St. Augustine in The American Civil War - Late War

Late War

Other notable contributions to the Confederate war effort were at least three generals: Edmund Kirby-Smith, Francis A. Shoup and William Wing Loring, although only Kirby-Smith was born there. During the war, St. Augustinian Stephen Vincent Benet, grandfather of American author Stephen Vincent Benet, continued to serve in the U.S. Army as an instructor at West Point with the rank of captain, eventually rising to the rank of Brigadier General. His younger brother James served in the Confederate Army—one of many examples of families divided in their loyalty during the war. Edmund Jackson Davis, while born in St. Augustine, moved to Galveston, Texas, as a child. After the war began, he crossed over to Mexico where he raised the 1st Texas Cavalry (USA), served as its colonel, and was later promoted to Brigadier General of U.S. Volunteers. In 1869, he was elected governor of Texas and served as such for four years.

Unlike nearby Jacksonville, which had four separate control changes, the Confederates did not attempt retaking St. Augustine. Confederate general Robert E. Lee, well familiar with the area after having charted the coastline years before, said that the city "serves only as an invitation for an attack". Union forces strengthened the fort during the war, in case of attack. A heavy presence of U.S. Army forces would remain through Reconstruction and until the end of the Spanish-American War, always as an important part of the local economy and social life. Many Union soldiers settled permanently in St. Augustine and intermarried with local families. Several served as mayors of the city. Lieutenant Foster, a Union officer, married Miss Sanchez, from a family of Confederate firebrands, and their son, General J. Clifford R. Foster, served as Adjutant General of Florida for most of the first quarter of the twentieth century.

Union forces enjoyed the city. The Seventh New Hampshire Volunteers' historian said that living in St. Augustine was good for the health of his fellow soldiers, and regretted when ordered to leave the city. Another benefit from the Union presence was that Sam A. Cooley, an official photographer of the U.S. Army's Department of the South, undertook the first major effort to take pictures of many of the city's buildings, which proved valuable a century later when efforts were made to restore many of St. Augustine's historic buildings. Among the interesting Union soldiers to serve in St. Augustine were Joseph Hawley, later governor and senator from Connecticut, Francis Wayland Parker, pioneer of progressive education in the United States, Joseph C. Abbott, later senator from North Carolina, and Anthony Comstock, who became the nation's most notorious bookburner and anti-pornography crusader.

On January 1, 1863, Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation came into effect for slaves in areas still under Confederate control. A bell and marker on the grounds of Old St. Augustine Village celebrates the event, and for many generations, Emancipation Day, on January 1, was a major celebration in the black community of the Ancient City.

On March 9, 1863, a small skirmish occurred when 80 Confederate troops attacked an advanced picket guard just north of St. Augustine. They were driven off by 120 men from the 7th New Hampshire Volunteers.