Fort Harker

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1977.

From the record

“Fort Harker, located near Stevenson, Alabama, United States, was a military fortification built by the Union Army during the American Civil War. Constructed in the summer of 1862 by soldiers and freed slaves of the Army of the Cumberland, the fort helped secure strategic railroad lines to ensure the free movement of Union troops and supplies in southeastern Tennessee and northeastern Alabama.”
Wikipedia article Fort Harker (Alabama), CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 12 National Register listings published here for Jackson County · listed in 1977 · category: Site.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

Address. S of AL 117, Stevenson, 35772
When was it listed? May 1977
Category. site
Census division. Stevenson
National Register reference number. 77000205 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

42 since 1994

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 42 fires within 5 miles of Fort Harker between 1994 and 2020, burning about 1,337 acres in total. None started naturally. 9 were recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Debris and open burning	16
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	11
Arson/incendiarism	9
Smoking	3
Recreation and ceremony	2
Equipment and vehicle use	1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
8 September 1998	Equipment and vehicle use	5.0 acres	Alabama Forestry Commission	not named
7 September 1998	Arson/incendiarism	under an acre	Alabama Forestry Commission	not named
22 September 2019	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	18 acres	Alabama Forestry Commission	20190922-15
18 September 1998	Smoking	1.0 acres	Alabama Forestry Commission	not named
17 September 1998	Smoking	1.0 acres	Alabama Forestry Commission	not named
17 September 1998	Debris and open burning	2.0 acres	Alabama Forestry Commission	not named
16 September 1998	Smoking	2.0 acres	Alabama Forestry Commission	not named
29 August 2011	Debris and open burning	15 acres	Alabama Forestry Commission	853 CR 285, AL

Every fire recorded in Jackson County

Mines and quarries near this property

2 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 2 workings within 5 miles of Fort Harker: 1 past producer, 1 prospect. None of them still produces. What was taken out: Iron, Manganese. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Where	Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
	Pace Prospect	Iron, Manganese	Prospect
	Childers Mine	Iron	Past Producer

Every working recorded in Jackson County

Storms near this property

20 since 1994

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Stevenson, the town this property stands in, in 20 storm reports between 1994 and 2014: 13 thunderstorm wind, 5 hail, 1 tornado, 1 flash flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
May 1994	Thunderstorm Wind	Stevenson	$500,000	Twenty homes were damaged by what was believed to be thunderstorm winds in the Fackler and Stevenson area. Isolated damage was also reported in other parts of Jackson County including Scottsboro with numerous trees down throughout the county. Damage included shingles off, porches and awnings ripped from buildings, and a mobile home was moved off its foundation.
January 1997	Tornado (F0)	Stevenson	$60,000	no account filed
May 1996	Thunderstorm Wind	Stevenson	$20,000	no account filed
January 1997	Thunderstorm Wind	Stevenson	$6,000	no account filed
August 2002	Thunderstorm Wind	Stevenson	$4,000	Trees were knocked down along US 72 and also along CR 587 near Stevenson. Several other trees were blown down across the county.
June 2003	Thunderstorm Wind	Stevenson	$3,000	home with minor roof damage due to wind damage.
July 1995	Thunderstorm Wind	Stevenson	$3,000	Trees were down and nickel-size hail was reported at Dutton in southeast Jackson County and Section. Large trees and power lines were reported down between Stevenson and Bridgeport. Several large trees blocked a road in Stevenson.
February 2001	Thunderstorm Wind	Stevenson	$2,000	A few trees were blown down around Stevenson. A few trees were also reported down in the rural areas of northern Jackson County.
August 2014	Flash Flood	Stevenson	-	A portion of County Road 171 in the Talley Branch area in Jackson County, Alabama was washed out due to flash flooding. At least a foot of water was flowing across the road.
May 2008	Hail	Stevenson	-	Nickel size hail reported.
April 2006	Hail	Stevenson	-	Quarter size hail was reported.
April 2006	Hail	Stevenson	-	Golf ball size hail was reported.
May 2006	Thunderstorm Wind	Stevenson	-	Numerous trees and power lines were blown down. Several power outages were reported. Time estimated report.
April 2006	Hail	Stevenson	-	Quarter size hail was reported.
July 2005	Thunderstorm Wind	Stevenson	-	A few trees and power lines were blown down.
July 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Stevenson	-	Numerous trees and power lines were blown down due to thunderstorm winds associated with a line of severe thunderstorms moving southeast into the county.
July 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Stevenson	-	A few power lines were blown down due to thunderstorm winds.
February 2003	Thunderstorm Wind	Stevenson	-	a few power lines blown down
May 2003	Thunderstorm Wind	Stevenson	-	few trees and powerlines reported down.
May 2002	Hail	Stevenson	-	Dime size hail was reported in the Stevenson area.

Every storm recorded in Jackson County

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Listed places nearby

4 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Property	Distance	Listed
Stevenson Railroad Depot and Hotel	0.4 miles	1976
Stevenson Historic District	0.5 miles	1978
Gen. William Rosecrans Headquarters	0.8 miles	1978
Russell Cave National Monument	7.9 miles	1966

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 77000205 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Jackson County	All 12 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.