Watertower on northern end of the island.

Davids' Island is a small island at the western end of Long Island Sound. It is part of New Rochelle, New York. Currently uninhabited, in the past it was the site of Fort Slocum. Image File history File links Metadata Size of this preview: 450 × 600 pixelsFull resolution (1944 × 2592 pixel, file size: 2. ... Image File history File links Metadata Size of this preview: 450 × 600 pixelsFull resolution (1944 × 2592 pixel, file size: 2. ... New York City waterways: 1. ... New Rochelle City Hall New Roc City New Rochelle (French: Nouvelle-Rochelle) is a city in the southeast portion of the U.S. state of New York in Westchester County, 16 miles (26 km) from Grand Central Terminal in New York City and 2 miles north of the border with... Fort Slocum, New York was a US military base occupying Davids Island and Hart Island at the western end of Long Island Sound. ...

History of the name

The name is often given as David Hawk's or David Hawk, but neither is correct. The island is named after its next-to-last civilian owner before the Army acquired it; New York City ink manufacturer and Westchester County resident Thaddeus Davids. It was first leased (1861-1867), then owned (1867-1965), by the U.S. Government, and was known as Davids' Island Military Reservation until it was named Fort Slocum on July 1st, 1896. Previously it had been named after other owners, and was called successively: Bouteillier's, Rodman's, Myer's, Treadwell's, Hewlett's, Allen's, and Morse's Island. New York, New York and NYC redirect here. ... Westchester County is a suburban county with about 940,000 residents located in the U.S. state of New York. ...

Donald Trump wished to rename it for himself, but this never happened, because it was never sold to him, and this island is still owned by the City of New Rochelle. Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946 in Queens, New York, New York) is an American business executive, entrepreneur, television personality and author. ...

Residents of New Rochelle still traditionally refer to this island as Ft. Slocum, rather than as David's Island, even though the US Army left this island in 1965.

In the late 1970's, the government of the City of New Rochelle began referring to the island as David's Island, rather than as Ft Slocum, to confuse the people of New Rochelle and surrounding communities. This confusion was intended as part of a campaign to overly-develop the island, including a plan to build a lengthy bridge, half way across the Long Island Sound, to reach Ft. Slocum. As soon as the citizens of New Rochelle and surrounding communities realized that David's Island is the same island as Ft. Slocum, popular opinion prevented the development. Currenly, local citizens often refer to the Island as Ft. Slocum more often than as David's Island.

Uses of the island

The 78 acre island was known to have been inhabited by Native Americans and then used by French settlers from New Rochelle as grazing land for farm animals.

Due to limited development since the 17th century, there remain many important American Indian artifacts buried in the ground. This was revealed by a US Coast Guard study of the late 1980's, which was done as part of the 'Xanadu' plan to overly-develop David's Island. It is important to protect these American Indian artifacts, as they are a rarity in the very developed NYC Metropolitan area.

It began its military use during the American Civil War as a hospital center and detention site for Confederate prisoners of war. By 1876 it had earned the name Fort Slocum. During World War I Fort Slocum was the busiest recruiting station in the northeast, processing 100,000 soldiers per year. The island served as an embarkation point during World War II and was a home for Army chaplains. Later it became Slocum Air Force Base and finally a Nike missile site. There was never a US Air Force base, nor an airport on this island. Nike Missile bases were run by the US Army. Citizens of New Rochelle were (and remain) unaware of any missile bases associated with Ft. Slocum. Combatants United States of America (Union) Confederate States of America (Confederacy) Commanders Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee Strength 2,200,000 1,064,000 Casualties 110,000 killed in action, 360,000 total dead, 275,200 wounded 93,000 killed in action, 258,000 total... Fort Slocum, New York was a US military base occupying Davids Island and Hart Island at the western end of Long Island Sound. ... “The Great War ” redirects here. ... Combatants Allied powers: China France Great Britain Soviet Union United States and others Axis powers: Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Chiang Kai-shek Charles de Gaulle Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki Tōjō Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead: 33,000... Launch of a Nike Zeus missile Project Nike was a US Army project, proposed in May 1945 by Bell Labs, to develop a line-of-sight anti-aircraft missile system. ...

