I have been unable to find out at what date this fort was constructed. The natural features have greatly changed since the time of Romans even. The island has been very much washed away by the current, and will soon cease to exist at all. The bar, which must have been nearly opposite the island, has gradually worked south until now it is nearly half a mile below the fort, and a high sand ridge, a part of Anastatia Island, is between the fort and the ocean, so that, instead of being visible three leagues at sea, the fort, probably, would not be seen from the ocean at all.[14] Soundings on Matanzas Bar are now given as one fathom. Fort Mosa, where Colonel Palmer was killed, was built by the negro refugees from the British colonies, and was often called the Negro Fort. It was a square earthwork with four bastions, containing a well and a house with a look-out, and surrounded with a ditch. The walls of a stone house are still standing near the location of this fort, at a place called by the town’s people “Moses,” north of Mr. Hildreth’s grounds. Oglethorpe was greatly blamed at the time for his failure to take St. Augustine, but it is evident that the town was well protected. The north side of the peninsula, on which the town is built, was defended by the fort, about which, for a space of fifteen hundred yards, a clear space was maintained by the Spanish governors, and also by the ditch and redoubt with salient angles running from the fort to the St. Sebastian River; upon the east side of the town the galleys and the guns of the fort could prevent a landing, as the water upon the bar was too shoal to admit the passage of the English ships; upon the south was a line of redoubts again with cannon, and a water front for the approach of the galleys, while upon the west was the long stretch of boggy marshes extending for a quarter of a mile to the St. Sebastian River. No place could be better situated for defense. Had the blockade been efficient and long-continued the town must have surrendered as there was a large population to feed besides the garrison, and the very advantages of the place for defense rendered it difficult to bring in supplies. Governor Monteano was constantly sending messages to Cuba, by the way of West Florida and the Keys, for succor of provisions, and was said to have received supplies from a vessel which arrived at Mosquito Inlet, while the harbor of Matanzas was yet blockaded.