the florida historical quarterly - …22309...ings and conditions in the florida of territorial days...

Volume XXII October 1943 Number 2

TheFLORIDA HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

C O N T E N T S Pioneer Florida

Indian Key and Wrecking in 1833T. Frederick Davis

Privateering in Florida Waters and NorthwardsDuring the Revolution

Wilbur H. Siebert

Spanish Grants in British West FloridaClinton N. Howard

The Antillean Problem in Florida ArcheologyJohn W. Griffin

New Books:Arnold, “Autobiographical Notes of a Lincoln

Conspirator”Albert C. Manucy

Peckham, ‘‘Guide to the Manuscript Collectionsin the William L. Clements Library”

Cabell and Hanna, “The St. Johns.”

The Florida Historical Society

Contributors to this number

SUBSCRIPTION TWO DOLLARS. SINGLE COPIES FIFTY CENTS(Copyright 1943, by the Florida Historical Society. Entered as second-class matter November 13, 1933 at the post office at Tallahassee, Florida,under the Act of August 24, 1912.)

Published quarterly by

T H E F L O R I D A H I S T O R I C A L S O C I E T YSt. Augustine. Florida

PIONEER FLORIDA *by T. FREDERICK DAVIS

INDIAN KEY AND WRECKING , 1833.Indian Key, one of the upper keys off its south-

east coast, crept into the history of Florida duringthe Seminole war when on August 7, 1840, it wasattacked by Indians who killed the noted horticul-turist and botanist Dr. Henry Perrine, resident ofthe island since December 1838. This event hasbeen well covered by historical writers, but littleis known of the situation at Indian Key prior tothat time.

An interesting account of conditions at IndianKey was published by the Charleston Mercury in1833. The writer seems to have been a keen ob-server and it is believed that what he wrote is a fairpicture. The account follows in his own words.

Indian Key is a place of rendezvous for Wreckers,while engaged in their vocation. Here they procuretheir supplies of provisions, stores, &c. They arestationed at various places of lookout along thecoast. Indian Key, however, possessing as it does,a good harbor, and being in a central situation, ismuch resorted to, several vessels making it theirheadquarters. These get under weigh every morn-ing about 3 or 4 o’clock, run out to the reef, andcruise up and down all day, in search of vesselswhich may have gone ashore in the night. They

*NoTE-This is the first of a series of brief articles on happen-ings and conditions in the Florida of territorial days and earlystatehood. As the source in each case is contemporaneous material,the reader may in a measure feel that he is carried back to thosetimes. Mr. Davis, whose knowledge of the period was alreadyextensive, has recently made exhaustive research into two of themost important sources: the Florida newspapers of the period,and Niles’ Register, which doubtless have never before beenthoroughly combed for Florida historical material.-Ed.

58 FLORIDA HISTORICAL QUARTERLY

return towards night, and anchor near the shore.Indian Key is not over eight or ten acres in extent.It contains twenty, or thirty small houses, and onelarge building. The large building is used as a kindof hotel, and is well provided and furnished for theaccommodation of transient persons. This estab-lishment has in connection a billiard table, nine pinalley, &c. The Wreckers amuse themselves, whenashore, in playing these various games. The Islanditself is nothing but rock ; but, by great labor, aquantity of earth has been collected and a fine gar-den made. Cocoa nuts, limes, bananas, and otherWest India fruits, are successfully cultivated. Itis, upon the whole, a delightful residence, remindingme forcibly of the lines of Moore-

“Oh had we some bright little Isle of our own,In a blue summer ocean far off and alone.”

It is inhabited by the families of the Wreckers andTurtlers, and contains 30 or 40 inhabitants. Thewaters in the neighborhood abound with the finestfish in the world. I apprehend that many nefarioustransactions are effected here. There is an indi-vidual resident here, who is entirely engaged inthe wrecking business. He keeps a large store,which is well stocked with assorted goods, such asmay be required by the Wreckers & others.

There are many poor persons, and some of themnot noted for honesty, settled on the Florida Keys,who are compelled to deal with this man. He, byallowing them credit and indulgence in hisstore, gains an ascendency which he turns to someaccount. These people are his agents, or spies, whogive him the earliest intelligence of wrecks, in what-soever part of the reef they may occur. It is alwaysunderstood that, in the event of their procuring awreck, they are to receive a share. When occasion

INDIAN KEY AND WRECKING IN 1833 59

requires they are brought in as disinterested wit-nesses to prove a meritorious claim for salvage.Circumstances which have come to my notice, in-duce me to think that, in some cases, they have,while engaged as pilots, materially aided in gettingvessels ashore [ i. e., beaching them].

I am aware of instances where vessels have beenwrecked, when boats have been started to conveythe intelligence 30 or 40 miles, other wrecking ves-sels being passed by in the mean while, which weremuch nearer the wreck. The notions which thesepeople entertain of morals, may be judged of by thissingle fact. That they will leave a vessel on thereef and go 40, 50, or 60 miles, to give intelligenceto this man passing perhaps in the meantime severalwrecking vessels, whose assistance could be pro-cured much earlier. The captains of these vessels.,should they board the boat, will be deceived by sometale of parties on board: that they are going forprovisions or something else. In the meantime, inall probability, a valuable cargo is endangered: andwhat is still more censurable, the lives of 20 or 30individuals left entirely at the mercy of the winds,waves, and rocks. On receiving the intelligence ofthe wreck the vessels will not immediately get underway and run down to her assistance.

From apprehension that the other wreckers maydiscover their object and join in pursuit of the game,they frequently wait until night before they start-when the captains and crews of other vessels lyingat Indian Key, being ashore engaged at some amuse-ment, they push off and reach the wreck sometimesbefore morning, and frequently not until late in theday. Many hours and sometimes even several dayselapse before relief is afforded to the wrecked ves-sel. I would by no means convey the idea, that allof the wreckers are concerned in this traffic, nor


would I insinuate against the honesty of all. It isa very hard matter for men to be honest wreckers;yet, hard as it is, I have seen some that were honestand even liberal. This kind of management has atendency, however, to take business from the handsof those who deal fairly, and to offer them thealternative of coming into similar arrangements orof starving. I propose, at some future day, topublish a complete account of wrecks and wrecking.In doing so I feel that I shall be performing a solemnduty. I have seen the management of many wrecks,and know how things have been conducted. Al-though ‘a mere looker on in Venice’, at least sofar as wrecking was concerned, I have not neglectedthe opportunity of collecting such information as Ithought likely to be beneficial to society. Wherethe wrecking business is fairly conducted, those whopursue it, so far from being censured, are entitledto great credit. There is nothing in the businessitself discreditable. Vast amounts of property havebeen saved by the Florida Wreckers, and many lives,which otherwise would have been lost. It will,therefore, be my object to commend when they areentitled to praise, and where they deserve it, tocensure.

