The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were stored at Fort Knox for safekeeping during World War II.
After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941, officials feared that Washington, D.C., could be attacked. The nation’s most important founding documents were therefore moved from the Library of Congress to the United States Bullion Depository at Fort Knox, Kentucky.
The documents remained there until 1944, when they were returned to Washington. The Declaration’s engrossed parchment is now displayed at the National Archives in the Rotunda for the Charters of Freedom, alongside the Constitution and Bill of Rights.
This wartime episode is part of the Declaration’s later history rather than its 1776 creation. America250 focuses on the founding milestone, but the documents’ preservation, movement, and public display explain how the physical evidence of that milestone survived for modern audiences.