Battery Cooper at Fort Pickens, Gulf Islands National Seashore
See the Military Forts and Batteries web page for an interactive location map.
If you have visited any of the other batteries at the Fort Pickens unit of Gulf Islands National Seashore, you most likely have read about disappearing guns but might not be able to wrap your mind around the concept. If so, make your way over to Battery Cooper, because here you can actually see one. The battery is located on Battery Cooper Road, a short, U-shaped loop road that branches off of Fort Pickens Road between the Fort Pickens Campground and the actual Fort Pickens. Road signs point the way. Allow ten minutes for your visit.
Construction on Battery Cooper began in 1905 and was completed in 1906. It is named for Lieutenant George Cooper, an officer killed in the Philippines in 1900. Armed with two 6-inch guns, the weapons were mounted on carriages that could be lowered below the battery walls for loading, then raised up over the wall when fired. The recoil from the blast sent the carriages back down to the loading position, thus they disappeared from view to those on enemy ships in the Gulf of Mexico. The following video demonstrates a disappearing gun at Battery Chamberlain in San Francisco.
The two original guns were removed during World War I and sent to France. The gun now at the fort was installed by the National Park Service in 1976, the same year that two 6-inch shielded guns were installed at Battery 234 just down the road. All guns came from the Smithsonian Institute’s collection. The interior of the battery is closed, but visitors are free to walk around and on it, including right up to the artillery for a closer inspection.
6-inch gun on a disappearing carriage at Fort Pickens’ Battery Cooper, Gulf Islands National Seashore
6-inch gun on a disappearing carriage at Fort Pickens’ Battery Cooper, Gulf Islands National Seashore
6-inch gun on a disappearing carriage at Fort Pickens’ Battery Cooper, Gulf Islands National Seashore
Empty gun emplacement where a second disappearing gun would have been installed at Fort Pickens’ Battery Cooper, Gulf Islands National Seashore
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Last updated on March 6, 2025