We do not know whether the writer of the fore-going ever published the account he referred to; but he has preserved in this article a good pictureof the wildcat phase of the wrecking business.There was another class of wreckers, as he mention-ed, and of them we get a glance from a letter writ-ten from Key West to the New York Enquirer in1827:

“This place [Key West] exhibits a constant sceneof business; vessels are continuously passing. A

INDIAN KEY AND WRECKING IN 1833 61

number of vessels of different denominations arebrought in here by the wreckers, in a state of dis-tress. I was taught to believe that this class ofmen were an unprincipled set of beings, who foragedon the misfortunes of others by plunder and de-predation. On the contrary, I find them to be decentmen of good common sense. Their usual custom is,when they fall in with a vessel in distress, to bar-gain with the unfortunate master of the vessel, whohas strayed from his course and has been stranded,to pilot him off the reef or shoals for a certain sum.Is this course of conduct more reprehensible thanthat of our Atlantic pilots? In fact, they are in-dispensably necessary, for there are a number oflives as well as a vast deal of property saved whichwould otherwise be swallowed up in the ocean.”

Thus we get a first-hand view of both sides of abusiness that thrived for a generation from IndianKey to Key West. Though an attempt was made toregulate it, by the establishment of a Court ofAdmiralty at Key West in 1828, which reputablewreckers advocated and for the inauguration ofwhich they were partly responsible, the businesscontinued in much the old way for many yearsthereafter. The establishment of lighthouses andthe issuance of more accurate charts tended to re-duce the number of navigational wrecks; then steamnavigation appeared, with its better chance ofmaneuver. Gradually, from one cause and another,the business of wrecking declined until it finallydied as a specific occupation.

PRIVATEERING IN FLORIDA WATERS ANDNORTHWARDS IN THE REVOLUTION

by WILBUR H. SIEBERT

With the outbreak of the Revolution East Flor-ida, remaining loyal to the British crown, was cutoff from intercourse and trade with the rebelliouscolonies to the north and was victimized by priva-teers. The province could no longer import itsfood supplies from its neighbors, and cargoes ofmunitions, ordnance stores, and domestic goodsfrom England were subject to capture at sea. Bythe same method St. Augustine sought to avengeand reimburse herself for her losses.

She was suddenly awakened to a privateeringhazard on August 7, 1775, by the audacious feat ofthe South Carolina sloop-of-war Commerce, ClementLempriere master, in boarding the brigantine Betsy,Captain Alvara Lofthouse, as she lay at anchor offthe bar. The provincial vessel had come out twodays before and carried in shore four brass field-pieces and two hundred ninety-three barrels of gun-powder. News of the Betsy’s expected arrival from

England with her valuable cargo, had reachedHenry Laurens, president of the council of safetyat Charleston, who thereupon ordered Lempriereto waylay her and take off what gunpowder andother warlike stores he could lay hands on. Hecame alongside of the Betsy on the seventh,, boardedher with twenty-five of his men carrying musketsfitted with bayonets or supplied with swords andpistols; he set guards over her captain and crew,had her hatches lifted, and shifted to his sloop onehundred and eleven barrels of the king’s powderand about four hundred pounds weight belongingto Robert Payne, a merchant of St. Augustine. Tenunarmed soldiers from the town were on the Betsy

P R l V A T E E R I N G I N T H E R E V O L U T I O N 63

as helpers and were constrained to assist the crewof the Commerce, for which they were paid tenguineas. Before returning to their own vessel thehigh-handed visitors spiked the guns of CaptainLofthouse, and dropped on his deck their orderfrom Henry Laurens and a draft on a Charlestonmerchant for 1,000 sterling, signed by Lempriere,in pretended payment for the powder. 1

When Governor Tonyn was informed of this“villany,” or “piracy” as he called it, he orderedout the provincial vessel, which took on an officerand thirty privates and eight pieces of small ord-nance. Its start was thus so delayed that it did not reach the bar at Savannah until the day afterthe Commerce had crossed it and gone up the inlandpassage toward Beaufort, whence she had sailed.The council of safety at Charleston acted defensive-ly by sending fifteen grenadiers and fifteen artillery-men towards St. Augustine by water and a companyof provincials to Beaufort.

On complaint of Captain Lofthouse against theraiders, Governor Tonyn issued a proclamation onAugust 21 stating the facts and offering a rewardof 200 sterling for the apprehension and prosecu-tion of the officers and crew of the Commerce. Healso promised the king’s pardon to any of her sea-men who would testify against their fellows. 2

Soon after this boarding episode it was reportedthat two armed schooners were cruising off theFlorida coast. Tory refugees were now resortingto the province in increasing numbers and the foodsupply was beginning to run low, therefore thegovernor took the risk of sending open boats intosouthern Georgia for supplies of rice and corn. Hehoped to establish this route of “private trade”

1. American Archives, 4th Ser., Vol. III, 180, 703, 834.2. Ibid., 705.


for provisions because the Florida planters werecultivating “more valuable produce,” namely indigoand naval stores. 3

The schooner St. John was supposed to be station-ed on the Florida coast at this time, and the sloopSavage was on duty at the island of New Providence.Actually both of these vessels anchored at the is-land, “out of the way of action, in perfect quiet,”instead of rendering needed assistance in Floridaseas. The St. John had been at St. Augustine onlyonce, which was before the Commerce-Betsy affair.Already Tonyn had received intelligence that armedcruisers were out from South Carolina to seizemerchant ships bound in with ordnance stores forthe garrison and powder for the merchants. Hisidea was that at their appearance the St. Johnshould go out to protect them until the wind per-mitted them to enter the harbor. However, Lieu-tenant Grant, commander of the St. John, had an-swered the summons of Governor Wright, of Geor-gia, who was in a desperate situation politically.Tonyn also had information that the warshipProsper of ten guns was being equipped in SouthCarolina to cruise under the command of Lempriere.In fact, it was offered to him only to be declined,and then handed over to his former mate, CaptainSimon Tufts. The report was that the Prosperwould take its station off the mouth of St. Marysriver in order to intercept such vessels as weresteering for St. Augustine. Tonyn feared to sendhis provincial vessel up to Charleston for the Flor-ida mail lest it be captured by the rebel cruisers.These items he communicated in a letter of Septem-ber 14, 1775, to Admiral Graves, at Boston. Heclosed with the remark that he should heartily

