Gardiners Bay

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Gardiners Bay is a small arm of the Atlantic Ocean, approximately 10 mi (16 km) long and 8 mi (13 km) wide in the U.S. state of New York between the two flukelike peninsulas at the eastern end of Long Island. It is bounded on its eastern end, where it connects to Block Island Sound, by Gardiners Island, privately owned by the Gardiner family, and the only intact real estate grant of the English Crown in the United States.

It is bounded on the western end by Shelter Island. It connects by two channels at the north and south end of Shelter Island to Great Peconic Bay. During the American Revolutionary War and the War of 1812, the bay was controlled by the British, who used Gardiners Island to store provisions. The British fleet assembled in Cherry Harbor in the bay before sailing to Chesapeake Bay to attack Washington, D.C. and burn the United States Capitol.