The Wandering Disciple

Welcome to the block, I am the Sheriff and I've got my eyes on you son. While it may look like a nice Victorian estate from the outside, the Old Jail in St Augustine was pure hell inside. When Henry Flagler built his luxurious hotel in town, he needed to move the jail. So he found a parcel north of town to build a new jail, however this was right along his rail line so he didn't want his guests to pass an eyesore so he built it to resemble a pink mansion. However the living conditions inside the mansion were horrible. Overcrowding and disease as well as mistreatment of the prisoners were common practice during the early days of the prison. The old jail stood as the St Johns County jail until 1953. Today it is on the National Register of Historic Places and can be toured by costumed tour guides telling the stories of those who were worked or were incarcerated at the old jail. (Photo: March 17, 2020)

No air conditioning, no windows to keep out critters, no indoor plumbing. This is what inmates today would consider cruel and unusual punishment as well as a violation to their civil rights. However this was life for an inmate of the old St Johns County Jail. Don’t let the mansion appearance fool you, this was far from luxurious accommodations. From working in the heat all day long to sharing a cell with over six fellow cons. In fact the 2 ½ story jail housed 72 male and 12 female inmates at once. The Old Jail remained in operation until 1953. Today you can tour the jail and see what life was like behind bars. (Photo: March 17, 2020)

Over the course of operations of the Old Jail in St Augustine, many inmates met their death under this live oak behind the jail. Sheriff Perry had him a knack for hangings, making them public events and even scientific experiments. The gallows of the jail saw 8 hangings in an 11 year span including a triple hanging in 1912. You can hear about these hangings and those that might still be hanging around the jail during the Ghost and Gravestones Tour or if you’re not up for the ghostly tour, they offer a daytime tour that focuses more on life as an inmate. (Photo: March 16, 2020)