Charleston Arsenal, Military arsenal in Charleston, United States.
The Charleston Arsenal was a U.S. Army facility built between 1825 and 1832 near Ashley Avenue and Mill Street. Its only surviving building is St. Luke's Chapel, a former artillery shed converted in 1883 by Dr. Porter for the Porter Military Academy. The site is now part of the Medical University of South Carolina.
The arsenal was built between 1825 and 1832 to store weapons and ammunition for the U.S. military. Control shifted in 1860 when South Carolina militia forces took over the facility during the Civil War crisis.
The arsenal's artillery shed was converted into St. Luke's Chapel by Dr. Porter in 1883, and the chapel served Porter Military Academy students until 1965. The site passed to the Medical University of South Carolina in 1963, and the chapel was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1996 as part of Porter Military Academy.
The arsenal site lies near the intersection of Ashley Avenue and Mill Street, and the surviving St. Luke's Chapel stands within the Medical University of South Carolina campus. The chapel, listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1996 as part of Porter Military Academy, can be viewed from the campus grounds.
The site was designated a Federal Military Reservation on July 16, 1866, covering 11.26 acres, yet the Army closed the arsenal in 1879 and sold the land in 1888 to the Porter Military Academy. Dr. Porter had already converted the old artillery shed into St. Luke's Chapel in 1883, and that chapel is the only arsenal building still standing.
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