In 1740 Governor Oglethorpe of Georgia, being encouraged by King George II., determined to capture St. Augustine, and thus drive the Spaniards from Florida. At his request the Carolina colonies sent him a body of four hundred troops under Colonel Vanderdussen. He also equipped a body of Creek Indians, and in May had rendezvoused at the mouth of the St. Johns River a force of two thousand men. With a portion of this force he attacked a small fort called Diego, situated on what is now known as Diego Plains (called by the inhabitants Dago), twenty-five miles north of St. Augustine, then the estate of Don Diego de Spinosa. The remains of this fort and several cannon were to be seen until a late date.

Having taken the fort after a slight resistance, he left the same in charge of Lieutenant Dunbar, and returned to the St. Johns River to await the arrival of more troops, and to allow Commodore Price, R. N., to blockade the harbor of St. Augustine with his fleet, consisting of four vessels of twenty guns each.

From the prisoners captured at Diego it was learned that the Spaniards had lately received a reinforcement of six half galleys, armed with several long brass nine-pounders, and two sloops loaded with provisions, besides which all the cattle in the neighborhood had been driven into town. The prisoners, he says, “agree that there are fifty pieces of cannon in the castle, several of which are of brass, from twelve to forty-eight pounds. It has four bastions. The walls are of stone and casemated. The internal square is sixty yards. The ditch is forty feet wide and twelve feet deep, six of which are sometimes filled with water. The counter-scarp is faced with stone. They have lately made a covered way by embanking four thousand posts. The town is fortified with an intrenchment, salient angles, and redoubts, which inclose about half a mile in length and a quarter of a mile in width. The inhabitants and garrison, men, women, and children amount to above two thousand five hundred. For the garrison the king pays eight companies, sent from Spain two years since, fifty-three men each; three companies of foot and one of artillery of the old garrison, and one troop of horse, one hundred each.”

This estimate would make the garrison about nine hundred and twenty-four men, which was probably within the whole number of fighting men, as another account says there were in the town at the time, the seven hundred regulars assigned from Spain, two companies of horse, and four companies of negroes, besides Indians. These negroes were probably free men, as it is elsewhere stated that they had their own officers, and though armed, by the governor, provided themselves.

Oglethorpe having been joined by more troops marched across the country, ordering the forces at Diego to advance as far as Fort Mosa, two miles north of St. Augustine, while he made an attack on the fort at Picolata. This fort was called St. Francis de Poppa, and commanded the approaches from West Florida and Mexico, and the ferry across the St. Johns River. Its remains existed until a short time since, and even yet the ditch can be traced upon the grounds of Mr. Michael Usina. If the testimony of the old residents can be relied upon, Forbes and Vignoles in their histories have fallen into error as to the location of this old Spanish fortification, describing it as on the west side of the river, while the old citizens call the fort at Picolata “Fort Poppa.”

Forbes says Picolata’s ancient fort was built by the “Spaniards with square towers thirty feet high and a deep ditch about it, which is now partly filled up. The stone was brought from Anastatia Island. On the opposite side is Fort Poppa, with shallow intrenchments twenty yards square and as many from the river. A small distance back is another turret of the same size, and some groves of orange trees and oaks.”

Vignoles’ description (1823) is as follows: “Of the old blockhouse of Picolata nothing remains except two of the shattered walls, through which loop-holes and meutriÈres are pierced. It stands on a low bluff, and is half concealed by the luxuriant branches of surrounding trees. It reminds the visitor who views it from the river of the deserted castellated residence of some ancient feudal lord. Opposite is Fort Poppa, of which scarce a vestige remains.”

William Bartram, in his “Travels through Florida,” published in Philadelphia, 1791, gives an interesting description of this fort which I will also quote, as I find all knowledge of these old relics is fast being effaced from memory and accessible records. Describing his sail up the St. Johns River, he says: “At noon I came abreast of Fort Picolata, where, being desirous of gaining yet further intelligence [about it], I landed, but to my disappointment found the fort dismantled. This fortress is very ancient and was built by the Spaniards. It is a square tower, thirty feet high, pierced with loop-holes and surrounded with a deep ditch. The upper story is open on each side, with battlements supporting a cupola or roof. These battlements were formerly mounted with eight four-pounders, two on each side.

“The work was constructed with hewn stone, cemented with lime. The stone was cut out of the quarries on St. Anastatia Island, opposite St. Augustine.” Williams calls the fort on the west side of the river Fort “San Fernando.”

