The importance of Chesapeake Bay in American history has long made the Virginia Capes strategically significant, most notably in the naval Battle of the Chesapeake that was crucial to the American victory at the siege of Yorktown, effectively ending the American Revolutionary War. As a result, the area was heavily garrisoned, beginning with the construction of Fort Monroe and Fort Wool in 1819. During the American Civil War, a pivotal battle between the ironclad warships and was fought in Hampton Roads. The "Virginia" was attempting to break the Union blockade that was strangling the Confederacy.