3. Ibid., 704.

PRIVATEERING IN THE REVOLUTION 65

rejoice to have the Florida coast “cleared of suchpetty, insignificant cruisers” which were neverthe-less “able to do great mischief to defenceless mer-chant ships." 4

At that time or soon after, captains Doran andWallace were at St. Augustine with their vessels,for which, according to Captain Mulcaster, they hadno employment. Wallace was contemplating a voy-age to the West Indies. They had recently soundedthe water over the bars of St. Marys and Nassaurivers. They declared that St. Marys had a better depth than Charleston and that Nassau’s was asgood as St. Augustine’s. Mulcaster’s sounding atthe mouth of St. Johns showed a depth of nine feetat low water. 5

On October 1, 1775, the man-of-war schooner St.Lawrence arrived off the bar of St. Augustine, withLieutenant Graves in command. The pilots wentout and were taken on board. The wind freshenedand the schooner stood off and on for the rest ofthe day and night. The next day she sailed inwithout touching the bar. Her draft was nine feet,but the tide was at three-quarters flood. The sound-ing here two months before had shown a depth ofseven feet at low water. The tide ran five feet,giving twelve at high water. Governor Tonynpromptly wrote to Admiral Graves thanking himfor this mark of his attention to the royal servicein Florida, to which she would be of great use. 6 Allthe towns-people were thankful that St. Augustinewas to be the station of the St. Lawrence. CaptainMulcaster wrote to General James Grant, formergovernor of the province, that she would be “in-finitely necessary here, for neither provisions, cor-

4. American. Archives, 706; Vol. IV, 63, 64.5. Ibid., 836; Vol. IV, 333.6. Ibid., 316, 317; Vol. IV, 329.


respondence, or anything whatever is to be obtainedat this place without such assistance.” Both Mul-caster and his fellow-officers knew from a reliablesource that East Florida was indebted to Grant forthis addition to its small flotilla at the capital,namely: a decked schooner of about fourteen tons,the province’s launch of sixteen oars, a stout, openboat, and Mulcaster’s own decked boat, which wasalways available for public use. Mulcaster referredto an armed schooner at St. Marys as effectivelystopping the inland passage by water and suggestedthat another at the St. Johns would prevent theenemy’s passing that river. Of course, the civiland military officers in St. Augustine heard withuneasiness that the Carolinians had fitted out threearmed vessels, besides the Prosper, to cruise offtheir coast and in Florida waters. 7

Late in September 1775, Captain Lofthouse hadladen his brigantine Betsy with lumber at St. Marysand was expected off the bar of St. Augustine ina few days, before sailing for England. 8

Lieutenant governor John Moultrie wrote toGrant his hearty thanks for the “essential service”he had rendered his former government by sendingthe St. Lawrence. He told that Georgia and SouthCarolina had done their utmost to starve the Flor-idians who had been alarmed at first by their neigh-bors’ threats. Moultrie reproved his fellow-planters for expecting to get their subsistence fromoutsiders when they could grow their own food. Hepracticed what he preached and, at the time of writ-ing, had a surplus of eight hundred bushels of cornat his Bella Vista plantation ; he also had a fine cropof rice garnered at his Mosquito place and a secondgrowth of it nearly ripe. Almost every planter7. Ibid., Vol. IV, 330, 331.8. Ibid., Vol. IV, 329.


was raising his own provisions, and many of themhad a great deal to spare. 9

About mid-July 1776 while Mr. John Berwick washelping to defend Charleston, South Carolina,against a British force, an armed vessel, supposedto be commanded by Captain Osborne and commis-sioned by Governor Tonyn, landed some of its crewat Berwick’s plantation. They compelled the wifeof the overseer to lead them to the huts where themost valuable slaves lived and carried off eight ofthem. This loss and the consequent impairment ofMr. Berwick’s crop, he estimated at 7,000 incurrency.

Somewhat over two months later Mr. Berwickstated his case in a petition to the South Carolinaassembly and asked to be allowed to indemnify him-self by seizing property within the state belongingto the Honorable John Moultrie, lieutenant gov-ernor of East Florida, and to John Stuart, Esq., thelate superintendent of Indian Affairs in the South-ern District, or to other owners of Carolina propertywho lived south of St. Marys river. 10

The petition was at once referred to a committeeof the assembly which promptly concluded thatmany other citizens would probably suffer losses ofproperty through enemy depredations, and in orderto indemnify them all under a general rule a lawshould be enacted for the purpose of creating a fundout of the estates of absentees from the state whowere known to be inimical to the liberties of Amer-ica. Such estates would thus be kept from aliena-tion, embezzlement, or diminution. The assemblyagreed to this report. 11

At the end of July 1776, when General Charles

9. Ibid., 336.10. Am. Archives, Fifth Ser., Vol. III, 23.11. Ibid., 29.


Lee was at Savannah arranging for an expeditionagainst East Florida, the committee of safety toldLee that one of the benefits of such an enterprisewould be in stopping the attacks upon the Georgiacoast by the Florida privateers. 12 This suggeststhat Governor Tonyn had been issuing letters ofmarque and reprisal to navigators of armed sloopsand schooners who hoped to bring in prizes. Weknow that he issued one of these letters to CaptainGeorge Osborne in August 1776, and another to Lieutenant John Mowbray, commander of the sloopRebecca of ten guns in the following month. 13 Itmay have been about this time that Captain AdamBachop of St. Augustine was commissioned to goprivateering. He was mentioned at the end of De-cember 1777, by Joseph Clay, a leading Whig mer-chant of Savannah, as being in command of a largesloop of fourteen guns and likely to prey upon thecoast and trade of Georgia. 14

Late in the summer of 1776 there was an armedschooner guarding St. Marys river, which was sup-plemented by a very few poorly manned outposts.Settlers fled down to the St. Johns river on accountof the constant alarms of the northern border. Torestore confidence, the tender Otter, CaptainSquires, and an armed shallop were sent up therewith a reinforcement of East Florida Rangers, In-dians, and regulars. These vessels evidently re-turned. In view of the news of Lee’s expeditionbrought by the royal ship Raven, Captain Stanhope,in September, Governor Tonyn felt safer with theOtter lying off the bar. Although the River St.Johns was protected by the sloop Rebecca and the

12. W. H. Siebert, Loyalists in East Florida, 1774-1785, I, 42.13. Ibid., 43.14. Letters of Joseph Clay (1776-1793), pp. 70-71.


