Hawkinsville existed from about 1855-1905 and has a post office 1858-1872 or so and then again 1888-1909 or so. The site is also sometimes called St Francis or Ponseinna(h) and is also confused with Crow's Bluff another ghost town on the St John's River. But they are actually seperate sites all about 2.5 miles apart opposite the Deland/ lake Beresford/ High Banks area on the east side of the river. Hawkinsville appears on several old maps of the 1870's & 1880's
Ft. Marion ( called the Castillo de San Marcos by the NPS) is of course the old fort. Fort Matanzas is a watch tower further south of St. Augustine that guards the southern approach to the oldest city. They are 2 seperate structures. Troops had a signal tower to communicate with the city by either flares/rockets from Matanzas.
St Augustine was evacuted upon the approach of the US naval blockading squadron in March of 1862. This is the same time that St John's Bluff was being encircled on the way to Jax. Also New Smyrna was being closed to blockade activity and the US sailors were ambushed at the old Stone Wharf March 22, 1862.
There was quite a lot of activity with supplies being landed and then taken by wagon to the St. Johns, then by boat across the river, then again by wagon to the railroad at Gainesville. Of course Northern troops wanted to stop this and thus the closing of the ports and river lead Southerners to withdraw into the interior.
The small community which once had a pier, hotel, and store disappeared with the coming of the railroad which by passed the area. As the steamboat era came to and end so did Hawkinsville, St Francis, & Crow's Bluff.
They are just a few remote footnotes in Florida's history.
However it is interesting to note that Gen. Breckenridge hid out in the area and got a row boat from JJ Dickison (which came from the Columbine that was sunk in 1864)in May of 1865 Gen. Grant would also visited the
area after he was president in late 1880 early 1881.