Oglethorpe captured the Fort at Picolata without difficulty, and after considerable delay advanced his whole force upon St. Augustine. The fleet, which had by this time arrived, was moored across the harbor, and one vessel stationed off the mouth of Matanzas River, to prevent the arrival of supplies from that quarter. A company of eighty Scotch settlers from Georgia, all dressed in Highland costume, together with forty Indians, were stationed at Fort Mosa, under Colonel Palmer, with orders to avoid a battle, but to be vigilant in scouring the country, to intercept all supplies, and to encamp every night at a different place. Colonel Vanderdussen, who had marched from the St. Johns River by the beach, was ordered to build a battery at Point Quartell (north beach), while Oglethorpe, with a regiment of Georgians and the main body of the Indians, landed on Anastatia Island, and began the construction of a battery at the north end of the main island. Aware that his force was too small to carry an assault on the castle, to which the inhabitants and forces had all retired, Oglethorpe determined to reduce the fort by bombardment, while he cut off all supplies by a blockade. The site of the first battery constructed on the island has long since become the channel of the river. The high ridge to the west of the lighthouse, on which Mr. Aspinwall has lately built a small building, probably extended at least half a mile north of the present shore line. It was on this ridge that Oglethorpe built his first battery, and having mounted in it several eighteen-pound cannon, he sent a message to the Spanish governor summoning him to surrender.

The governor, Don Manuel de Monteano, a very brave and efficient officer, replied that he would be pleased to shake hands with General Oglethorpe in the fort. The general, being indignant at such a reply, opened fire upon the place, which was kept up with spirit, and many shells were thrown into the town, causing the citizens to seek shelter within the walls of the castle. The Spaniards replied with the cannon in the fort, and also diverted the attention of the British with the maneuvers of the six galleys with their batteries of nine-pounders. Captain Warren, a brave officer from the fleet, offered to lead an attack on these galleys in the night; but it was decided that the plan was too dangerous, as the galleys lay at night under the guns of the fort, where the water was too shoal to bring up any large vessels to cover the attacking party. Finding the distance too great for his fire to injure the fort, Oglethorpe began the construction of a second battery on the marsh of the island, nearer the town. This battery was called Battery Poza, and mounted four eighteen-pound cannon. The remains of this battery are still to be seen. It is located on an island in the marsh, and reached from the bay by ascending a small creek, navigable for boats at half tide. Oglethorpe is said to have buried an eighteen-pound cannon in this battery when the siege was raised, which may yet be beneath the sand of the redoubts.

While engaged in the construction of Battery Poza, the fire of the British was somewhat relaxed. Observing this, Governor Monteano sent out a detachment of three hundred men and a party of Yemassee Indians, to attack Colonel Palmer at Fort Mosa. It is said the sally was made on the night of the king’s birthday, and that the British were found drinking and carousing. The former statement is incorrect, though the latter may be true. Colonel Palmer was a brave and able officer, but he seems to have had Scotch obstinacy, united with undisciplined men, to render his authority nugatory.

The camp was surprised and the Highlanders quickly overcome after Colonel Palmer was slain and the soldiers who were vigilant had been killed or made their escape. There was a tradition that Colonel Palmer was killed by Wakona, the Yemassee chief, on the spot where the soldiers had brought him the infant image fifteen years before.

This loss was a severe blow to the expedition, not so much from the loss of the men, but its effect was to depress the spirits of the command and to greatly discourage the Indians, who soon after found an excuse to withdraw. A Cherokee having killed a Spaniard, cut off his head and brought it to Oglethorpe, who spurned the Indian and called him a barbarous dog. This rebuff was made a pretext by the Indians for their desertion, and, without making known their intentions, soon after they were gone.

Meantime the bombardment continued; but it was found that, even from the nearest battery, the shot produced little effect upon the walls of the castle. The siege, which was commenced on the 13th of June, had now continued into July, with only disastrous results. The soldiers began to wilt under the extreme heat, and complain of the annoyance of the sandflies and mosquitoes. To add to the difficulty sickness appeared, and the men, never under very good control, began to desert in squads, and return across the country to their homes. The commodore, finding his provisions becoming short, and fearing the autumn gales, was unwilling to remain longer on the station. The ship at Matanzas had already withdrawn. The inlet being unguarded, the Spaniards soon succeeded in bringing in a large supply of provisions, of which they now stood in great need. Learning that the Spaniards had received succor, the troops lost all hope, and the siege was soon after raised.

It would seem, from the accounts of this blockade and the fact that supplies were brought in at Matanzas Inlet, that the old fort at Matanzas was not then standing. If this is the case, it must have been constructed immediately after Oglethorpe’s departure, as the Spaniards had had a garrison in it before the English occupation, as will be seen from the following extract from Romans: “Twenty miles south [of St. Augustine] is the look-out or fort of Matanca, on a marshy island commanding the entrance of Matanca, which lays opposite to it. This fort is to be seen at a distance of about five leagues. It is of very little strength, nor need it be otherwise, as there is scarce eight feet of water on this bar at the best of times. The Spaniards kept a lieutenant in command here; the English a sergeant. Between two or three miles from this inlet or bar is another of still less note, called El Penon. Matanca Bar is known from the sea by the fort, which shows white in a clear day, when the inlet bears west, three leagues off.”

I have been unable to find out at what date this fort was constructed. The natural features have greatly changed since the time of Romans even. The island has been very much washed away by the current, and will soon cease to exist at all. The bar, which must have been nearly opposite the island, has gradually worked south until now it is nearly half a mile below the fort, and a high sand ridge, a part of Anastatia Island, is between the fort and the ocean, so that, instead of being visible three leagues at sea, the fort, probably, would not be seen from the ocean at all.[14] Soundings on Matanzas Bar are now given as one fathom. Fort Mosa, where Colonel Palmer was killed, was built by the negro refugees from the British colonies, and was often called the Negro Fort. It was a square earthwork with four bastions, containing a well and a house with a look-out, and surrounded with a ditch. The walls of a stone house are still standing near the location of this fort, at a place called by the town’s people “Moses,” north of Mr. Hildreth’s grounds.

