St Augustine’s Buried Cemeteries

The Tolomato Cemetery Preservation Association has invited Historic City News readers to attend a special presentation by noted historical archaeologist, Dr. Kathleen Deagan, on the hidden First Spanish Period cemeteries of St Augustine on Sunday, November 17, 2013 at 3:00 p.m.

Hidden graveyards from St Augustine’s First Spanish Period (1565-1763) have been largely forgotten and obscured by development over the centuries, according to Deagan.

“The cemeteries that are still visible in St Augustine are only the most recent chapter in the history of the town’s reverence for the dead,” Mary Jane Ballou told Historic City News. “Although they are less well-know, at least six of these cemeteries have been located and studied by archaeologists and bio-archaeologists.”

Sunday’s presentation will focus on what we have learned from their work over the past 75 years and is being held at the Bishop Baker Center, located on the grounds of the Cathedral Parish School at 259 St George Street, between Bridge and St Francis Streets in St Augustine. Admission to the program is free of charge and on-site parking is available.

Dr. Kathleen Deagan is Distinguished Research Curator of Archaeology Emerita and the Lockwood Professor of Florida and Caribbean Archaeology at the University of Florida’s Florida Museum of Natural History. She has taught at the University of Florida since 1982 and is the author of more than 70 publications, most of them relating to early Spanish settlement of the Caribbean. Dr. Deagan was awarded the J.C. Harrington Medal for Distinguished Lifetime Achievement by the Society for Historical Archaeology in 2003, and in 2006 she received the “Order of La Florida,” awarded by the city of St. Augustine.