Last Updated: February 21, 2017
Gulf Islands National Seashore stretches from the Florida Panhandle to Mississippi, protecting the natural and historic resources of a chain of Gulf Coast barrier islands that have seen an extraordinary amount of American history. The protected area spans mainland sections and parts of seven islands — and the ground here has been fought over, abandoned, reclaimed, and fought over again for more than 500 years.
A Contested Shore: The History of Gulf Islands
By the 1500s, Native American settlements were well-established across the Florida Panhandle — the Timucua, Calusa, Tequesta, Apalachee, Tocobaga, and Ais peoples among them. Most resisted the Spanish. Over the following century, a combination of European warfare, English-allied raids, and introduced diseases devastated these communities, and much of the Florida peninsula was largely depopulated of its indigenous inhabitants by the early 1700s.
Spain established a settlement on Pensacola Bay in 1559, abandoned it almost immediately, then revived it in 1698. What followed was a century of hand-offs: surrendered to France in 1719, returned to Spain by treaty in 1722, ceded to England in 1763, retaken by Spain by force in 1781, and finally transferred to the United States through the Adams–Onís Treaty of 1819 — a deal in which Spain, unable to afford settlers or garrisons, traded Florida for a settled boundary dispute in Texas. The treaty also defined U.S. territorial claims west through the Rockies to the Pacific.
After the War of 1812 exposed how vulnerable American coastlines were to British attack, the U.S. began constructing a system of over 40 coastal fortifications designed to withstand cannon fire from wooden warships. Fort Pickens was one of them.
Fort Pickens
Fort Pickens guards the western tip of Santa Rosa Island, commanding the entrance to Pensacola Bay and the Navy Shipyard beyond. Named after Revolutionary War hero General Andrew Pickens, it was built between 1829 and 1834 using over 21 million bricks — much of the construction done by enslaved laborers. The fort is pentagonal in shape, with four-foot-thick walls and arched casemates engineered to absorb direct cannon hits. Note: Sandy’s feet are not actually that large. Michael was testing the wide-angle lens.
Fort Pickens remained an active part of the U.S. coastal defense system until 1947, when coastal forts were declared surplus. It became part of Gulf Islands National Seashore in 1971 and is one of the best-preserved examples of Third System fortification in the country.
Geronimo at Fort Pickens
One of the more sobering chapters in Fort Pickens’ history is its role in the imprisonment of Geronimo. Born around 1829 in present-day New Mexico, Geronimo was an Apache medicine man — not a chief, a distinction often lost in popular accounts. After the Civil War, U.S. policy turned toward forcing Native American tribes onto reservations. The Apaches resisted. Mexican soldiers murdered Geronimo’s mother, wife, and children, and he spent the next three decades in relentless guerrilla warfare across Arizona, New Mexico, and northern Mexico — the same Apache War landscape you can still feel today at Cochise Stronghold in the Dragoon Mountains of Arizona, where Geronimo’s fellow Chiricahua Apache leader Cochise held off the U.S. Army for over a decade.
He and his band were finally captured in 1886 and shipped by rail to Fort Marion in St. Augustine — separated from their families. Pensacola businessmen then petitioned the government to have Geronimo transferred to Fort Pickens, where he would, they argued, serve as a great tourist attraction for the city. The request was granted. The Apache prisoners were put to work at hard labor in the fort. Eventually their families were allowed to join them. On his best day as a “tourist attraction,” Geronimo received 459 visitors; on average, about 20 per day. He spent the rest of his life as a prisoner, eventually selling souvenirs and photographs of himself at fairs and exhibitions. He died in 1909 at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, from pneumonia after falling from a horse. He was approximately 79 years old and had never been a free man in his final decades.
Concrete Stalactites
Look up at the undersides of the fort’s arches and you’ll find something unexpected: stalactites, draperies, stalagmites, and soda straws — formations that look identical to what you’d find in a limestone cave. These are created by efflorescence: water percolates slowly through the brick and mortar, dissolving the calcium-rich salts in the mortar as it goes. When the water reaches the underside of an arch and evaporates, it deposits those salts, which gradually build up into the same kinds of formations that take thousands of years to form underground. The fort has been doing this for nearly 200 years.
Armadillos at Camp
Jake re-discovered armadillos at Gulf Islands — there weren’t many squirrels at this location, so he had to adapt. One armadillo in particular decided our campsite was its territory and kept turning up at inconvenient moments, making it extremely difficult for Jake to focus on the business of going outside. The armadillo appeared unbothered.
Sunset Beach
The beach at Gulf Islands was spectacular at sunset — and entirely empty. No one else there. The controlled burns happening across the Panhandle all winter had an unexpected side effect: the smoke particles in the atmosphere were diffracting the light in ways that made the sunsets dramatically more vivid than usual, deepening the oranges and reds into something almost surreal. We found Great Blue Heron tracks pressed into the sand, fresh and clear, heading into the surf.
Fresh Seafood in Pensacola
After a full day at the fort, we went into Pensacola for fresh seafood. Sandy ordered the oyster sampler — a dozen oysters, each pair baked a different way. It was as good as it sounds.
Visitor Information
Gulf Islands National Seashore
Address (Fort Pickens): 1400 Fort Pickens Rd, Pensacola Beach, FL 32561
Phone: (850) 934-2600
Hours: Fort Pickens Area open daily; hours vary by season
Admission: $25 per vehicle (7-day pass); $10 pedestrians and cyclists; America the Beautiful Pass accepted
Camping: Fort Pickens Campground offers RV and tent sites; reservations at recreation.gov
Website: nps.gov/guis
Practical Tips
Give yourself at least a half day for Fort Pickens — the fort itself is large and the history layers run deep. The Geronimo exhibit is small but worth reading carefully. Bring a flashlight if you want to explore the darker interior chambers. The beach on the Gulf side is accessible directly from the fort area and is consistently uncrowded compared to the beaches closer to Pensacola Beach’s commercial strip. Sunsets here are exceptional year-round, and the controlled burn season in late winter and early spring adds an extra dimension to the light. Dogs are welcome in the campground and on the roads but are not permitted on the beach.