Oglethorpe was greatly blamed at the time for his failure to take St. Augustine, but it is evident that the town was well protected. The north side of the peninsula, on which the town is built, was defended by the fort, about which, for a space of fifteen hundred yards, a clear space was maintained by the Spanish governors, and also by the ditch and redoubt with salient angles running from the fort to the St. Sebastian River; upon the east side of the town the galleys and the guns of the fort could prevent a landing, as the water upon the bar was too shoal to admit the passage of the English ships; upon the south was a line of redoubts again with cannon, and a water front for the approach of the galleys, while upon the west was the long stretch of boggy marshes extending for a quarter of a mile to the St. Sebastian River. No place could be better situated for defense. Had the blockade been efficient and long-continued the town must have surrendered as there was a large population to feed besides the garrison, and the very advantages of the place for defense rendered it difficult to bring in supplies.

Governor Monteano was constantly sending messages to Cuba, by the way of West Florida and the Keys, for succor of provisions, and was said to have received supplies from a vessel which arrived at Mosquito Inlet, while the harbor of Matanzas was yet blockaded.

The siege was abandoned on the 10th of July. During the bombardment one hundred and fifty-three shells fell in the town, but occasioned no loss of life, and did very little damage. That the fire from the batteries was very ineffectual is evident from an inspection of the shot-holes in the walls of the old fort made by the guns of Oglethorpe’s batteries which are still visible. I have counted eight indentations on the eastern face of the main fort, and two on the south-east bastion. Their penetration was barely sufficient to bury the solid shot, while the shell do not appear to have done any injury, thus exhibiting an ineffectiveness of the artillery which seems remarkable, as there were said to have been thirty mortars large and small, and ten eighteen-pound cannon in the different batteries erected by Oglethorpe, of which the farthest was not more than three-quarters of a mile distant.

This attack of Oglethorpe seems to have demonstrated to the Spanish crown the likelihood of an English occupation of their possessions in Florida. The following year large reinforcements were sent to Governor Monteano, with instructions to improve the defenses of the town in every possible way.

Finding the British colonists did not renew their attack on the town as he had anticipated, Monteano advised an invasion of Georgia and South Carolina. Accordingly an army of two thousand men was raised in Cuba, which, being dispatched to St. Augustine, was placed under the command of Governor Monteano. To this force the governor added one thousand men from the garrison of the town, including a regiment of negroes, whose officers are said to have dressed, ranked, and associated with the Spanish officers without reserve.[15]

With this force Monteano entered upon the invasion of Georgia; but, being opposed by Oglethorpe with great energy and skill, was entirely unsuccessful, and the expedition retired to St. Augustine. From thence the forces returned to Cuba, where the governor was imprisoned and tried for misconduct, though acquitted of the charges.

In the next year Oglethorpe endeavored to retaliate upon the Spaniards, and get possession of St. Augustine by a sudden attack which should take the town by surprise. He is said to have approached with such celerity and secresy that he arrived within sight of the town without exciting an alarm. Here he captured a small body of troops acting as a guard to the king’s workmen. This capture defeated the success of his surprise, for, the absence of the guard being noticed, a body of horsemen were sent out to learn the cause of their detention, and the forces of Oglethorpe were discovered in time to close the city gates and prepare the garrison. Oglethorpe was unwilling to risk an assault on the town, and retired into Georgia, after spending two months in attempting to provoke the Spaniards to a fight without the walls of the town. During this time his troops completely devastated the surrounding country.

Up to about this period there had existed an Indian village near the site of Fort Mosa (or Moosa) called Macarizi. It was probably located on a creek now called “Baya’s Creek,” about two miles north of the city, though the Franciscan Father Ayeta, in his “La Verdad Defendida,” p. 215, says that Macarizi and Nombre de Dios (Topiqui) were the same.

Soon after Oglethorpe retired Governor Monteano furnished arms and ammunition to one Pedro Christano, a Spanish Indian chief among the Yemassees, and incited incursions against the British colonists in Georgia. These were continued under the encouragement of the Spaniards until the settlements south of St. Simonds Island were entirely broken up. These hostilities, which had continued since 1725, were mutually suspended under the treaty which was concluded between England and Spain in 1748, but marauding expeditions were again entered upon in 1755. The Spanish ambassador at London, having obtained from the court of St. James an order commanding the English settlers to retire from the territory of Florida, the new governor, Don Alonzo Fernandez de Herreda, sent a company of dragoons to hasten the obedience of the English colonists. Upon a summons the English agreed to retire, but they never did so, and the next year, 1763, the provinces of the Floridas were ceded to Great Britain in exchange for Havana and the western portion of Cuba, which had been captured from the Spanish. This treaty was concluded on the 3d of November, 1762, and ratified February 10th, 1763.