Charlotte Harbor (estuary)

The name of Charlotte Harbor is a corruption of the name Calusa into the Spanish name Carlos. At the time of Spanish contact in the 1560s, the leader of the Calusa was known as Carlos. The bay was first known as Bahia Carlos, or Carlos Bay, by the Spaniards. The British changed it from Carlos to Charlotte to honor King George III's wife, Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz.{{cite web|url=http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/107533/Charlotte-Harbor |title=Encyclopædia Britannica: Charlotte Harbor Inlet, Gulf of Mexico | accessdate=April 28, 2009}}

Image:1774mapCharlotteHarbor.jpg

Prior to the first Europeans, Charlotte Harbor was home to settlements of Native Americans who were part of the Calusa paramount chiefdom that occupied southwest Florida, extending from Tampa Bay in the north to the Ten Thousand Islands.{{cite web | url=http://www.keyshistory.org/histindians.html |title=Historic Florida Indians by Wilkinson, Jerry | accessdate=April 28, 2009}} The Calusa capital of Calos was located on Mound Key, just south of Charlotte Harbor.

Ponce de Leon was likely the first European who visited Charlotte Harbor in 1513 and again in 1521. He and his soldiers encountered hostile Calusa, and de Leon is believed to have died from a poisoned arrow wound received there. The site of the conflict is now Ponce de Leon Historical Park in eastern Punta Gorda.{{cite web|url=http://www.visitflorida.com/articles/charlotte-harbor-area |title=Visit Florida, Charlotte Harbor Area |accessdate=April 28, 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090331182117/http://www.visitflorida.com/articles/charlotte-harbor-area/ |archive-date=March 31, 2009 }} Charlotte Harbor might have been next visited by Juan de Anasco, Comptroller to the King of Spain, in 1538, one year before Hernando de Soto's exploration. In 1539, Hernando de Soto began his journey across the Southeast by landing on the west coast of the Florida peninsula, near the chiefdom of Uzita, where he encountered Juan Ortiz, a survivor of the Narváez expedition who had been captured by the Tocobaga at Tampa Bay. Traditional reconstructions locate Uzita at the mouth of the Manatee River in Tampa Bay, now the site of the De Soto National Memorial.{{Cite book|title = Hernando de Soto and the Indians of Florida|author1=Hudson, Charles |author2=Milanich, Jerald T.|publisher = University Press of Florida|year = 1993|location = Gainesville, FL}} However, other historians believe de Soto may have entered via Charlotte Harbor as he began his exploration of North America.{{cite web | url= http://floridahistory.com/inset444.html | archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20060507155726/http://www.floridahistory.com/inset444.html | url-status= usurped | archive-date= May 7, 2006 | title=DeSoto's Florida Trails | accessdate =April 28, 2009}}{{Cite book|title = Hernando de Soto, A Savage Quest for the Americas|last = Duncan, David Ewing|publisher = Crown Publishers, Inc.|year = 1995|location = New York, NY|pages=255, 486–492}} Another suggested landing site for de Soto was directly below Charlotte Harbor up within the Caloosahatchee River.{{Cite book|title = De Soto Didn't Land at Tampa Bay|last = Schell, Rolfe F.|publisher = Island Press|year = 1966|location = Fort Myers Beach, FL}} This is unlikely because Mound Key in Estero Bay south of the Caloosahatchee is generally agreed to have been the location of the Calusa capital, not the Uzita chiefdom.

As the Florida continued to be explored, some fisherman from Cuba and other Spanish settlements began to set up fishing camps, or "ranchos" along the Gulf Coast, including around Charlotte Harbor.{{cite journal |last1=Hammond |first1=E.A. |title=The Spanish Fisheries of Charlotte Harbor |journal=The Florida Historical Quarterly |date=April 1973 |volume=51 |issue=4 |url=http://palmm.digital.flvc.org/islandora/object/ucf%3A25419 |access-date=30 August 2022}}

The mythical pirate José Gaspar (also known as "Gasparilla") was said to have roamed from the Gulf of Mexico to the Spanish Main from his secret base (sometimes referred to as his "pirate kingdom") in Charlotte Harbor from the late 1700s until his death in battle with the US Navy in 1821. Though no archival or physical evidence of Gaspar's existence has ever been found, he is a popular figure in Florida folklore, and the tale of the dashing pirate and his lost treasure has been used to promote tourism in Charlotte Harbor and along Florida's Gulf coast for many years, most notably in Tampa's Gasparilla Pirate Festival. The practice began in 1900, when the Charlotte Harbor and Northern Railway published the first written account of Jose Gaspar in a promotional brochure for its Boca Grande Hotel on Gasparilla Island.{{cite book | title=The Mangrove Coast | publisher=Coward McCann, Inc. | author=Bickel, Karl A. | year=1942}}{{cite journal

| last =dAns

| first =André-Marcel

| title =The Legend of Gasparilla: Myth and History on Florida's West Coast

| journal =Tampa Bay History

| issue =Fall/Winter 1980

| location =Tampa, Florida

| year =1980

| url =http://scholarcommons.usf.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3512&context=flstud_pub

| accessdate =May 20, 2012

| archive-date =March 4, 2016

| archive-url =https://web.archive.org/web/20160304102825/http://scholarcommons.usf.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3512&context=flstud_pub

