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.
[Illustration: The Oldest House Museum]
[Illustration: 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.
[Illustration: 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.
[Illustration: This cannon tube is typical of most 18th-century guns
and bears the cipher of Carlos III, showing it to be Spanish.]