The control facilities were located at Fort Slocum, with the launch facilities located at nearby Hart Island. In July 1960, after only five years of operation, Nike Battery NY-15 was closed. From then until it was deactivated, Fort Slocum was the site of the information school, where Army soldiers and Air Force airmen were trained in journalism, public affairs, and photography. In 1965, the information school was moved to Fort Benjamin Harrison, Indiana and Fort Slocum was deactivated.

In the mid-1960's the US Army sold David's Island to the City of New Rochelle for $1. A few years later the City of New Rochelle sold David's Island to Con Edison for several million (6 million?) dollars, for the purpose of Con Ed building a Nuclear Power Plant there, within 1.5 miles of NY City, as well as many wealthy, influential communities in Westchester County on the mainland and 'North Shore' Nassau County in Long Island. Of course, no one in these well-informed communities would permit a Nuclear Power Plant in this location, and Con Ed then sold most of David's Island back to the City of New Rochelle, for a $1. Thus, New Rochelle successfully scammed Con Ed for millions of dollars. This money was retained by the City of New Rochelle for decades but evetually was squandered without explanation or benefit to the citizens of New Rochelle or to DAvid's Island. Con Edison retains ownership of a small portion of the Island as part of a system of power cables running under the Long Island Sound from mainland New Rochelle to David's Island to Long Island.

The island was sold back to to New Rochelle in 1967, by Con Edison for $1. Plans for Davids Island are to preserve it as parkland under the Westchester County Parks system. It is not legal to land at the island. Boaters regularly land on the Island, as it is unoccupied and left total unsecured by the City of New Rochelle Year 1967 (MCMLXVII) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display full calendar) of the 1967 Gregorian calendar. ...

In the mid-1960's, after Con Edison's Nuclear Power Plant plans fell through, it was used as a childrens summer camp named July O Rama for inner city children during summers. Ther summer camp was not known by that name to local citizens who knew it as 'Up With People'.

After 'Up With People' ceased, David's Island was used for several years as a location to quarantine wild animals before moving them to zoos.

By the early 1970's, David's Island was unoccupied and unused. During the 1980's, under the 17 year administration of New Rochelle's unelected City Manager, Samuel Kissinger, the island was deliberately left unsecured, resulting in the presumably unintentionl burning down of all existing building and facilities left over from the US Army's 100+ year old Ft. Slocum. Local Urban Myth, whether based on truth or not, is that City Manager Kissinger had deliberate policy to destroy all buildings and functionality on David's Island, as an excuse to overly-develop David's Island as the 'Xanadu' project. This was a tipping point, that caused the population of New Rochelle to put several years of irresistable pressure on the City Council to fire City Manager Kissinger, resulting finally in his resignation in late 1991, after of 17 years of incompetence, negligence, malfeasance and serious deterioration, not only of David's Island but also of downtown New Rochelle.

City Manager Kissinger was forced to resign in 1991, and the City Council to failed to accept the unpopular 'Xanadu' plan for high-rise residential development with a bridge from the mainland to David's Island, all due to unpopular sentiment and constituent political pressure. The City of New Rochelle then sought new development plans, and seriously considered a 1994 plan of Donald Trump, for high-rise residential development with a bridge from the mainland to David's Island. This was seen by the local population as a second attempt at 'Xanadu' by a different developer, resulting in constituent political pressure on the City Council to deny Trump the right to develop David's Island. However, as a result of those negotiations, Trump is presently building an inappropriate, distatseful, 40 story high-rise residential building on the mainland on US Rt 1 North (Huguenot Street) in downtown New Rochelle.

David's Island remains valuable real estate, owned but unused by the City of New Rochelle, with no definite plans for usage or development. Any potential plans to populate David's Island remain doomed to failure, because the nearby Westchester and Nassau County communities surrounding it, are populated by many wealthy, educated, highly-influential people who are watching out for their own real estate's property values. Popular pressure insists that any development of David's Island be to turn it into Public Park Land, by either the City of New Rochelle or by Westchester County.

External links

• Citizens Campaign for the Environment page about Davids Island
• Saving Davids Island: An Activist History
• Michael Cavanaugh's Fort Slocum page
• Historic Pelham blog entry, including entire text of a September 11, 1862 New York Times article about the soldiers hospital on Davids Island