In 1564, French Huguenots successfully established a fort and settlement near the mouth of the St. Johns River, now known as Jacksonville. This French presence in Florida posed a potential threat not only to Spanish territorial claims but also to the Spanish treasure fleet that sailed along the Florida coast from South America and Mexico before heading back to Spain across the Atlantic.
As Don Pedro Menéndez de Avilés assembled a fleet for an expedition to Florida, the Spanish authorities became aware of the French intrusion on lands claimed by Spain. In response, King Philip II instructed Menéndez, Spain's most capable admiral, to eliminate the French threat to Spain's interests.
The expedition set sail in July 1565 with 11 ships and approximately 2,000 men. On August 28, the feast day of St. Augustine, Menéndez arrived at the bay of St. Augustine and built a fort there. His primary objective was to quickly construct a defensive structure to protect his people and supplies during the unloading of ships, followed by a thorough survey to determine the best location for the fort.
On September 20, Menéndez captured the nearby French colony of Fort Caroline and carried out a massacre of its entire population, hanging the bodies on trees with the inscription "Not as Frenchmen, but as heretics."
The Spanish soon realized that St. Augustine offered a valuable base to assist their trading ships during tropical storms and to deploy warships needed to combat pirates. Consequently, the Spanish Crown heavily subsidized the colony.
However, maintaining St. Augustine as a permanent military settlement proved to be a formidable challenge, as English pirates and corsairs repeatedly raided and burned the town in the following century.
St. Augustine became a crucial center for Spanish power in Florida, making it a frequent target of attacks by the English and other enemies. In 1586, Sir Francis Drake raided and burned St. Augustine, but the residents eventually returned and rebuilt the settlement.
In the early 1600s, expeditions were launched from St. Augustine to attack the British colony at Jamestown, Virginia. Additionally, displaced indigenous people from the north attacked the missionaries in St. Augustine during the second half of the 17th century. In response to a 1668 attack by British buccaneers, the decision was made to construct a permanent stone fortress.
Two hundred years after Menéndez's arrival, Spain ceded Florida to Great Britain, and the Spanish population evacuated to Cuba.
The oldest city in the United States: St. Augustine, Florida
