Savannah Powder Magazine

Front and side of the structure. shbtlr (Atlas Obscura User)

This long-forgotten, abandoned munitions storage building appears on few maps and is unknown even by most local residents.

In 1898, the City of Savannah built a powder magazine to store explosive powder, artillery ammunition, and eventually dynamite well outside of town. Designed by Savannah architects who also created City Hall, Telfair Hospital, the Scottish Rite Temple, and SCAD’s Eichberg Hall, this building is the only municipal powder magazine still in existence in Georgia.

With enough capacity to store 96,000 pounds of black powder and 8,500 pounds of dynamite, the brick walls of the structure are three feet thick, and imprints of powder kegs are still visible in the floor.

Proposals for saving the structure include developing the site into a city park, but plans have stalled and the historic building sits abandoned, swallowed up by the woods and hidden from the road with no markers to indicate its existence.

Know Before You Go

The abandoned structure is not considered safe to enter, and "no trespassing" signs are posted at the edge of the woods in the parking lot adjacent to the property. While the undergrowth is cleared enough to permit a walk around the exterior, it would be unwise to attempt to enter the building.