a bolt in the center. There's no info on which guns were mounted here, though.
	Good example of damage to concrete, although this would have been either from age or vandalism, as the Fort never saw battle.
	The two watch towers, and the walkways from the battery.
	Looking down at what was probably a loading area. Where I'm standing taking the picture is the gun level, right near the projectile lift (see below).
	This is the projectile lift - they were winched up, slid to the stops, and loaded onto carts which were guided into place by rails on the concrete deck. To the left of the projectile lift was a powder lift. Gun powder was stored in the lower storage rooms in sealed cartons of two. These cartons were opened when needed, the two bags placed on a lift, and winched to the upper level.
	The projectile lift.
	An odd building. It's so close to the gate, it looks like it was added after the main structure.
	The same building seen from the hill.
	Inside the building.
	Across the field from the rear of the battery were these four buildings; two ground level, hex shaped and the two behind semi-circular. The guns had been removed, and there was no info regarding which guns were used here.
	This is inside one of the hex buildings - by the look of the base, I'd say the 6" rifles on disappearing carriages were used here. (The concrete would have been poured to fill the hole for the counterweight.)
	Here's a shot from the doorway...
	... and here's the doorway!
	These two buildings were locked up.
	There were several of these water pipes set in the exterior walls.
	This section has the 3" rapid-fire rifles, and is separate from the main battery (at least, we couldn't find the passage that connected them!)
	Up to the rifle...
	This doorway, with "1918 / Switchboard" engraved above it, leads down a hall to a large room about 20x20 which has a narrow passageway going all around it. Possibly dead airspace? There were two little rooms, maybe offices, inside the main room but it was too dark to take pictures. There was no apparent way out, although there was a patch of concrete on the floor that could have blocked an old ladder access shaft.
	Many of the doors swung out of the way, into a recess in the concrete wall.
	The gate is succumbing to old age...
	but it sure looks cool from a distance!!

The Coast Defense Study Group

The 10" guns on disappearing carriages at Fort Casey

The 3-inch rapid-fire gun

Coastal Defense of the Pre-Dreadnought Area

More info on Fort Worden.