St. John, the sloop Tuncastle was sent to jointhem. 15

On the morning of October 4, 1776, the ship-of-war Defence, out of Annapolis, commanded by Cap-tain George Cooke, seized a sloop from St. Augus-tine and bound to Liverpool. She had only a littleindigo on board, and a large packet of papers be-longing to the sloop. Her two passengers informedCaptain Cooke that the British sloop-of-war Otterand her tender, the schooner Kinderhook, and threesmall schooners of four and six guns were stationedoff St. Augustine, while off of Cockspur, on thecoast of Georgia, were the Sphywx of twenty 9-pounders, the Raven of sixteen 6-pounders, and theCherokee of six 4-pounders. The captured sloopwas placed under a prize-master and sent intoAnnapolis. 16

In the opening days of February 1777, RobertMorris, vice-president of the Marine Committee ofthe United Colonies, revealed his plan to try toneutralize privateering in Southern waters by anincursion from the North, which, he hoped, mightgive British warships something else to do thanoperating along the coast against the little Americanfleet. He chose John Paul Jones as the bold sea-rover to execute his project. Jones was first totake from the almost defenseless island of St. Kitts,in the West Indies, its cannon, stores, and mer-chandise. He was next to defeat the two or threesloops-of-war at Pensacola and loot the town of itsartillery and munitions of war. He would thensend a brigantine and sloop to the mouth of theMississippi to seize British cargoes of indigo, rice,tobacco, and pelts. His own cruisers would cir-cumnavigate Florida and terrorize St. Augustine.15. Siebert, op. cit., 38, 43, 44.16. Am. Archives, Fifth Ser., Vol. II, 863.


His force of marines was to be ample enough forhis several tasks on shore, and he would refit atSavannah or Charleston. 17 But this ambitious planwas not even attempted.

However, another wide-ranging mariner from theNorth made a capture in February 1777, at the ex-pense of St. Augustine. This was Captain SamuelChamplain, Jr., of New London, Connecticut, whoutilized his armed sloop American Revenue in cap-turing a double-deck brig filled with king’s storesand dry goods from London for St. Augustine. Theprize was taken into a North Carolina port for con-demnation. The Florida capital suffered a similarbut smaller loss five months later, when the brigJudith, with a cargo of dry goods, was seized bythe cruiser Notre Dame and carried into a SouthCarolina port. 18

In April and May 1777, Colonel Samuel Elbertled an expedition from Sunbury, Georgia, to St.Marys river, Commodore Bowen being in chargeof the “fleet.” We are interested here only in thenaval arrangements in northern Florida disclosedby the expedition. From the northern part ofJekyl island one of Elbert’s officers saw two sailingvessels standing off and on. A woman from Ameliaisland came on board the Congress galley and toldthat the local people had been advised of the ap-proach of the Georgians, whom they were preparingto receive. She reported that cannon had beenplaced on Hesters (St. Johns) Bluff, at the base ofwhich was a large ship with guns. Several dayslater Daniel McGirth, a leader of Indians and EastFlorida Rangers, assured the invaders that their

17. C. O. Paullin, The Navy of the American Revolution, 173,174-176.

18. Louis F. Middlebrook, Maritime Connecticut during the Amer-ican Revolution, II, 51, 429.


strength, both by land and water, was known to theFloridians, and that a frigate and several otherarmed vessels were lying in wait for them at themouth of the St. Johns. In Nassau sound twoenemy vessels were seen. The little fleet fromGeorgia was now so short of meat that Elbert sentan urgent note to Commodore Bowen for the opin-ions of the galley and transport captains as to thetime it would take to pass through Amelia narrows.The answers must have been discouraging, and theinland passage was now guarded by two armedvessels. By the end of May the fleet and armywere on the way back to Sunbury. 19

About a year later there was much cruising offthe Florida coast by several privateers out of St.Augustine. Success in capturing prizes fell to theDaphne, Galatea, and Perseus. French merchantships which they took, had on board seventeen mili-tary officers and two hundred soldiers who were keptfrom joining the Americans by being held as prison-ers of war. At about the same time East Floridalost a brigantine, the ship Hinchenbrook, and thesloop Rebecca at Frederica to three galleys fromGeorgia, which carried three hundred of ColonelElbert’s men and two fieldpieces. 20

In June 1778, Florida privateers were cruising offCharleston harbor, where the Connecticut shipDefence, Captain Samuel Smedley, was just com-pleting its quarantine for smallpox. Smedley wasappealed to by the governor to go in quest of theprivateers. Mariners of the town helped him tofit out, and the French armed sloop Volant (Flyer),Captain Daniel, volunteered to accompany him.They crossed the bar and before night fell in with

19. Siebert, op. cit., 45, 46; Collections, Georgia Historical So-ciety, Vol. V, Pt. 2, pp. 25-27.

20. Siebert, op. cit. 56.


three enemy sloops. They captured two of them,namely: Tonyn's Revenge of seventy-two men andtwelve carriage guns and swivels, commanded byCaptain Adam Bachop ; the other was the Rangerof thirty-five men and eight guns, commanded byCaptain George Osborne. The third privateer es-caped in the heavy weather and the dark, whileSmedley was securing the prisoners. Next day thecaptors took their prizes into port and libeled themin the court of admiralty. A few weeks later thecaptured vessels were sold for more than 80,000in Carolina currency. Of this amount the Volantwas awarded one-third, and the balance was dividedbetween Captain Smedley and the state of SouthCarolina. 21

The southernmost part of the Florida coast tobe invaded by a privateer was Mosquito (now Poncede Leon) inlet. That was on August 30, 1778, whenthe intruder’s crew did considerable damage onshore and abducted thirty of Dr. Andrew Turnbull’snegroes. The vessel was pursued by the tenderOtter, which was wrecked by a gale on CapeCanaveral. At this period Colonel James MarkPrevost sought to strengthen the coast defense ofthe province by appealing to General Clinton tosend down men-of-war, fieldpieces, arms, and am-munition. 22 The convexity of the coast of southernGeorgia and northern Florida afforded a favorablecruising ground to privateers trailing richly ladenvessels converging to St. Augustine. Privateerswere still frequenting that stretch of water in thespring of 1779. About the first of May three of themdid team work in seizing the Jason and its convoy. 23

