The Castillo de San Marcos, Part 2—And a Giveaway

By Jennifer Uhlarik

 

On October 25, 2021, I began telling you about the history of the Castillo de San Marcos, or the large masonry fort in St. Augustine, Florida. During its existence, the Castillo has existed under six different flags, the first being the Spanish flag. I told you of the building of this impressive structure by the Spanish in my earlier post if you would like to read or refresh your memory.

 

We’ll pick up where we left off—the end of the French and Indian War in 1763. In the Treaty of Paris that ended this conflict, several Caribbean Islands went to the French, Spain got Havana and Manilla, and England had Canada and the newly acquired Florida. With that outcome, all North American land east of the Mississippi River belonged to the Brits. When this happened, the Spanish settlers in Florida made a mass exodus to Cuba. But the tropical paradise wouldn’t stay empty for long. 

The British government noticed that conflicts were brewing between the British colonists in America and the Native populations. To curb this problem, the government created the English Crown Proclamation of 1763. In it, all settlers were forbidden from moving any farther west than the Appalachian Mountains. So with their western expansion cut off, they drove southward instead—to Florida. England’s government, in return, offered 20,000 acres to any group that chose to settle in Florida, and for individual pioneers willing to settle in the new land, they gave 100 acres, plus 50 more per family member. In the first ten years of British rule, St. Augustine’s population rebounded and doubled from what it had been during the Spanish period.

 

British colonists flooded the new area, taking over the one-story Spanish-style homes their predecessors had left and, in many cases, building second or third stories onto them. They also built new homes and business buildings in St. Augustine and surrounding areas. With water on three sides of the state, Florida made for an excellent shipping locale, and its rich, fertile soil made for excellent farmland and grazing land for cattle. The British colonists prospered here.

 

However, not all was so rosy in the British colonies. Other colonists in more northern locales were beginning to rebel against the Crown, so Florida—and Fort St. Mark, as the Castillo de San Marcos was now called—became the staging area for British soldiers brought in to put down the rebellion in the Southern colonies. The fort was used as a supply base, and more interestingly, as a prisoner of war camp. During this time of British control, three signers of the Declaration of Independence were captured and held at Fort St. Mark: Thomas Heyward Jr., Arthur Middleton, and Edward Rutledge. Also held at the fort was the lieutenant governor of South Carolina, Christopher Gadsden—held for 42 weeks in solitary confinement.

Arthur Middleton

Edward Rutledge

     

Thomas Heyward, Jr.

 

As the Revolutionary War actually broke out, Florida didn’t see any great action. It all took place in the more northern colonies we are familiar with. But Spain took plenty of shots at Britain while their attention was focused on the war with their unruly colonies. The Spanish came in to take Baton Rouge, Mobile, Natchez, and even Pensacola. When it became obvious to Britain that they were not going to be able to hold onto their American colonies, they granted America its freedom in the Treaty of Paris in September 1783. And with little use for the British outpost of Florida, they also made a separate treaty with Spain, giving control of Florida and Fort St. Mark, back to its original owner. So the British control of St. Augustine and Fort St. Marks lasted only twenty years, and resulted in Spain’s return. What did that second Spanish period look like? We’ll explore it in next month’s post, so stay tuned!

It’s Your Turn: Were you aware that St. Augustine and the Castillo de San Marcos wasn’t always under one country’s rule? What, if anything, did you find most interesting about the British period of the Castillo’s history? Leave your thoughts with your email address to be entered in a giveaway for a print copy of Love’s Fortress.

 

Award-winning, best-selling novelist Jennifer Uhlarik has loved the western genre since she read her first Louis L’Amour novel. She penned her first western while earning a writing degree from University of Tampa. Jennifer lives near Tampa with her husband, son, and furbabies. www.jenniferuhlarik.com

 

 

COMING MARCH 1, 2022

 

Love’s Fortress by Jennifer Uhlarik

A Friendship From the Past Brings Closure to Dani’s Fractured Family

 

When Dani Sango’s art forger father passes away, Dani inherits his home. There, she finds a book of Native American drawings, which leads her to seek museum curator Brad Osgood’s help to decipher the ledger art. Why would her father have this book? Is it another forgery?

