Editing Wakulla County, Florida (section)

== History ==

=== First Spanish period ===
In 1528, [[Pánfilo de Narváez]] found his way to what would be Wakulla County from the future [[Pinellas County, Florida]], camping at the confluence of the [[Wakulla River|Wakulla]] and [[St. Marks River|St. Marks]] rivers. Narváez determined this was a very suitable spot for a [[fort]]. In 1539, [[Hernando de Soto (explorer)|Hernando de Soto]]'s expedition passed through ''La Florida'' with a similar route.

The [[San Marcos de Apalache Historic State Park|Fort San Marcos de Apalache]] began with a wooden fort in the late 1600s. The vicinity around the fort was not settled until 1733. Spanish colonial officials began constructing a stone fort, which was unfinished in the mid-1760s when [[Kingdom of Great Britain|Great Britain]] took over.

=== British period ===
The British divided Florida into [[East Florida]], which included present-day Wakulla County, and [[West Florida]]. The boundary was the [[Apalachicola River]]; at that time, West Florida extended all the way to the [[Mississippi River]].  Twenty years later when the Spanish returned, they kept the East and West divisions, with the administrative capitals remaining at St. Augustine and Pensacola, respectively.

===Second Spanish period===
The area to become Wakulla County was an active place in the early 19th century. A former British officer named [[William Augustus Bowles]] attempted to unify and lead 400 [[Creek people|Creek Indians]] against the [[San Marcos de Apalache Historic State Park|Spanish outpost of San Marcos]], capturing it. This provoked Spain, and a Spanish flotilla arrived some five weeks later to restore control.

In 1818, [[Andrew Jackson|General Andrew Jackson]] invaded the area, capturing Fort San Marcos. Two captive British citizens, [[Robert Ambrister]] and Alexander Arbuthnot, were tried, found guilty of inciting Indian raids, and executed under Jackson's authority – causing a diplomatic nightmare between the U.S. and [[Kingdom of Great Britain|Britain]]. The [[U.S. Army]] [[garrison]] of 200 infantry and artillery men occupied the fort for the better part of a year (1818–1819).

In 1821, Florida was ceded to the United States and Fort St. Marks, as the Americans called it, was again garrisoned by U.S. troops.

=== Florida's territorial period ===
In 1824, the fort was abandoned and turned over to the [[Florida Territory|Territory of Florida]].

By 1839, the fort was returned to the Federal government and a [[merchant marine]] hospital was built. The hospital provided care for seamen and area [[Yellow Fever|yellow fever]] victims.

==== American forts in Wakulla County ====
* 1840 - Camp Lawson, northwest of Wakulla and northeast of Ivan, on the St. Marks River. A log stockade also known as Fort Lawson (2).
* 1841-1842 - Fort Many located near Wakulla Springs.
* 1839 - Fort Number Five (M) located near [[Sopchoppy, Florida|Sopchoppy]].
* 1839-1843 - Fort Stansbury was located on the [[Wakulla River]] {{convert|9|mi|km}} from St. Marks.
* 1841-1843 - Fort Port Leon. Abandoned after a hurricane destroyed it. Site was later used for a [[Confederate States of America|CSA]] [[Confederate States Army|Army]] artillery battery.
* 1839 - James Island Post located on James Island.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.geocities.com/naforts/flmiddle.html |title=Florida Forts: page 2 |access-date=April 29, 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050426083629/http://www.geocities.com/naforts/flmiddle.html |archive-date=April 26, 2005 }}</ref>

=== Antebellum Wakulla ===
Wakulla County was created from Leon County in 1843.  It may (although this is disputed) be named for the [[Timucuan]] [[Native Americans in the United States|Indian]] word for "spring of water" or "mysterious water". This is in reference to Wakulla County's greatest natural attraction, [[Wakulla Springs]], which is one of the world's largest freshwater [[spring water|springs]], both in terms of depth and water flow. In 1974, the water flow was measured at {{convert|1.23|e9USgal|m3}} per day—the greatest recorded flow ever for a single spring.