In the following August the sloop Revenge of

21. Middlebrook, op. cit., 311, 312. 315-316.22. Siebert, cit.,op. 60.23. Ibid., 76.


eighty men and twelve guns, commanded by CaptainNathan Post of Saybrook, Connecticut, capturedthe privateer sloop Mosquito of fourteen guns fromSt. Augustine. Her late master was Neil McNeil. 24

The Rosebud privateer from St. Augustine ar-rived at New York on November 19, 1779, with let-ters from Governor Tryon and Lieutenant ColonelFraser, containing news of the blockade of Savan-nah by D’Estaing’s fleet and a rebel force whichhad begun early in the preceding September. 25

Our incidents of privateering in which East Flor-ida was involved on one side or the other, stop atthis point, but there must have been more of them.

So far as West Florida was concerned Middle-brook gives but one instance. It occurred in July1781, when the brigantine Favorite of seventy-fivemen and fourteen guns, Captain Jonathan Bud-dington, carried into New London, Connecticut,some prisoners he had taken from a transport thathad part of the Pensacola garrison on board. 26

24. Middlebrook, op. cit. 268.25. Collections, New York Historical Society, 1883, p. 189.26. Middlebrook, op. cit. 87.

ALLEGED SPANISH GRANTS IN BRITISHWEST FLORIDA

by CLINTON N. H OWARD

One of the lesser but puzzling questions in Britishpolicy following the Seven Years’ War has alwaysbeen why Lord Bute’s ministry gave up the strategiccitadel of Havana in return for what the opponentsof the treaty in England called the barren swampof Florida. 1 There are a number of reasonablylogical explanations for the action, but thus far nocertainty has emerged from the study of the mazeof diplomatic correspondence which preceded theTreaty of Paris; and there still remains unproventhe very important explanation that the action wasmore the result of internal politics in Britain thanof consideration of British foreign policy. 2 In termsof control of the Caribbean, Jamaica may have beena possible counterpoise to Cuba ; Florida undoubt-edly could have been made into a base for thecontrol of the straits through which the Spanishfleets passed on their way home-these are possiblelines of reasoning.

With the cession of the peninsula of Floridanaturally went the panhandle which extended west-ward to include the settlement of Pensacola. Thissmall western territory could be of little use toSpain if it were isolated from the peninsula. Evenhad the administrators of Spain been more sea-minded than they were, an isolated Pensacola couldhave been but little use to them, for it lacked thenatural fortifications which Gibraltar or Malta orSingapore possess. The town was built upon a

1. The North Briton, No. 45. This publication, edited by JohnWilkes, was a focal point of opposition to Lord Bute’sministry.

2. For an account of the Havana question see the writer’s forth-coming study of the British siege and capture of that city.

ALLEGED GRANTS IN WEST FLORIDA 75

sand bar, immediately surrounded by a swamp, andbeyond were miles of sterile pine barrens. 3 To theBritish, however, the town was useful primarily be-cause it gave them a port on the Gulf of Mexicowhich could be protected by the superior Britishseapower; and it was proximate to Georgia and theother British colonies. It was the cession of theOhio country and the eastern slope of the Missis-sippi valley which forced upon Britain the novelproblems of land settlement which were more perti-nent to a land power. Furthermore this westernpart of Florida could be joined to the French granteast of the Mississippi and give the British a front-age which covered almost half of the Gulf of Mexico.The concept of the Caribbean as “an AmericanMediterranean” is by no means a false analogy.

The Spanish seem to have left little mark of theirsettlement in this western part of Florida whichwas incorporated in the British province of WestFlorida. For one thing the Spanish settlementthere had been comparatively recent. The push hadbeen made westward during the early part of theeighteenth century to meet the growth of the ex-panding French settlements along the Gulf coast.Pensacola and its neighbor, Mobile, were outposttowns of rival empires. Compared to Havana, Pen-sacola was of but little importance in the Spanishscheme of things, and its passing from the dominionof the Spanish crown probably provoked little noticein the mother country. The settlement had beenlittle more than a border post to guard, as has beensaid, against French encroachments from New Or-

3. All of the material discussed in this article, unless otherwiseindicated, is drawn from the Minutes of the Council of WestFlorida or other documents in the colony’s archives. Theseare now deposited in the Public Record Office of GreatBritain, Colonial Office Division, Class Five. Copies of mostof these are in the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division.


leans and Mobile;. and more recently British in-cursions from Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia.At one time it had been used by the Spanish gov-ernment as a penal station for exiles from NewSpain, and it appears that some sort of a penalsettlement had been maintained on Santa Rosaisland on the south side of the harbor. The orderfrom the court of Spain for the surrender of theterritory directed the governor of Pensacola to“ . . . . deliver up the Province of Florida . . . . andthe exile place of Ft. Miguel de Pensacola” to theBritish occupying forces. 4

A study of the early history of Pensacola, as it isprobably recorded in the Spanish archives, woulddoubtless repay the labor. 5 There is little of recordin the British archives of what Pensacola and itspeople were like before the British occupation, butsuch references as there are tease the interest ofthe student. There seems to have been no missionat Pensacola, at least at the time of the Britishoccupation, and, possibly because of this fact, littleseems to have been accomplished in Europeanizingthe Indians. A conclusion derived from a study ofthe record during the British period of control seemsto be that the major Indian tribes of the south andthe Gulf coast were virtually unacquainted withChristianity. At least this is true in the sense thatChristianity was not practiced by any considerablenumber of them. This is, of course, not to denythat they had been subject to missionary endeavorsby the Spaniards, French, and British. The Jesuits,Franciscans, and Society for the Propagation of

4. Wilbur H. Siebert, “How the Spanish Evacuated Pensacolain 1763”, Florida Historical Quarterly, XI, 48-57. A contem-poraneous map of the bay with the site of San Miguel dePanzacola is reproduced in XX, 165 (October 1941).

