With new batteries being constructed under the Endicott program in 1898, the U.S. Army officially named the military reservation at the site and the fort as Fort Rodman Military Reservation, in honor of Lieutenant Colonel Logan Rodman, a New Bedford native with the 38th Massachusetts Infantry who died in the assault on Port Hudson, Louisiana in 1863. It was the primary fort of the Coast Defenses of New Bedford, and was garrisoned by the United States Army Coast Artillery Corps. Along with gun batteries, facilities for planting and controlling an underwater minefield were built. The site was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.