Excerpt from Castillo De San Marcos and Fort Matanzas National Monuments, Florida: Historical Research Management Plan; December 10, 1967 Successive fortifications, coinciding With the founding and growth of St. Augustine, enabled Spain to hold Florida for 235 years, during 1565-1763 and 1784 1821. Castillo de San Marcos, begun in 1672, is the epitome of the highest development attained by a forti fication within that part of Florida governed from St. Augustine. However, a flank of the fortification was subject to surprise attack because Matanzas Inlet and Matanzas River to the south provided an avenue of approach to St. Augustine. When it was fully realized that an adequately equipped enemy possessed this capability, Fort Matanzas was built in 1740-1742 to provide greater control over the inlet and the waterway, and thus protect the back door to St. Augustine. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.