Founded in the mid-19th century the town of Broadwater was located in a clearing in the pine forest two miles from the ocean in the center of the island. In the 1930s when rapid beach erosion caused by several hurricanes that flooded the entire island made its continued existence untenable, many of the houses and other buildings in the town of Broadwater were floated by barge to the mainland and still stand in the towns of Willis Wharf and Oyster today.
