The primary modern meaning for sally port is a secure, controlled entryway, as of a fortification or a prison. The entrance is usually protected by some means, such as with a fixed wall blocking the door which must be circumvented before entering, but which prevents direct enemy fire from a distance. It may include the use of two doors such as with an airlock. In former times, from around 1600 to 1900, a "sally port" was a sort of dock where boats would pick up a ship's crew and ferry them to the vessel anchored offshore, or vice versa. The term is occasionally still used today, especially in coastal Great Britain. However, there are not many old sally ports left.
Read more about Sally Port: Etymology and Historical Usage, Modern Usage
Famous quotes containing the words sally and/or port:
“Hard times accounted in large part for the fact that the exposition was a financial disappointment in its first year, but Sally Rand and her fan dancers accomplished what applied science had failed to do, and the exposition closed in 1934 with a net profit, which was donated to participating cultural institutions, excluding Sally Rand.”
—For the State of Illinois, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done,
The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won,
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.”
—Walt Whitman (1819–1892)