5. See, however, Richard L. Campbell, “Historical Sketches ofColonial Florida”, Cleveland, 1892.


the Gospel in Foreign Parts, Wesleyan and othermissionaries all attempted to strike into theheart of the southern country. One small groupof Indians, the Yamasee, seem, however, to havebeen devotedly Catholic and loyal friends of theSpaniards. Their number is given as one hundredand two persons. 6 Possibly this count enumeratedonly the braves and omitted the women and children.These Yamasee Indians are an interesting group ;7the romance of their career as a nation rivals thatof the Natchez Indians, who were immortalized byChateaubriand. In earlier times they had apparent-ly lived in the Carolinas, and the English had madefrequent and bloody slave raids upon them. Onewriter, William Gilmore Sims, has incorporatedthis material in a historical novel, bearing theirname.

Apparently because of those raids and becauseof the encroaching white settlement, the Yamaseemoved south into the peninsula of Florida and onto the Gulf coast. They seem to have lost theirunity as a nation and to have broken into severalgroups. One of these groups appears to have beenthis one which the British record finding at Pen-sacola. They sold their lands, or so it was claimed,and retired with the Spanish troops to New Spainwhen the British troops occupied Pensacola. 8 Pre-sumably, their descendants live in Mexico today.

A petition presented to the British governor andCouncil on the twenty-fourth of January 1765, inthe name of a group of English investors who weresaid to be forming a company, stated that this land

6. Siebert, loc. cit.7. Handbook of American Indians North of Mexico, Ed. Fred-

erick Webb Hodge, Smithsonian Institution, “Bureau ofAmerican Ethnology”, Bulletin 30, Washington, Part II, 1910,986-987.

8. Siebert, loc. cit.


had been sold to representatives of the Englishgroup by the Indians for “the said Sum of OneHundred Thousand Mexican Pesos of eight Ryals,and they thereupon making use of the faculty allow-ed them by the King of Spain Did by These ofSale . . . .” transfer the land. This transaction ap-pears to have taken place before the arrival of theBritish troops of occupation. The petitioners statedthat the sale had been confirmed by the Spanishgovernor. There appears to have been some con-fusion or chicanery in the transaction. Among theeminent investors in the English group, in whosename the purchase was made, were said to havebeen their royal highnesses Edward, Duke of York,and William, Duke of Cumberland ; the Right Hon-orable John, Earl of Bute; William, Lord of Mans-field; the Honorable Augustus Keppel, John Kin-nion Esquire, Marriot Arbuthnot Esquire, SamuelTouchet Esquire, John Lindsay Esquire, ThomasHorsefall and James Noble. Noble’s petition tothe Council stated that the said lands were pur-chased on account of the said John Kinnion, SamuelTouchet and of him, the said James Noble, ThomasHorsefall and Joseph Page and his partner; thatone-half was to be the property of John Kinnion,and the other half the property of James Noble,Thomas Horsefall and Joseph Page; and that theirroyal highnesses and the other honorable person-ages were not interested in such purchases. Thegovernor and Council disallowed the claim on thegrounds that the “Plan exhibited did not carry theslightest representation of the actual face of thecountry which was pretended to be Described; Thatthe Several Claims of Mr. James Noble were notsufficiently supported either by external or InternalEvidence. . . .". This decision, however, left the


party, or parties, at liberty to sustain their claimin England.

The emphasis of British policy in the new pro-vince was upon crown ownership of the land. Inthis case of the Yamasee Indians the governor andCouncil agreed that the sale was invalid, and asfor the confirmation of the sale by the Spanishgovernor, that official had no authority to do anysuch thing. The Council, on the grounds that Span-ish titles were invalid, disallowed practically allof the pretended Spanish sales around Pensacolato British land speculators. Most of the speculatorsdeclined to sustain their claims, but availed them-selves of an adjustment of grace, granted them bythe Council. In all such cases it was promised thatthey would be granted such of their lands as didnot interfere with the laying out of the colony. Ofthe Yamasee sale Governor Johnston later wrote“Every means by proffers and threats have beenused to induce me to be of opinion that Mr. JamesNoble actually purchased an Estate of . . . . Ninenaked Indians, for Edward Duke of York, WilliamDuke of Cumberland & that for the said prem-ises, to the said Naked Indians, he had paid 120,000Mexican Dollars, of the money of Mr. Kinnion,Touchet and others; but even this is not the mostabsurd Article in his Transactions.”

In spite, however, of the opinion of the Council,it might be well that the description of the Yamaseepurchase be published for its intrinsic interest. Thelands were described as running “from the En-trance of the River Escambe, from the East, sideand N : W : point called the Mehipasaqua, 15 leaguesup the Course of the River to the Entrance of theRiver called Escape from which 15 Leagues Northto the village named Nichilisuilgase from which 20


Leagues N: E : to the Village named Tatisalague,from where the Course is nearest E: N: E to theRiver called Suitujatse, by the Spaniards RioColerado, to the Village called Pachan Pacha &from thence the course of the River Downward tothe Village known by the Name of Fachcatipacha& from thence by the Course of the River to the Hayof Sancta Rosa coasting to the Right Hand to thepoint called Chuliguide & from there coasting alongto the point in the Bay of Panzacola called pointBenado from there coasting along the Bay Side tothe point of Saint Antonio de Punta Raza & fromthence coasting along to the place of their DepartureMchapasacua which is the Lands that is expressedto belong to their Ancestors together with the Moun-tains Plains & other appurtenances possessed bythem.”

Of the other inhabitants of Pensacola and thecountry thereabout under Spanish rule, we knowpractically nothing. The story of the Spanishevacuation of Pensacola has been told by W. H.Siebert. 9 He has drawn upon materials from thearchives of the Indies. He records Prevost’s de-parture from Havana as July the tenth ; that hewas supplied with three thousand livres; that hearrived on August fifth. There appear to be dis-crepancies between these records and the Britishrecords. The number of men under Prevost’s com-mand is recorded as three hundred and fifty. Thefrigate “Richmond” convoyed the fleet of fourtransports. The number of inhabitants under Span-ish rule is given as seven hundred seventy-two, in-cluding one hundred and two Catholic Indians wholeft with the Spaniards. These are the Yamasee.Prevost recorded the population as one thousand

9. See Note 4.


two hundred, but Professor Siebert surmises thathe was including his own forces in this count. Allof the Spanish subjects left Pensacola upon itsoccupation by the British, save one, who was de-tained for a short time as custodian of the cargoof a wrecked fluke.