 

Brad Osgood longs to provide his four-year-old niece, Brynn, the safe home she desperately deserves. The last thing he needs is more drama, especially from a forger’s daughter. But when the two meet “accidentally” at St. Augustine’s 350-year-old Spanish fort, he can’t refuse the intriguing woman.

 

Broken Bow is among seventy-three Plains Indians transported to Florida in 1875 for incarceration at ancient Fort Marion. Sally Jo Harris and Luke Worthing dream of serving on a foreign mission field, but when the Indians reach St. Augustine, God changes their plans. However, when Sally Jo’s friendship with Broken Bow leads to false accusations, it could cost them their lives.

 

Can Dani discover how Broken Bow and Sally Jo’s story ends and how it impacted her father’s life?

From Stamp Act to Revolution

by Elaine Marie Cooper

The Stamp Act of 1765 took the American colonists by complete surprise. Without any representation in English Parliament, a tax was placed on every legal document and printed piece of material, including wills, newspapers, pamphlets, even playing cards. But this now-mandatory stamp was an affront to the economically-strapped Americans who simmered with growing rage. That anger grew to a boil that, ten years later, resulted in the American Revolution.

Stamp Act Seal

The Colonists were not unused to levies of various sorts set by their local legislatures. But they had a voice in those decisions. This was the first time that Parliament, with no colonial representation, levied such a bill. It was feared this Stamp Act would be a precedent to other such oppressive decisions by the Crown in England. In fact, they were correct. 

On the one hand, Colonists viewed themselves as Englishmen, yet believed they were being treated as foreigners with lesser rights. 

On the other hand, Parliament reasoned that the American colonies had benefitted from the protection of the British troops throughout the French and Indian War, and would continue to receive military protection from the natives on the frontier. Practically speaking, the Brits believed the colonists owed them for such service, which had greatly increased England’s debt since the beginning of that war. 

The passage of this Stamp Act on March 22, 1765 prompted mob violence in the colonies, where the stamp collectors were harassed into resigning their positions. The negative response actually caused Britain to repeal the act in 1766. 

But the precedent was now set that England viewed the colonists in a dimmer light. Americans’ view of their alliance with England had taken a turn. Since they were not able to vote for members of Parliament, they rejected the government’s argument that they were represented in that legislative body.

It is believed by historians that the incredible shift in devotion to the Mother country from 1765 to 1775 was almost unimaginable. The American colonies had gone from fighting in a war with their British comrades, to taking up arms against them. 

It was a metamorphosis in allegiance that had lasting consequences—both terrible and great—for the entire world.  

March 22, 1765 to April 19, 1775. Ten years and one month that transformed the future of America. 

Elaine Marie Cooper has two historical fiction books that released in 2019: War’s Respite(Prequel novella) and Love’s Kindling. Love’s Kindling is available in both e-book and paperback. They are the first two books in the Dawn of America Series set in Revolutionary War Connecticut. Cooper is the award-winning author of Fields of the Fatherless and Bethany’s Calendar. Her 2016 release (Saratoga Letters) was finalist in Historical Romance in both the Selah Awards and Next Generation Indie Book Awards. She has been published in Chicken Soup for the Soul and HomeLife magazine. She also penned the three-book historical series, Deer Run Saga. Her upcoming release, Scarred Vessels,” is about the black soldiers in the American Revolution. Look for it in October 2020. You can visit her website/ blog at www.elainemariecooper.com

George Washington, Spymaster

By J. M. Hochstetler

I’m currently toiling away on Refiner’s Fire, book 6 of my American Patriot Series set during the American Revolution. In this installment Elizabeth Howard has been whisked off to France to keep her out of the hands of British secret agents out to kill her. Meanwhile, Jonathan Carleton, also known as the Shawnee war chief White Eagle, is far out in Ohio Territory involved in frustrating negotiations with his tribe to support the Americans instead of the British or at least stay neutral in the war. As in previous volumes of the series, there’s lots of intrigue and spying—which was serious business on both sides during the Revolution, just as it is in all wars.

