The History of Saint Augustine, Florida

by William W. Dewhurst

In 1823 St. Augustine witnessed for the second time the assembly of a legislative body, the second session of the territorial council being held that year in the government house. In the same year a treaty was concluded at Moultrie Creek, seven miles south of the city, with the Indian tribes of Florida, in which they agreed to surrender all their lands in the territory. It is needless to say that this treaty was never executed.

Forbes’s “Sketches,” published the year of the cession, gives an interesting account of the condition of St. Augustine at the end of the Spanish possession. It is related in these words: “The town, built in Spanish manner, forms an oblong square, or parallelogram; the streets are regularly laid out, but the buildings have not been put up to conform strictly to that rule. The streets are generally so narrow as to admit with difficulty carriages to pass each other. To make up for this inconvenience they have a terrace foundation, and, being shaded, renders the walking very agreeable. The houses are built generally of a freestone peculiar to the country, which, with the aid of an outer coat of plaster, has a handsome and durable effect. They are only two stories high, thick walls with spacious entries, large doors, windows, and balconies, and a garden lot to each, more commonly stocked with orange and fig trees, interspersed with grape-vines and flowers. On entering this old town from the sea, the grandeur of the Castle of Fort St. Mark’s presents itself, and imposes a degree of respect upon travelers upon seeing a fort forty feet high, in the modern taste of military architecture, commanding the entrance. The works are bronzed and squamated by age, but will, with some American ingenuity, be justly deemed one of the handsomest in the western hemisphere. It mounts sixty guns of twenty-four pounds, of which sixteen are bronze, and is calculated to contain one thousand men for action; with which, and the courage such a fort should inspire, it is capable of a noble defense, having in old times resisted some formidable attacks. It is not liable to be shattered by balls, nor does it expose its defenders to the fatal effects of storms [stormings]. From the castle, southward, are the remains of a stone wall trenching its glacis, built to prevent the incroachment of the sea; along this is a very pleasant walk as far as the market-place, which is opposite the old Government House in the center of the town, and separated from it by an oblong square called the parade, on which there is a Roman Catholic church of modern construction and quite ornamental. In front of this there formerly stood a handsome and spacious edifice, built in modern style by Lieut.-Governor Moultrie for a State-house, which was not completed. For want of an exterior coat of plaster it has crumbled to pieces, leaving not a single vestige of its former splendor.

“The old Government House, now much decayed, is occupied as a barrack for the Royal Artillery. It leaves the marks of a heavy pile of buildings in the Spanish style, having balconies in front, galleries and areas on both sides, with several irregular additions well contrived for the climate. Among these was an outlook built by Governor Grant, on the western summit of the main building, which commanded a full view of the sea-coast and surrounding country. The garden attached to the Government House is surrounded by a stone wall; it was formerly laid out with great taste, and stocked with most of the exotic and indigenous plants common to the tropics and the Middle States, such as the pomegranate, plantain, pineapple, papau, olive, and sugar-cane. The orange and lemon trees here grow to large size, and produce better fruit than they do in Spain and Portugal.

“From the square environed by orange trees the streets extend southwardly to some stone buildings, one of which was formerly a Franciscan convent, now converted into a jail, but under the British was used as barracks. In addition they constructed the very large and handsome buildings, four stories high, of wood, with materials brought from New York and intended for Pensacola, but detained by Governor Grant. These barracks at the southern extremity of the peninsula in which the town is built formed an elegant appendage to it, but were burned and now exhibit only the stack of chimneys. In a course westward from these vestiges of royalty are streets leading to a bridge formerly of wood but now of stone, crossing a small creek running parallel with the sea, on the east side, and St. Sebastian on the west. Over this are several valuable and highly improved orange groves and several redoubts, forming the south and western lines of fortification. Near the bridge, in the same street as the Government House, is the burying-ground of the Protestants, where stood an Episcopal church with a handsome steeple, not a vestige of which remains.

“Before the entrance of some of the houses built by the Spaniards rises a portico of stone arches, the roofs of which are commonly flat. There are nearly one thousand houses of all descriptions in the town, which is about three-quarters of a mile in length by one-quarter in breadth. As it is built upon a point of land it is in some degree insulated by the conflux of Matanzas River and St. Sebastian Creek, by which means the egress by land must be by the northern gates, and by a bridge and causeway in a western direction. The whole forms a very picturesque piece of scenery, being surrounded by orange groves and kitchen gardens. Within the first line [of redoubts upon the north] was a small settlement of Germans, with a church of their own, on St. Mark’s River: within the same was an Indian town, with a church also; but it must be regretted that nothing of these remains, as they serve if not as temples certainly as ornamental relics.

“The governor has given the land belonging to this township as glebe land to the parish church, which will no doubt be confirmed by the American Government in its liberal appropriations for religious purposes. The harbor of St. Augustine would be one of the best in the world were it not for the bar, which admits vessels drawing not more than six feet with safety. It is surrounded by breakers which are not as dangerous as they appear. There is a roadstead on the north side of the bar with good anchorage for vessels drawing too much water to enter the harbor. [A part of Anastatia Island] is known as Fish’s Island, and from the hospitality of Mr. Jesse Fish, one of the oldest inhabitants of the province, is remarkable for the date and olive trees, the flavor of the oranges, and the cultivation of his garden.”[32]

The location of the Protestant cemetery as here described is confusing, being located near “this bridge, in the same street as the Government House.” Probably the text should read, in the same street as the Convent House, which would place the Episcopal church and cemetery near the southern end of St. George Street.

Another account, published about the same period as Forbes’s, gives the following picture of the town: “Somewhat more than half way between the fort and the south end of the western peninsula a stone causeway and wooden bridge crosses Mari-Sanchez (Santa Maria) Creek, and connects the two portions or precincts of the town. It is to the north of this causeway that the principal part of the buildings are placed, forming a parallelogram somewhat more than a quarter of a mile wide from east to west, and three-quarters in length from north to south. The neck of land (on which the town is built) is divided into two peninsulas by Mari-Sanchez (Santa Maria) Creek, running parallel to the harbor, but heading in some low lands within the lines. It is on the eastern peninsula alone that the town is built, the western one being occupied by kitchen gardens, corn fields, orange groves, and pasture grounds. The houses on the side of the harbor are chiefly of stone, having only one story above the ground floor: these latter are invariably laid with a coat of tabia, a mixture of sand and shells, and are scarcely ever used but as store rooms, the families living in the upper stories.[33]

“The dwellings on the back streets with few exceptions, particularly in the north-west quarter, have but the ground floor, and are generally built of wood, though stone ones are common, but almost all are laid with tabia flooring.”[34]