Civil War Union Soldiers in Trenches on June 9, 1864 – Courtesy: Shutterstock – Image by Everett Collection
In the summer of 2016, Joshua Marano was flying over the Gulf of Mexico when he observed an unusual pattern in the water. Mr. Marano, a National Park Service maritime archaeologist, reviewed some antique nautical charts in the hopes of discovering the ruins of a lighthouse or beacon.
Instead, he discovered an entire island.
Rising tides and hurricanes had long ago submerged and damaged the island, which was roughly 70 miles west of Key West, Fla. However, Mr. Marano’s investigation discovered that it originally housed a quarantine hospital and cemetery for those stationed at Fort Jefferson, a Civil War-era military bastion in the Dry Tortugas National Park.
“There was dry land here at one point. There was a structure on that island at one point,” Mr. Marano said in an interview. “When did it disappear?”
The Dry Tortugas National Park was established around 200 years ago and consisted of 11 islands. There are now only six. The changes are the result of a combination of natural processes and the effects of climate change.
Mr. Marano and some of his students at the University of Miami, where he is an adjunct lecturer, as well as other colleagues, were finally able to inspect the site in August, six years after his initial discovery. They swam in straight lines, wearing snorkels and fins, he added, looking for signs of life.
“The very first thing we came across was a single post,” Mr. Marano said. “Basically like a pipe sticking out of the sand. Nothing around it. Nothing else nearby.” But then, he said, “We find another, and then we find another one, and then we find another.” The spacing of the posts matched measurements of the hospital in public records he researched after seeing the strange pattern in the Gulf of Mexico. “This is a pretty good bet,” he said, “that this is that building.”
Devon Fogarty, one of Mr. Marano’s students, swam up to a sandstone block coated in algae and sand. However, there was one location that appeared to have an inscription. They soon discovered what it was: a gravestone.
“I didn’t believe it,” Ms. Fogarty said in an interview, noting that records showed people had been buried at the Dry Tortugas, but that she had never expected to find a gravesite so well preserved. “It felt like it shouldn’t be happening.”
The archaeologists returned the next day, armed with brushes, clipboards, and Mylar (a polyester film that can be written on underwater), determined to decode the inscription of the watery grave. They created a rubbing. It was unreadable. They then sandblasted the letters. The sand settled into the carving as though by magic. “JOHN GREER. November 5, 1861,” it said.
Despite popular perception, marine archaeology is rarely as exciting as Scooby Doo rescuing a zombie in a deep-sea diving suit from the ocean, or the plot of the 1985 film “The Goonies,” in which a group of young misfits discover treasure in a ship after discovering an ancient pirate map. But a whole grave marker? Mr. Marano believes it is close. “To have a smoking gun like that, it’s just it’s a once-in-a-million chance.”
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Hans Van Tilburg, a maritime archaeologist who was not engaged in the survey, hailed the discovery as “fantastically interesting.”
Dr. Van Tilburg stated that shipwrecks get all the attention, but there are all kinds of undersea sites that “have great information about the past.”
Fort Jefferson was utilized as a military prison during the American Civil War. Not only prisoners and military personnel were imprisoned on the adjacent islands, but also enslaved people, laborers, and their families. According to the National Park Service, outbreaks of mosquito-borne yellow fever killed scores of individuals on the island throughout the 1860s and 1870s.
Further investigation found that Mr. Greer had worked as a worker at the fort and that the slab on his burial was made of greywacke, the same material used to build the fort. He never received his final salary, and there is no record of him being in the hospital, implying he died suddenly and violently. According to Civil War historical archives, dozens of other people were interred at the cemetery, and the quarantine hospital was used to treat yellow fever patients between 1890 and 1900.
For the time being, the archaeologists intend to leave Mr. Greer’s grave alone. They will also not identify the actual location of the facility, as is customary.
“In the Florida Keys, we’re in the birthplace of modern treasure hunting,” Mr. Marano said, adding that there was a common misconception that things found in the water fell under the rule of “finders keepers,” but that such artifacts belong to the public and are well protected by federal law. “A lot of times, we want to leave it in place,” he added, “because it’s going to be better protected.”
Kirstin Meyer-Kaiser, a marine biologist at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution who was not involved in the survey but has researched the relationship between undersea sites and marine biodiversity, believes that leaving human artifacts in place is likely best for any marine creatures. “It was not supposed to be there in the first place,” she said of the relics. “But after a certain amount of time, any man-made object turns into a habitat.”
The NOAA archaeologist, Dr. Van Tilburg, stated that his field was only beginning to understand the effects of climate change on the cultural heritage of the marine environment, but that those in shallow environments, such as the Dry Tortugas site, were likely to be the most vulnerable to storms and other ocean changes. Still, he stated that the gold standard was to leave things alone where feasible.
“Things that are submerged,” he said, “have a story to tell.”
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Chris began his writing as a hobby while attending Florida Southern College in Lakeland, Florida. Today he and his wife live in the Orlando area with their three children and dog.
