PHOTO: © NATALIE TEPPER/ARCAID/CORBIS
l St. Augustine, Florida, is the oldest permanent European settlement in the continental United States. With beaches, fine weather, unique museums, and interesting tourist sites, St. Augustine has something for everyone.
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The City Gate provides visitors with a magnificent entrance onto historic St. George Street.
more durable than the previous wooden structures that had stood here. Ground was broken for Castillo de San Marcos in 1672. The fort, which was built from a strong yet easily sculpted limestone composed of shell and coral called coquina, was finished in 1695, and in 1702, the new fort was attacked by English troops. After 1,500 of St. Augustine’s Spanish citizens took cover in the fortification and refused to surrender, the English gave up their siege of the castillo and turned their attention to the town instead, burning it to the ground. Not easily daunted, the Spanish rebuilt their settlement and built earthwork walls to further protect it.
T H E E L K S M A G A Z I N E
u Completed in 1695, Castillo de San Marcos, with its moat and sturdy walls and watchtow- ers, gave sanctuary to the defenders of the Spanish colonial town from attacks whether they came from the land or the sea.
Castillo de San Marcos was refortified as well, thus helping it survive another attack by the English in 1740. Following the Seven Years’ War, which was fought by all the leading powers of Europe from 1756 to 1763, Florida was divided into two colonies under British rule, and St. Augustine was named the capital of East Florida. In 1783, the Florida peninsula was returned to Spain as part of the complex negotiations outlined in the Second Treaty of Paris, which ended
the American Revolution. The next thirty-seven years in Florida became known as the Second Spanish Period, but in 1821, Florida was ceded by Spain to the United States and finally became an American territory. As in other parts of North America, conflicts soon arose between the Native American population of Florida—the Seminoles—and the US government, which had already fought one war against the tribe prior to acquiring Florida. During the Second Seminole War, which lasted from 1835 to 1842, St. Augustine played a role in US–Native American relations when the influential Seminole leader Osceola was captured not far from
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PHOTO: © DAVID SAILORS/CORBIS
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