In an 1856 book, adventurer Charles Lanman wrote of the springs:{{citation needed|date=October 2013}}

{{blockquote|An adequate idea of this mammoth spring could never be given by pen or pencil; but when once seen, on a bright calm day, it must ever after be a thing to dream about and love. It is the fountain-head of a river... and is of sufficient volume to float a steamboat, if such an affair had yet dared to penetrate this solemn wilderness... It wells up in the very heart of a dense cypress swamp, is nearly round in shape, measures some four hundred feet in diameter, and is in depth about one hundred and fifty feet, having at its bottom an immense horizontal chasm, with a dark portal, from one side of which looms up a limestone cliff, the summit of which is itself nearly fifty feet beneath the spectator, who gazes upon it from the sides of a tiny boat. The water is so astonishlingly clear that even a pin can be seen on the bottom in the deepest places, and of course every animate and inanimate object which it contains is fully exposed to view. The apparent color of the water from the shore is greenish, but as you look perpendicularly into it, it is colorless as air, and the sensation of floating upon it is that of being suspended in a balloon; and the water is so refractive, that when the sun shines brilliantly every object you see is enveloped in the most fascinating prismatic hues.}}

Another possible origin for the name Wakulla, not as widely accepted, is that it means "mist" or "misting", perhaps in reference to the [[Wakulla Volcano]], a 19th-century phenomenon in which a column of smoke could be seen emerging from the swamp for miles.

The town of [[Port Leon, Florida|Port Leon]] was once a thriving cotton-shipping hub, with a railroad from Tallahassee that carried over 50,000 tons of cotton a year to be put on ships, usually for shipment direct to Europe. Port Leon was the sixth-largest town in Florida, with 1,500 residents. However, a hurricane and the accompanying storm surge wiped out the entire town. New Port (today known as [[Newport, Wakulla County, Florida|Newport, Florida]]) was built two miles (3&nbsp;km) upstream but never quite achieved the prosperity of Port Leon.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.wakullacountytdc.com/wakulla-41.htm |title=Historical Places |publisher=Wakullacountytdc.com |access-date=April 29, 2013 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120303064829/http://www.wakullacountytdc.com/wakulla-41.htm |archive-date=March 3, 2012 }}</ref><ref name="Jahoda, Gloria 1967">Jahoda, Gloria (1967). ''The Other Florida'', Florida Classics. {{ISBN|978-0-912451-04-6}}.</ref>

=== Civil War ===
During the [[American Civil War|Civil War]], Wakulla County was blockaded from 1861 to 1865 by a [[Union Navy]] squadron at the mouth of the [[St. Marks River]]. [[Confederate States Army|Confederates]] took the old Spanish [[fort]] known as [[San Marcos de Apalache Historic State Park|San Marcos de Apalache]], or Fort St. Marks, and renamed it [[Fort Ward (Florida)|Fort Ward]].

The [[Battle of Natural Bridge]] eventually stopped the Union force that intended to take Fort Ward and nearby [[Tallahassee, Florida|Tallahassee]], the only Confederate state [[Capital city|capital]] other than Austin Texas which had not been captured. The [[Union (Civil War)|Union]] was not able to land all of its forces, but they still outnumbered the Confederates, who chose to make their stand at a place where the [[St. Marks River]] goes underground: the "Natural Bridge" referred to. However, the [[Confederate States Army|Confederate Army]] had over a day to prepare its defenses, and the [[Union Army]] retreated. Most of the dead were [[African-American]] Union soldiers.

=== 20th century and beyond ===
In Gloria Jahoda's book ''The Other Florida'', she writes movingly of the extreme poverty of Wakulla County from the early 1900s to 1966 when Wakulla still had no doctor and no dentist, few stores, and a county newspaper produced just once a month on a [[mimeograph]] machine.<ref name="Jahoda, Gloria 1967"/>

Today, Wakulla has several doctors and dentists, several supermarkets and big-box retailers, a golf resort, and a thriving seafood business.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.wakullacountychamber.com/ |title=Wakulla County Chamber of Commerce |publisher=Wakullacountychamber.com |access-date=April 29, 2013 |archive-date=May 29, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130529161348/http://wakullacountychamber.com/ |url-status=live }}</ref>