Visiting Blackbeard Island

Blackbeard Island is administered by the Fish & Wildlife Service as a National Wildlife Refuge. Official website

The refuge is open for daytime use, sunrise to sunset, every day year-round, with the exception of two several-day periods in fall and winter when annual deer hunts are held. There is no access to the general public during these times. See the Fish & Wildlife Service’s website for more information.

Admission is free. Pets are not permitted.

Blackbeard Island Activities

Hiking & Biking

Blackbeard Island has several scenic designated trails suitable for hiking and biking (see map), through maritime forest and marsh. Keep to the marked trails to protect wildlife and the environment.

Wildlife Watching & Photography

Blackbeard Island is an especially good spot for wildlife observation and study, with large numbers of shorebirds, songbirds and waterfowl. Photography is a very popular activity here.

At 5618 acres, Blackbeard Island is one of coastal Georgia’s largest National Wildlife Refuges. The varied environment of the island – maritime forest, freshwater ponds, salt marsh and beach – provides a home to many species of wildlife and birds.

Bald eagles, word storks, American oystercatcher and piping plover are some of the bird species you can see. Other wading birds, shorebirds and songbirds are all present on the island over the course of a year, with populations and the species mix varying by season as birds migrate northwards and southwards along the eastern coast.

Blackbeard Island is an important nesting place for the endangered loggerhead turtle, which lays its eggs on the island’s beaches. Alligators too, along with other smaller wildlife, can be seen.

Fishing

Saltwater surf and creek fishing are allowed at Blackbeard Island. Freshwater fishing in the refuge’s ponds is not permitted.

History Of Blackbeard Island

Blackbeard Island’s name derives from its reputation as a hiding-and-waiting place used by the legendary pirate Blackbeard and his crew as they targeted ships to plunder.

Blackbeard was active along the Georgia and South Carolina coasts for several years in the 18th century. It is probable that the pirate and his men did in fact sail in the waters around Blackbeard Island, its inlets and creeks providing ideal places to hide. Less credible is the belief that he buried some of his treasure on its shores: despite many searches, no hoard has yet been uncovered.

Blackbeard Island’s earliest official – and documented – use was as a source of lumber for ships.

The US Navy bought the island in 1800 from its French owners. The Navy wanted it for its heavy stands of live oak, a tree considered especially useful for ship building on account of its hard wood and curved limbs, perfectly suited to forming ships’ hulls.

Later, in the last two decades of the 19th century, Blackbeard Island was developed as a quarantine station.

The epidemics of the mid century – Savannah’s yellow fever of 1876 was particularly devastating – prompted a raft of regulations intended to curb the introduction and spread of disease.

Georgia’s ports were a dangerous source of infection, as diseased sea travelers arrived in Savannah or Brunswick – or indeed any other port – from overseas. On shore, they passed on their afflictions, sometimes killing hundreds before the epidemic died down.

One of the most obvious sanitary measures to impose was inspection of incoming ships and quarantine of any of these ships and their men found to be harboring disease. Quarantine stations were therefore built at suitable points, at which ships were obliged to call before proceeding to port.

The station at Blackbeard Island operated for roughly three decades, finally closing up in 1909 once the threat from yellow fever had been largely eradicated by the development of vaccination programs.

A crematory, bult in 1904, remains visible on the island today; the hospital for infected sea travelers and other buildings associated with the quarantine station are gone.

Once it was no longer used for detaining ships, Blackbeard Island was set aside as wildlife preserve, later becoming part of the system of National Wildlife Refuges.

More Things To Do In Coastal Georgia

– Beaches in Georgia and nearby
– Ossabaw Island tours
– Things to do in St Simons Island
– Things to do in Brunswick, GA
– Things to do in St Marys, GA
– Kayak tours near Savannah

See also:
– Savannah events
– Tybee Island events
– Lowcountry food festivals in spring/summer and fall
– St Simons Island events
– Jekyll Island events