On 1 June 1769, an engineer by the name of Le Bœuf proposed the construction of a lunette in front of then Fort Bourbon.
During the British attack in March 1794, the lunette resisted for 14 days, after holding off numerous assaults and suffering extensive bombardment.
At the time of the British attack on Martinique in 1809, the fort had an irregular pentagonal shape as it followed the terrain.
They then commenced an unrelenting bombardment that lasted until the French capitulated on 24 February after the British fire had dismounted most of their guns (some 98) and exploded a powder magazine.
A Court of Inquiry in Paris in December 1809 stripped Admiral Louis Thomas Villaret de Joyeuse, the Governor General of Martinique, and some of his subordinates of their rank and honors, holding them responsible for problems with the fortification of Fort Desaix and the loss of the island.
Between 1940 and 1943, while under the administration of the Vichy High Commissioner in the Antilles, Admiral Georges Robert, the fort housed 286 tons of the Bank of France's gold reserves, delivered by the cruiser Émile Bertin.