Columbus-Belmont State Park, on the shores of the Mississippi River in Hickman County, near Columbus, Kentucky, is the site of a Confederate fortification built during the American Civil War.

He had equipped it with a massive chain that stretched across the Mississippi to Belmont, Missouri, to block the passage of U.S. gunboats and supply vessels to and from destinations in the western theaters of the war.

[citation needed] Many of the earthen fortifications, buildings, and artillery pieces were lost to the erosion of the bluff during heavy flooding in the region during the 1920s.

[2] The primary attraction in the park continues to be Polk's giant chain, estimated to have been more than a mile long before flooding and erosion destroyed part of it.

At 10 feet (3.0 m) long and 15,000 pounds, the imposing gun bombarded Ulysses S. Grant's troops at the Battle of Belmont with 128-pound conical projectiles that it could fire up to three miles (5 km).