| url-status =dead

}}

Charlotte Harbor is also said to have been the refuge of the pirate Brewster Baker and the site of several shipwrecks of vessels containing untold millions of Spanish gold.{{Cite book | last1 =Kaserman| first1 =James F.|last2=Kaserman|first2=Sarah Jane| year =2007 | title=Pirates of Southwest Florida, Fact and Legend| publisher =iUniverse, Inc.| pages =16–27|isbn=978-0595471522}} However, despite many professional and amateur searches over the years, no treasure or evidence of a historical pirate stronghold has ever been found in the area.{{cite news | url=https://www.tampabay.com/features/humaninterest/how-jose-gaspar-stole-his-way-into-the-history-books/2162643/ | title=Chasing Gaspar | work=The Tampa Bay Times | date=24 January 2014 | access-date=15 September 2016 | author=Montgomery, Ben}}{{cite news |last1=Spata |first1=Christopher |title=Is Gasparilla's treasure real? We went with these friends to find it. |url=https://www.tampabay.com/arts-entertainment/is-gasparillas-treasure-real-we-went-with-these-friends-to-find-it-20190117/ |accessdate=18 January 2019 |work=Tampa Bay Times |date=17 January 2019}}

File:Gilchrist Park Punta Gorda FL 01.jpg

The Charlotte Harbor of the present day is a harbor mainly for privately owned pleasure craft and fishing boats.{{fact|date=September 2023}} The area thrives partly due to tourism. There are also numerous retirement communities in the Charlotte Harbor area.

Image:Charley Landfall.gif on August 13, 2004]]

Charlotte Harbor has been hit by several tropical cyclones since records began to be kept in 1851. Listed below are the tropical cyclones whose paths have crossed Charlotte Harbor.{{cite web | url=http://www.wunderground.com/tropical | title=Weather Underground, Tropical Weather, Hurricane Archive: All Atlantic Storms (1851–2009) | accessdate=April 28, 2009}}

• 1894 Hurricane No. 4
• 1910 Hurricane No. 5
• 1925 Tropical Storm No. 4
• 1944 Hurricane No. 13
• 2004 Hurricane Charley
• 2022 Hurricane Ian

Hurricane Charley made landfall just south of Charlotte Harbor on Friday, August 13, 2004 at 3:54 PM EDT.{{cite web|url=http://www.nws.noaa.gov/om/assessments/pdfs/Charley06.pdf |title=NOAA Service Assessment, Hurricane Charley August 9–15, 2004}} Charley had reached a maximum sustained wind speed of {{convert|150|mph|km/h|abbr=on}}{{cite web |url=http://daac.gsfc.nasa.gov/hurricane/HurricaneCharley2004.shtml |title=NASA's Hurricane Portal, Hurricane Charley |access-date=2016-11-03 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061004132934/http://daac.gsfc.nasa.gov/hurricane/HurricaneCharley2004.shtml |archive-date=2006-10-04 |url-status=dead }} By the time Charley reached Orlando, its winds had dropped to {{convert|95|mph|km/h|abbr=on}}, with gusts as high as {{convert|111|mph|km/h|abbr=on}}. Due to the rapid forward movement of Charley the amount of measured rainfall was between {{convert|4 and 6|inch}}.{{cite web|url=http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/archive/2004/tws/MIATWSAT_aug.shtml? |title=NWS, National Hurricane Center, Tropical Weather Summary}}

On September 28, 2022, Hurricane Ian made landfall just south of Punta Gorda at Pirate Harbor.{{cite web|url=https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/text/refresh/MIATCUAT4+shtml/281901.shtml |title=NWS, National Hurricane Center, Tropical Cyclone Update}}

{{Clear}}

Image:Floridian seagrass bed.jpg|Florida seagrass

File:Caretta caretta01.jpg|Loggerhead turtle (closeup)

Image:Mangroves.jpg|Coastal mangroves

File:Johnsons seagrass bed.jpg|Florida seagrass bed

• Rookery Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve
• Charlotte Harbor Preserve State Park

{{Reflist}}

• [https://web.archive.org/web/20070115113543/http://omp.gso.uri.edu/doee/science/descript/esttype1.htm Estuaries Classified by Geologic Features]
• [http://www.checflorida.org/ Charlotte Harbor Environmental Center]
• {{usurped|1=[https://web.archive.org/web/20090608195046/http://www.protectingourwater.org/watersheds/map/charlotte_harbor/ Charlotte Harbor Watershed – Florida DEP]}}
• [http://www.floridastateparks.org/charlotteharbor Charlotte Harbor State Park ]
• [http://www.chnep.org Charlotte Harbor National Estuary Program ]
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20070206084414/http://www.dep.state.fl.us/coastal/sites/charlotte/info.htm Charlotte Harbor Aquatic Preserve ]
• [http://www.floridadisaster.org/eoc/eoc_activations/charley04/Pictures/Charlotte/index.htm Florida Disaster.org, Hurricane Charley August 13, 2004 – Charlotte County Damage Photos]
• [http://www.chnep.wateratlas.usf.edu/ Charlotte Harbor Water Atlas]

{{Coord|26|46|33|N|82|08|31|W|display=title}}

{{Charlotte County, Florida}}

{{Lee County, Florida}}

{{Florida}}

{{Authority control}}

Category:Bodies of water of Charlotte County, Florida

Category:Estuaries of Florida

Category:Gulf of Mexico

Category:Bodies of water of Lee County, Florida