Ershawan Fort

Date Captured

January 10th, 2016 at 07:39 UTC

Camera

NIKON D3100

Lens

AF-S DX Zoom-Nikkor 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6G ED II

Aperture

ƒ / 8

Shutter Speed

1/250 sec

Focal Length

24.0 mm

ISO

400

Exposure Value

14.0 EV

Download

3600 × 2400

Ershawan Fort began as a shore battery built by Yao Ying (姚瑩) in the early 1840s to guard Keelung against British warships but in October 1841 HMS Nimrod bombarded the position and destroyed its guns. Liu Mingchuan (劉銘傳) rushed a battery of German Krupp guns into place here in July 1884, but the French squadron under Sébastien Lespès took them out of commission on August 5th of that year, in the opening action of the Sino-French War in northern Taiwan. What stands today is Liu’s post-war rebuilding on the hill above, overseen by a German engineer, its guns set on the seaward crest and the barracks sheltered on the landward slope. The gate inscription Haimen Tianxian (海門天險) gives the site its other name, and it has been a national monument since 1983.