<p>Prescribed fire is a common management practice for restoring and preserving coastal forest ecosystems in the southeastern U.S., increasingly complicated by wind events that alter fuel distribution and loads, and potentially fire severity. We quantified variations in dissolvable matter of soil to identify how variations in fire severity influence carbon and nutrients within the first year following the re-introduction of prescribed fire to two recently hurricane-impacted, fire-dependent coastal forests along the Gulf of Mexico, USA: (1) Perdido River Preserve, Florida, a young (~ 20-year old) longleaf pine forest with an open herbaceous understory and (2) Weeks Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve, Alabama, a mature (60+-year old) slash pine forest with an understory containing shrubs and hardwood saplings. At the time of fire re-introduction, both forests had variable fuel biomass, likely driven by previous wind events. At Perdido, fire severity positively correlated with an immediate increase in water-extractable organic carbon (WEOC), nitrogen (WEN), and the carbon-to-nitrogen ratio (C: N). No pronounced change in WEOC was seen at Weeks Bay. Elevated WEN levels were measured at both sites one-year post-fire, resulting in a decreased C: N ratio from 15 to 8, indicating enhanced microbial-derived carbon. We observed a transient increase in dissolved phosphate and small pyrogenic carbon at Perdido, while humic-like fluorophores increased at Weeks Bay. Thus, varying fuel loads and, consequently, fire severity in fire-managed, wind-disturbed forests can temporarily alter patterns of dissolvable matter, potentially leading to more pronounced consequences for carbon and nutrient loss in young, open forests.</p>