Saint Augustine
Although Saint Augustine was primarily a military outpost intended to protect Spain’s dominion over Florida and the sea route of its treasure fleets, Saint Augustine also became a viable community as well, home to the settler-soldiers and their families. Except for the Castillo, which was finished in 1695, hardly any structure survives from Saint Augustine’s first 150 years. Archeological investigations show that almost all the earliest dwellings were small, crude structures made of local materials with thatched roofs and bare, dirt floors; coquina, the stone used in building the fort was not used for homes until 1690. The ordinary wear and tear of weather and time ensured that none of these early structures lasted.
Archeology can tell us about the lives of the people who lived in these houses, for more than 1,000 objects and pieces and bits of pottery dating to the 16th century have been found. Most of them are from local Indian sources and corroborate written records that show that by 1600 almost 25 percent of the soldiers had taken Indian wives because few Spanish women initially came to Florida. Besides using their local ceramics, the Indian women introduced New World foods to their families and into the Spanish diet, creating something that was neither wholly Spanish nor wholly Indian.
The Oldest House Museum
View in St. George Street
The town itself was laid out according to ordinances dictated by the Spanish government in 1563, resulting in a carefully planned community with houses fronting directly on standard-width streets with gardens in the rear or at the side. This showed clearly that Spain intended St. Augustine to be a permanent settlement, not a mere outpost on the fringes of empire. In the 18th century, indeed, it had become a vibrant community that numbered almost 3,000 persons when the garrison and all inhabitants withdrew after Florida became British in 1763.
The community and the people who lived in it were a mixture of influences showing graphically how quickly Spaniards adapted to the New World, using its materials, changing patterns that they had brought from their homeland to meet new conditions, and creating a society that simulated, but did not mirror, what they had left behind. Saint Augustine was the beginning of a new world for those who came here in 1565.
The map, based on the surveys of Juan de Solís, was drawn in 1764, a year after the British took control of Florida. English names have already been given to the town’s features. Somehow Fort St. Mark, a translation of Castillo de San Marcos, does not have the same ring.
The new man, Major Juan Márquez Cabrera, formerly governor of Honduras, checked the Castillo work carefully with the construction master. Those long years without an engineer had left them a heritage of mistakes—skimpy foundations, levels miscalculated—that had to be set right. From Havana came a military engineer, Ensign Don Juan de Císcara. During his brief stay he gave valuable guidance for continuing the work, built the ramp to San Pablo bastion, and laid foundations for the ravelin and its moat wall.
The 1680s were turbulent years. In 1682, the year the ravelin was finished, a dozen or so pirate craft in the Straits of Florida seized numerous Spanish prizes, including the Florida frigate on its way to Veracruz. They raided Mosquito Inlet, only 60 miles south of St. Augustine. In the west, pirates struck Fort San Marcos de Apalache and even went up the San Martín (Suwanee) River to rob cattle ranches in Timucua.
Work on the Castillo fell further and further behind schedule. Márquez appealed to the curate for dispensation to work on Sundays and holy days. Because of a history of bad relations with Márquez, the request was refused. Márquez appealed to higher authorities. When approval came, however, it was too late, for invasion came first.
On March 30, 1683, English corsairs landed a short way south of the Centinela de Matanzas, the watchtower, at Matanzas Inlet near the south end of Anastasia Island and about 14 miles from St. Augustine. Under cover of darkness, a few of the raiders came up behind the tower and surprised the sentries.
The march on St. Augustine began the next day. Fortunately a soldier from St. Augustine happened by Matanzas and saw the motley band. Posthaste he warned the governor, who sent Capt. Antonio de Argüelles with 30 musketeers to meet them on Anastasia. A mile from the presidio the pirates walked into the captain’s ambush. After exchanging a few shots—one of which lodged in Argüelles’ leg—the Englishmen beat a hasty retreat down the island to their boats. They sailed to St. Augustine and anchored at the inlet in plain sight of the unfinished Castillo.
Márquez, his soldiers, and the townspeople worked day and night to strengthen the Castillo. Missing parapets and a firing step were improvised from dry stone. Expecting the worst, everybody crowded into the fort. But the corsairs, looking at the stone fort and nursing their wounds, decided to sail on.
After this scare, the Castillo crew worked with renewed zeal. By mid-1683 they had completed the San Agustín and San Pablo bastions. Governor Márquez sent the crown a wooden model to show what had been done.
This was progress made in the face of privation—hunger that made the people demand of Márquez that he buy supplies from a stray Dutch trader from New York. It was unlawful, but the people had to eat. Imagine the joy in the presidio soon afterward when two subsidy payments came at one time! Márquez gave the soldiers two years’ back pay and had enough provisions on hand for 14 months. The 27 guns of the presidio, from the iron 2-pounder to the 40-pounder bronze, all had their gunner’s ladle, rammer, sponge, and wormer, along with plenty of powder and shot. There was also an alarm bell in San Carlos bastion.
By August 1684 Governor Márquez started on the fort rooms and finished them the next spring. Courtyard walls paralleled the four curtains, and foot-square beams spanned the distance between them. Laid over these great beams were 3-inch planks, supporting a slab roof of tabby masonry. On the north were the powder magazine and two big storerooms. Quarters were along the west curtain, guardroom and chapel on the south, and rooms on the east included a latrine and prison. Altogether there were more than 20 rooms.
The only major work yet to do was beyond the walls. The surrounding moat, 40 feet wide, needed to be deepened, for only part of the moat wall was up to its full 8-foot depth. In fact, of the outworks only the ravelin was finished.
With the fortification this far along, Governor Márquez could give more attention to other business, such as Lord Cardross’ Scottish colony at Port Royal, South Carolina. This was, in the Spanish view, a new and obnoxious settlement that encouraged heathen Indians to raid mission Indians. Furthermore, it was in land recognized as Spanish even by the English monarch.
So in September 1686, Márquez sent Captain Alejandro Tomás de Léon, with orders to destroy the colony, which he did. He then sacked and burned Governor Joseph Morton’s plantation on Edisto Island.
This cannon tube is typical of most 18th-century guns and bears the cipher of Carlos III, showing it to be Spanish.