One of the most interesting records of the formerSpanish occupation appears in the Minutes of theprovincial Council of West Florida under the dateJanuary 24th, 1765. On that day 16 petitions werepresented to the Council asking confirmation of titlein purchases made from departing Spaniards. Anelaboration of detail in this matter is well worththe labor. John Kinnion, Esquire, of London, pe-titioned for an estate called Sanado Mayor whichwas said to be at the mouth of the river Escambe.The estate was described as being one league square,and the house and outhouses and possibly the entireestate, were said to be in the present possession ofMessrs. Bruce and Mease. 10 Zachary Bayly, a mer-chant of Jamaica, petitioned for an estate calledPunta de Silio or, alternatively, Arroyo de La Gar-zona. William Bond, a merchant of London, pe-titioned for an estate called Jamas Vicjos. ThomasHossfall (Thomas Horsefall) petitioned for an es-tate called Punta del Ingles. The HonorableAugustus Keppel (later Viscount Keppel) of Eng-land petitioned for an estate called Nostra Senorade La Luz. Marriott Arbuthnot, Esquire, of Wey-mouth, England, petitioned for an estate called St.Antonio. Samuel Touchet, a merchant of London,petitioned for an estate called El Estero de La Luz.William Michie of Charleston, South Carolina, pe-

10. From the description of Pensacola on the arrival of theBritish in 1763 as but a stockade and village of thatchedhuts, it is apparent that these estates were little more thana medium for acquiring land for speculation. Ed.


titioned for an estate called St. Joseph. GeorgeRogers, Esquire, of London, and John Peddar,Esquire, of Lancaster, England, petitioned for anestate called Chicasa de St. Martin. Sir John Lind-say of England petitioned for an estate called ElPaso de Arroyo Ingles. William Lance, Esquire,and James Noble of Sandwich in Kent, England,petitioned for an estate called El Estero de laVighia. Barnard Noble petitioned for an estatecalled Sta. Clara. George Stothart of Stockton, inthe county of Durham, England, together with twoother merchants, Richard Maitland and John Elliot,of London, petitioned for an estate called Santiagoel Grande. Messrs. Bolton and Horslar (or Horse-lor) petitioned for an estate called Pensacola leVieja. Colonel Augustine Prevost petitioned for anestate, which was unnamed in the record of theCouncil, and also in company with some others, hepetitioned for a second estate, which was likewiseunnamed in the records of the Council.

All of these petitions were refused by the gover-nor and Council. The Council was, however, not asarbitrary in its actions as it may appear to havebeen at a first glance. The undoubted object of theCouncil was to prevent the buying up of huge tractsof land from the departing Spaniards, for purposesof speculation. To have allowed large tracts ofland in the province to fall into the hands of specu-lators would, perhaps, have been to deter settlementin the province. One of the aims most consistentlyfollowed by the provincial government and theimperial government seems to have been the settle-ment of small farmers and artisans in the provinceas speedily as possible. For this and other reasonsthe Council on instructions from the home govern-ment held that titles granted under Spanish orFrench jurisdiction did not automatically become


valid under British dominion. At Mobile, MajorFarmar, commandant of the occupying forces, issueda proclamation requiring that all sales or transfersof land be registered with him. 11 One of the prin-ciple objections of the Council to these sales ofSpanish land, aside from the fact that they clearlyregarded all of the transactions as an altogetherunjustified speculative venture, was that thesesales had taken place before the arrival of theBritish troops of occupation. After the establish-ment of the civil government in November of 1764the governor and Council clearly tried to make whatadjustments they could for the convenience ofindividuals. They insisted, however, on the crownownership of the land on the policy that grantsof land made under Spanish and French juris-dictions were not ipso facto valid under Britishdominion, that new British titles must be granted,and that any adjustment that might be made wasmade by the grace of the Council and not by theright of the individual.

The policy of the home and the provincial gov-ernment seems to have been to put the quit-rentsystem upon a working and paying basis. Theyseem, wherever possible, to have avoided makinglarge grants, apparently on the theory that the quit-rent system would operate more effectively and thewelfare of the colony would be better served by theencouragement of numerous settlers of the smallfarmer and artisan class, who held their landsdirectly of the crown. It was the industrial revolu-tion in Britain and the introduction of cotton grow-ing on a large scale in response to demand from

11. “The Military Papers of Major Robert Farmar,” P. R. O.,W. O., I : 49; Mississippi Provincial Archives, English Dom-inion, I, Ed. Dunbar Rowland, Nashville, 1911, 61. Thisvolume also contains some of the documents cited above fromthe Colonial Office.


the factories in the north of England which pro-duced almost a century later an agricultural revolu-tion in the land of former West Florida, and itproduced the plantation system and slavery on alarge scale. From the government’s point of viewthen it would be undesirable to create a class oflarge land owners who would be, in most cases,absentees. To have followed the latter policy wouldhave been to create in the new colony a quasi-feudalclass which might well have impeded the smoothworking of the royal colonial system. Indeed, thewhole policy of the imperial government appearsto have been directed toward the destruction of anycharters and immunities which remained in thecolonies after the Seven Years’ War. To have setup a class of large landholders in the new colonieswould have been to reproduce on the frontier ofNorth America the economic conditions which ex-isted in Ireland ; and aside from considerations ofgovernment policy, it is extremely doubtful whethersuch a system could have been imposed even byforce upon the often highly individualistic frontierpopulation.

To return, however, to the Spaniards who soldthese properties in West Florida and sailed withthe Spanish troops for Vera Cruz, the student whois working in the English archives finds himselfcurious concerning them. Taking the estimate ofseven hundred seventy-two persons who sailed fromPensacola for Vera Cruz and subtracting one hun-dred two Yamasee Indians, there are left six hun-dred seventy persons, presumably Spaniards, whowere the inhabitants of the province under Spanishrule. Colonel Prevost, the English commandant ofPensacola, recorded the number as one thousandtwo hundred, but as had been said, Professor Sie-bert surmises that Prevost was including his own


British forces in this count. There is, however,the possibility that Prevost was including not theEnglish forces but the Spanish garrison force.

