Fort Crockett – Battery Hoskins, Galveston, TX - World War II Sites on Waymarking.com

Most people using the swimming pool at Galveston’s San Luis Hotel probably don’t realize that they float atop a secret WW II bunker. Hoskins Battery was one of four batteries fortifying Fort Crockett in Galveston, Texas. Originally, it consisted of two 12-inch guns mounted in the open on barbette carriages, with protected magazines between the guns.

In 1942 when the menace of German submarines entering the Gulf of Mexico became apparent, it was realized the open guns of Battery Hoskins were very vulnerable to both air and sea bombardment. It was decided that a concrete casemate (often referred to as a "bunker") be built over the gun emplacements to increase their protection and the Army Corps of Engineers began by casemating Battery Hoskins to withstand an attack of 5,000-pound naval shells.

The work was done in complete secrecy and was finished in 1943. Below is an aerial photograph showing the exposed guns of Battery Hoskins in 1930 (left) and another photograph taken in 1952(right), showing the covered Battery Hoskins bunker.

In the 1950s, Fort Crockett became home for fisheries research for the US Fish and Wildlife Service and many of the old military structures were dismantled. However, due to the massive amount of concrete used in constructing the protective casemate for the guns and magazines at Battery Hoskins, the bunkers proved uneconomical to remove and remained in place. In the 1990s, a luxury resort was built on and behind the battery. The bunkers remain dramatically visible from the seawall highway that runs along Galveston Beach, even though one gun emplacement now sports a swimming pool atop it, and the other one is adorned with a wedding gazebo!