The "new" guardhouse, built in 1876 and shown in this 1887 view, was the last and most comfortable of three such structures at Fort Laramie. It was constructed upon the ruins of the original guardhouse, built in 1849-1850. The "new" guardhouse contained spacious guard quarters and prison rooms, and relatively few prisoners. In 1885, for example, inmates averaged less than three out of every hundred soldiers on the post. Also appearing in the photograph is the two-company, 1866 barracks on the right - an adobe structure with a wooden porch - and the three-company frame barracks on the left, erected in 1868. Foundation ruins are all that remain of these buildings.
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