Nathan Hale by Frederick MacMonnies
City Hall Park, New York 

When George Washington took command of the rebel army besieging Boston after the battles of Lexington and Concord, he discovered that his new force was poorly trained, badly staffed, and lacking in supplies, equipment, and funds. To have any hope of beating the British, he would have to learn in advance as much of their military plans and movements as possible. In other words, he was going to need spies, double agents, and secret informants, and plenty of them. The British already had spy networks galore among the patriots, so he didn’t waste time setting things in motion. He took command at Cambridge on July 3, 1775, and on the 15th he paid an unidentified spy $333.33 “to go into the town of Boston; to establish a secret correspondence for the purpose of conveying intelligence of the Enemy’s movements and designs.”

Benjamin Tallmadge

Perhaps the most widely known spy of the Revolution was Nathan Hale, a Yale graduate and teacher who served in Knowlton’s Rangers. In September 1776 he volunteered for a mission ordered by Washington to slip behind enemy lines in New York City and gather much-needed intelligence—only to be quickly captured and hanged. Much more successful was another Continental officer Washington enlisted, Benjamin Tallmadge, who had been a close friend of Hale’s. If you’ve watched the series Turn on AMC, you’re familiar with the most famous of Washington’s spy rings—the Culper Ring—though facts are few and far between in this inventive re-imagination of history. Tallmadge was the mastermind behind the Culper Ring, recruiting both soldiers and civilians into what became one of the most effective espionage networks of the American Revolution. In 1780 its members uncovered British plans to ambush French troops en route to aid the Continentals, allowing Washington to prepare a defense that forced the British to change their plans. The ring also identified Major John Andre as a British spy and through him exposed the treachery of Benedict Arnold.

Culper Ring Code Book

The Culper Ring was only one of Washington’s spy networks, which involved merchants, ordinary laborers, farmers, and women, among others. Their success was crucial to the eventual defeat of the British. In addition, Congress passed resolutions that directed military intelligence operations in a number of directions as well. To maintain the greatest secrecy, spies were provided with code names and aliases, cipher codes, invisible ink, dead drops, and even such methods as posting “codes” on clotheslines and messages concealed in balls of knitting yarn. Washington also spread disinformation and fake intelligence about military movements and attacks on specific forts by sending messages via regular post so they could be intercepted and using “deserters” who offered “intelligence” to the British.

Washington essentially laid the groundwork for today’s intelligence organizations by recognizing that gathering information was just as important as building a powerful army. Without the efforts of Washington and his spies, our Revolution might have had a very different outcome. As Major George Beckwith, a British intelligence officer, noted: “Washington did not really outfight the British, he simply outspied us.”

I love tales of spies and intrigue, which is probably why I write them. But honestly, I have to wonder whether I’d have the courage to become a spy. Do you enjoy those kinds of stories too? Have you ever wondered what you would do if our country were under direct attack by an enemy and people you loved depended on you to protect them?

~~~

J. M. Hochstetler is the daughter of Mennonite farmers and a lifelong student of history. She is also an author, editor, and publisher. Her American Patriot Series is the only comprehensive historical fiction series on the American Revolution. Northkill, Book 1 of the Northkill Amish Series coauthored with Bob Hostetler, won Foreword Magazine’s 2014 Indie Book of the Year Bronze Award for historical fiction. Book 2, The Return, received the 2017 Interviews and Reviews Silver Award for Historical Fiction. One Holy Night, a contemporary retelling of the Christmas story, was the Christian Small Publishers 2009 Book of the Year.