Submerged Island Off Florida Reveals Secret: Civil War-Era Cemetery
The site, discovered by marine archaeologists about 70 miles from Key West, Fla., once held a quarantine hospital and cemetery for those stationed at Fort Jefferson in the Dry Tortugas National Park.
Joshua Marano was flying over the Gulf of Mexico in the summer of 2016 when he noticed a strange pattern in the water. Mr. Marano, a maritime archaeologist with the National Park Service, consulted some old nautical charts, expecting he might find the ruins of a lighthouse or beacon.
Instead, he found a whole island.
The island, about 70 miles west of Key West, Fla., had long since been submerged and eroded by rising tides and storms. But Mr. Marano’s research revealed that it had once held a quarantine hospital and cemetery for those stationed at Fort Jefferson, a Civil War-era military fortress in the Dry Tortugas National Park...
