Long before Juan Ponce de Leon sailed Florida's east coast in 1513 searching for a "Fountain of Youth,"  Timucuan Indians lived here. Nomadic hunters and gatherers, they inhabited this area 10,000 year ago. But Timucuans disappeared within 200 years of Ponce de Leon's landing, victims of European infections and slavery.

Only their shell mounds survived. Dr. Amos W. Butler, an Indian archaeologist, identified 22 mounds between Port Orange and Oak Hill in his "Observations on Some Shell Mounds on the Eastern Coast of Florida," published in 1917.

Nearly all 22 were destroyed for use as road material. The Florida State Historical Society saved Turtle Mound in 1924, purchasing Canaveral National Seashore for $8,000. Today it is a designated State Historic Memorial. Visible seven miles out to sea, Turtle Mound has been a navigational aid since the 1500s.

After the Spanish ceded Florida to the British in 1763, the British Government offered large land grants and bounties to encourage colonization and cultivation of cotton, hemp, indigo and silk. Dr. Andrew Turnbull, a wealthy Scottish physician who resided in London, said yes.

Turnbull was impressed with the climate and the soil, believing it was suitable for raising indigo, rice, hemp, cotton and other crops. He named the colony in honor of his wife's birthplace, Smyrna, Asia Minor. He met and married Gracia Dura Bin (Mrs. Andrew Turnbull) while traveling throughout the Mediterranean area.

In 1768, Turnbull sailed to Greece and recruited 200 mountain tribesmen, traveling next to Corsica, where he took on 110 settlers. On Feb. 1, 1768, he arrived at Mahon, Minorca, where the people had suffered three years of famine. 1,190 heeded the promise of new opportunities in Florida.

Preparations had been made for about 500 colonists, not  1,200 plus. This made New Smyrna the largest British attempt at colonization in the New World, nearly three times larger than Jamestown, Virginia. As an economic enterprise, New Smyrna succeeded, perhaps the most lucrative of all New World colonies.

From the beginning, shortages, hard labor and mosquitoes took their toll. Nine years of difficult colony life and tyrannical overseers reduced the settlers to 600. In 1777 a group of the indentured colonists petitioned the English governor in St. Augustine to let them stay. Court was held and heard  accusations of the overseers' cruelty and ill-treatment. The governor offered land grants north of St. Augustine to the colonists; many of their descendants live there today.

The Spanish regained control of Florida in 1783, ceding the Bahamas to the British for Florida. Spain encouraged colonization and Dr. Ambrose Hull, an Episcopal minister from Connecticut, obtained grants of more than 2,000 acres at New Smyrna in 1801.

Following portions of Indian trails, the Spanish laid the King's highway in 1632 -- the first land route along Florida's East Coast. In 1768, the British enlarged upon earlier work, cutting a road 30 feet wide through dense foliage. The highway began at the St. Mary's River and went to St. Augustine. Turnbull persuaded the English governor to extend the highway south to New Smyrna.

Remains of the wharf and plaque are best viewed at low tide. Remaining sections of the highway can be seen north of Spruce Creek.

The wharf was the site of an engagement between Confederate forces and seamen from the Union steamers Penguin and Henry Andrew. New Smyrna was one of the busiest blockade running ports in the South. Goods arrived from Europe and were transported by wagon to the St. Johns River. 

The Yankees dispatched gunboats to curtail blockade running and capture vessels carrying contraband. On March 22, 1862 a skirmish left two Union officers and six crewmen dead, six others wounded and two taken prisoner. The Confederate troops suffered no casualties and had only two men with minor wounds.

The Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse, still standing today, dates from the mid-1800's. The inlet, though, became known in 1565, as the vicinity where a hurricane destroyed French Admiral Jean Rebault's entire French fleet.

Sugar Mill Ruins, 600 Mission Drive, once thought to be the remains of an old Spanish mission, were actually constructed in 1830 by William Kemble for William DePeyster and Eliza and Henry Cruger of New York. The land was purchased from the estate of Ambrose Hull and several thousand acres were planted in sugar cane.

Thomas Stamps, a South Carolina sugar planter, ran the steam engine mill.  Kettles received the juice pressed between heavy rollers. Syrup was the main product. If sugar was the main product, the hot liquid was boiled and then left to solidify.

The mill was a lucrative business until Seminole Indians destroyed the entire plantation during the Seminole War of 1835. The sugar industry in the area was never revived. Today it is a State Historic Site, open from 8 a.m. 5 p.m. A visit to the ruins is a step back in time.