The construction of Fort Jefferson, on Garden Key in Dry Tortugas National Park, was started in 1846 and halted in 1875. It was never completed. Even so, the builders did a great job aligning the openings in its internal walls.
At this place where two of the fort's six wall sections meet is a modern lighthouse.
This is one end of the larger of the fort's two parade magazines. These contained stores of ammunition near the fort's parade grounds. (I'd like to give youz some better information, but when I try to look up "parade magazine", most of what I get is a periodical magazine entitled Parade.)
This fort's inner area included this shot furnace, used to heat cannon balls with the intention of having them set wooden ships on fire.
Here are what remains of the fort's officers quarters.
This monument is a cenotaph of Brevet Major Dr. Joseph Sim Smith. He was the fort's medical officer, but died of the yellow fever at age 30. He was succeeded by the aforementioned Dr. Samuel Mudd. From what I can gather, Dr. Smith was buried on an island near Garden Key, later exhumed, and afterwards reinterred in New York City.
I went back outside the fort and saw a few people taking a stroll on a seawall between part of the moat and the Gulf of Mexico.
I eventually returned to the Yankee Freedom III, which served us visitors a light lunch. Then we all had to leave the vessel to allow Coast Guard personnel to conduct an inspection, which was over with rather quickly. Finally, it became time to get everyone onboard and head back to Key West.
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