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The stockade
Francis Light built the first fort in 1786 as a stockade of palm trunks
Captain Francis Light took Penang Island from the Sultan of Kedah in 1786 and built the original fort. It was a nibong stockade with no permanent structures, meant to protect Penang from pirates and Kedah.
Brick and stone
Convict labourers rebuilt it in brick and stone, and it was finished in 1810
In 1804, after the Napoleonic Wars began, Indian convict labourers rebuilt the fort using brick and stone. It was completed in 1810. It is the largest standing fort in Malaysia, though the threat it was built for never materialised.
Administration
The fort was used more for administration than for defence
Though built for the British military, its function was more administrative than defensive. Sir Edmond Stanley, judge of the Supreme Court, was first housed there when the court opened on 31 May 1808. In 1921 the moat was filled in after a malaria outbreak.
Seri Rambai
The cannon Seri Rambai, cast in 1603, was seized by the British in 1871
The largest cannon, Seri Rambai, was cast in 1603 and given to the Sultan of Johore in 1606. The Acehnese took it in 1613, and in 1795 it went to Kuala Selangor. The British seized it in 1871 and took it to Penang. It moved to the fort in the 1950s.
The lighthouse
A steel lighthouse was added in 1882, the second oldest in Malaysia
A skeletal steel lighthouse was erected in the northeast corner of the fort in 1882. It is the second oldest lighthouse in Malaysia, after Cape Rachado Lighthouse, and was renamed Penang Harbour Lighthouse after renovation in 1914 and 1925.
Day 1, morning
Next is Pinang Peranakan Mansion.
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The words are a retelling of the Wikipedia article Fort Cornwallis, and are shared under CC BY-SA 4.0. They are checked against those articles, and a fact that is not in them is left out.