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As the sea brought good, it too
brought evil. In 1586, Francis Drake, an English alchemist who made fortunes by turning Spanish blood into gold, spied
the settlement’s watchtower/lighthouse from sea, landed, and reduced the town to smoldering ashes. In 1668, the pirate Robert Searle left the city in desolation and more than sixty men, women and children dead
in the streets. Like Drake, Searle attacked from the sea. Once again, in 1702, Governor
Moore of the Carolinas tried to rip
St. Augustine from the Spanish and caused much wailing and gnashing of teeth with his siege of the townspeople. This time though, his boats left without victory. With each blow, St. Augustine hardened her defenses to ocean-stalking marauders.
Enslaved Africans from British southeastern plantations emancipated themselves to La Florida, where they could live with the dignity of freedom.
Many historians, including St. Augustine’s Susan Parker, have pointed to their use of waterways, much like the Underground Railroad, to get to Fort Mose, the first free black settlement on the continent, and freedom. St. Augustine’s rivers and coastline were profoundly connected to this system and without the sea and the St. Johns River, many would not have been able to reach the protection of Spanish Florida.
When Florida withdrew to the
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