SUMMARY"The Indian Depot at Egmont Key": the island prison at the mouth of Tampa Bay (Egmont Key, 1850s–1858) [Connections: Tampa Bay, Nov 5, 2026]
RECORDThe Seminole Tribe's THPO writes that the U.S. Army made Egmont Key a prison camp in the 1850s, called in official records "The Indian Depot at Egmont Key." Captives were taken from Fort Myers to Egmont Key and then west on the steamer Grey Cloud to New Orleans. The captives "were mostly women, children, and elders," and many died on the island. The Grey Cloud left Egmont Key in 1858 with 160 Seminoles; its removal list ran in the New York Herald on May 27, 1858. Polly Parker (Emateloye), captured in 1856 on Fisheating Creek and held at Egmont Key, escaped with about half a dozen others when the ship stopped at Fort St. Marks and walked more than 340 miles back to the Okeechobee area. A 2016–2017 THPO survey has not yet located the internment site
PATTERNThe same bay that held the 1830s removal port held the 1850s island camp
LENS (WW9)Our grandmothers walked home 340 miles to stay on this land: some of the original people never left
OPENThe names on the New York Herald list (reproduced only as an image); whether any Black Seminoles were held at Egmont Key (the THPO document does not say)
SOURCEEgmont Key: A Seminole Story (Seminole Tribe of Florida THPO, PDF); New York Herald, May 27, 1858.