True Lies
The real-life setting of a familiar horror story you didn't think was true
I
n addition to being a great place to walk, run, sunbathe, or watch planes land at Logan, Castle Island is the site of the oldest continually used military fort in America: Fort Independence, established in 1634, with tours on weekends and holidays. And here’s the part you didn’t know: The friends of a Lieutenant Robert Massie, who was shot dead in a duel over a card game in 1817, sealed his killer alive in a wall at Fort Independence with bricks and mortar, leaving him to die. A sullen private named Edgar Allan Poe, posted to Fort Independence 10 years later, heard about the incident and used it as the basis for his story, "The Cask of Amontillado." Marcus
Shhhh! It’s longer actually an island, having been connected to the mainland in 1891.
Shhhh! In 1905, workers repairing a casemate
found a skeleton in military uniform buried in
a wall of the fort. The body was never identified.
found a skeleton in military uniform buried in
a wall of the fort. The body was never identified.
Shhh who knew
Born in Boston as Edgar Poe, Edgar Allan Poe was taken in by John and Frances Allan of Richmond, Virginia, when both his parents died. He hated Boston, largely out of resentment of its then-dominant literary elite.
2000 William J. Day Boulevard
at Shore Road
South Boston,
MA,
02127
617.268.5744.
Find on a map|Get directions.
These lines serve Castle Island. Click to find more secrets on your route.
10 Bus, 11 Bus, 7 Bus, 9 Bus, Broadway/Red Line, JFK/UMass/Red Line
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Get directions to Castle Island by T.
Find more secrets like Author, Chills, Crime, Edgar Allan Poe, Fort, History, Literature, Maritime, Murder, Harbor
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Daily, dawn to dusk
Fort Independence tours given weekends and holidays, noon to 3:30
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