Fort William, India
Encyclopedia : F : FO : FOR : Fort William, India
Fort William is a British Raj fort in the Indian city of Calcutta and was named after King William III of England.
The original fort was built by the British East India Company under the supervision of John Goldsborough after 1696. It was situated near the bank of the river Hooghly. The building had two storeys and projecting wings. A guard room in the fort was later named the infamous black hole of Calcutta.
In 1757, an attack on the fort by the forces of Siraj Ud Daulah, the Nawab of Bengal, led the British to build a new fort in the Maidan. The new fort was started by Robert Clive after the Battle of Plassey and was completed by 1780. It is octagonal with three sides facing the Hoogli River.
The old fort was repaired and used as a customs house from 1766.
Currently the fort houses the Indian Army.
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.