Dry Tortugas National Park Histories Project

Before its designation as a National Park, Dry Tortugas and Fort Jefferson already had a long history of occupation and abandonment. Construction of the fort began in 1846 and by the time the Civil War broke out, the fort was only halfway done. During the Civil War, Union forces were stationed at Fort Jefferson to prevent it from falling into the hands of rebel forces. Within a year, the first soldier prisoners appeared. Soldier prisoners were those who had been court-martialed to imprisonment and manual labor for various offenses. At its peak, Fort Jefferson housed approximately 650 soldiers and 750 convicts, though this number was constantly in flux. A majority of the documents related to this project are records, logs, and correspondence associated with the Civil War era and the documentation of soldiers and prisoners stationed/imprisoned at Fort Jefferson, as well as the labor they did. A small portion of the materials in this collection are from the Carnegie Institution of Washington. From 1903 until 1939 the Carnegie Institution of Washington operated the Marine Biology Laboratory on Loggerhead Key (a key making up the Dry Tortugas). This lab was considered one of the most advanced and well-equipped laboratories in the tropics. Additional records related to different histories and eras of Fort Jefferson and the Dry Tortugas may be added at a later time.