St. Augustine, FL
Fort Mose
Sanctuary
Promised land
Fort Mose is the only site of its kind in the United States. It was a promised land, sanctuary, and refuge for formerly enslaved Africans. One of the largest slave revolts in history, the Stono Rebellion, was inspired by this place- slaves in South Carolina sought to escape to Fort Mose. Fort Mose became a Site of Memory in 2019. UNESCO noted that the story of Fort Mose includes experiences of Africans in Spanish Florida and their efforts to find freedom.
Images courtesy of Ebyabe, CC BY-SA 3.0 and Justin Waters, CC BY-SA 4.0.
More than 250 years ago, enslaved Africans risked their lives to escape English plantations in Carolina and live free among the Spanish in St Augustine. They established the first Underground Railroad more than 100 years before the Civil War. The Spanish freed the fugitive slaves in return for their service to the King and conversion to Catholicism. The freedmen served as skilled laborers and additions to the Spanish’s weak military forces.
"When you want freedom, you're determined to get it"
In 1738, freedmen, escaped from Carolina plantations, established their own town: Gracia Real de Santa Teresa de Mose. It was the first legally sanctioned free Black town in the present day United States. There is evidence that Black American colonial history was much more than slavery and oppression, and Fort Mose contributes to that evidence.
The freedmen won their liberty through daring and effort and made great contributions to a multiethnic heritage in Florida. How much of the way of life was African? Spanish? Native American or English? Fort Mose truly is one of a kind.
In 1740, Black troops fought with the Spanish and their Native allies against the English and their former masters.
In 1759, the freedmen’s village consisted of 22 palm thatch huts. 37 men, 15 women, 7 boys, and 8 girls lived there. They attended Mass in a wood church where their priest also lived. Most of the fugitives married fellow escapees, but some married Native American women or enslaved people in St. Augustine.
To date, lots of artifacts have been found at the fort, including military, food, and household items.
