Filed Under Havre

Ordinance Storehouse

Fort Assinniboine Historic District

The bars on the windows of this single-story hipped-roof building weren’t put there to keep people in, but to keep them out. Forty-five caliber Colt revolvers, single-shot Springfield rifles or Krag-Jorgenson rifles after 1892, cannon, and a Gatling machine gun were among the weapons stored here. Ammunition was kept separately in a building above the fort near Beaver Creek. Completed circa 1884 at a cost of $818 equivalent to approximately $19,000 in 2011, this twenty-five-by-sixty-foot warehouse is the only surviving building from a once massive storage and operations area. Overseen by the quartermaster charged with maintaining supplies, the area included three large storehouses each over two-hundred feet long, two granaries, a stable and corral complex, and shops for various craftsmen. Built of load-bearing red brick, two courses thick, on a native rubble-stone foundation, the warehouse had three rooms and a cellar. Its large doorway facilitated the removal of oversized equipment. Except for the window bars, the utilitarian structure reflects the style of many of Fort Assinniboine’s smaller buildings, most of which have been lost to time.

Images

Ordinance Storehouse
Ordinance Storehouse Ordinance Storehouse. Front view of the building, facing southwest in the field on the fort grounds. Source: Montana State Historic Preservation Office Creator: Becki Miller Date: Oct. 2015- June 2016
Ordinance Storehouse
Ordinance Storehouse Ordinance Storehouse. Side view of the building, facing northwest from the field on the fort grounds. Source: Montana State Historic Preservation Office Creator: Becki Miller Date: Oct. 2015- June 2016

Location

County Road 82nd Avenue West, .5 mi. SE of US 87, Havre, Montana | Public

Metadata

The Montana National Register Sign Program, “Ordinance Storehouse,” Historic Montana, accessed March 28, 2024, https://historicmt.org/items/show/2356.