Without the aid of the Spanish archives littlemore can be done here than to surmise. There isobviously the possibility that there were threeclasses in the Spanish colony: the “inhabitants”,the garrison troop and prisoners in the penal colony.The more it is thought about, the more it becomesapparent that it would be interesting to know moreabout the life in this Spanish outpost. Who werethe “‘inhabitants” of the colony? Were they pris-oners who had served their time? Who were theowners of these plantations which were sold to theEnglish speculators? Were they former- prisoners,political exiles and officers of the garrison?

Altogether one concludes as he looks through thescanty references to the Spanish colony in the Eng-lish records, that one has here another fragmentof the story of the Spanish borderland, which is asfascinating in its story of those who lived and work-ed and fought there as is that of all frontiercountries.


THE ANTILLEAN PROBLEM IN FLORIDAARCHEOLOGY

by JOHN W. GRIFFIN

Almost since the beginning of archeologicalstudies in Florida the problem of aboriginal rela-tions between Florida and the Antilles has con-cerned investigators. Many similarities, both arch-eological and ethnological, between the two areashave been noted. It shall be the purpose of thispaper to discuss several aspects of the problem.

There seems to be little doubt that the islands ofthe Antillean chain were populated from the south-from mainland South America. At the time ofdiscovery by Columbus the Island Arawak inhab-ited, roughly, the Greater Antilles, while the war-like Island Carib inhabited, roughly, the LesserAntilles. The Carib represented a later push fromthe mainland, which at the time of discovery wasstill expanding at the expense of the Arawak.

These are the basic facts, but how are we to ex-plain the similarities of aboriginal culture in theAntilles and the southeastern United States? (Theproblem of relations between Florida and the An-tilles is merely a part of the larger problem of An-tillean-Southeastern relations, and will be so con-sidered in this paper.) The most obvious explan-ation is that there was cultural contact between theareas, and this has frequently been claimed. Thatsome contact did occur we cannot deny, but that itwas of the magnitude necessary to explain all of thesimilarities is not so certain.

Pottery was one of the traits first used to showAntillean-Southeastern relations, but subsequent re-search has thrown some interesting light on the sub-

FLORIDA ARCHEOLOGY 87

ject. Goggin (1939 and 1940) 1 has recently givenus several papers on the ceramics of the southernpart of Florida. He finds two pottery wares: oneis generally unornamented but occasionally has anincised feathered design, the other is either plainsurfaced or ornamented with the check stamp sofamiliar in Florida. In the area closest to the An-tilles we do not find examples of the more or lesselaborate Antillean wares. On the other hand thecheck stamp treatment is found nowhere in theAntilles. This type of ornamentation, which beginsvery early in the Southeast and continues into his-toric times, is particularly prevalent in Florida. Intwo shell heaps in Volusia county the present authorfound that approximately sixty-five percent of thesherds were check-stamped; the remainder wereplain. The absence of the technique of cheek stamp-ed ornamentation in the Antilles forms a ratherimpressive bit of negative evidence, whatever nega-tive evidence may be worth.

Approaching the problem now from the Antilleanside, we find that Rouse (1940) has formulated fourpottery types for the Antilles. While he feels thatthere are similarities between two of these typesand wares in the Southeast he admits that the majordrawback lies in the fact that examples of thesetypes, as defined, are not forthcoming from theSoutheast. Thus we see no truly Antillean types inthe Southeast.

Looking at the pottery from both sides of theStraits of Florida we find nothing more than vaguesimilarities upon which to claim relationship. Suchdata cannot be considered as conclusive of culturalcontact.

Are these vague similarities due, then, to inde-1. Dates in parentheses refer to publications listed in the

selected bibliography at the end of this paper.


pendent invention in the two regions? Not neces-sarily. If we assume that culture spread from aMiddle American, or even South American, sourcearound the Caribbean sea and the Gulf of Mexicowe may find an alternative hypothesis to that ofdirect relations between the Antilles and the South-east. In this case the cultures of both areas mightbe basically derived from the same region, but havereached the areas by widely divergent routes. Thisis fundamentally what Stirling says :

Similarities which exist seem more likely tobe due to an early common Middle Americanimpulse which spread in opposite directionsaround the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean,the extremities of which are to be found inFlorida and the Greater Antilles. 2

Certain other evidences tend to support thisthesis. Urn burial has frequently been adduced asa trait indicative of relationship between the An-tilles and the Southeast. Even were we to breakup the Southeast by states the distribution wouldseem continuous throughout the Southeast, Florida,the Antilles, and northeastern South America. Sig-nificantly enough however, so far as I am aware, nourn burials have ever been found in the long tongueof peninsular Florida, and thus the continuous dis-tribution on paper is more apparent than real.Again taking the circum-Caribbean view, we findurn burial in Middle America. Future research maydisclose a continuous circum-Caribbean distribution,with the exception of peninsular Florida.

The blowgun appears both in the Southeast andin northern South America, and is frequently as-sumed to be indicative of relationship. It is speci-

2. Stirling, 1936, p. 357.


fically denied for the Antilles (Krieger, 1935), and isconfined to the extreme northwest of Florida. Itstretches in a continuous distribution from theAmazon-Orinoco region, through Central America,and up to about twenty-three degrees in Mexico.Thus while there is a discontinuity of perhaps 700miles between the Southeastern and Mexican areasin which it is found, there is a discontinuity ofroughly 2400 miles between the Southeast and SouthAmerica, via the Antilles. Here we may have an-other trait which spread in both directions, but pene-trated neither the Antilles nor peninsular Florida.

Head deformation has an essentially circum-Caribbean distribution, and this may be significant,although it would be more satisfactory if the specifictype of head deformation was studied. In Florida,the Southeast, and Middle America the head de-formation was of the fronto-occipital type, whereasin the Antilles only the forehead was flattened.

Although maize was present in the Antilles, itwas subsidiary to manioc in the economy. Thepresence of maize in the islands does not provenorthern affiliations for it could have as readilybeen derived from South America, from whence themanioc was most certainly derived. The absenceof manioc in Florida is more significant than thepresence of maize in the Antilles. We might haveexpected this crop to spread northward had An-tillean contacts been of any intensity. It is truethat the techniques used by the extinct Calusa inthe preparation of coonti root are similar to tech-niques used in the preparation of manioc. If thisis evidence of Antillean contact its impact did notreach very far north.

Assuming the path of diffusion which has beenoutlined, many other traits which have caused com-ment in some quarters absolve themselves readily.


Labrets, fish-poisoning, the dugout canoe, humansacrifice, clans and matrilineal descent, burialmounds, and others fall nicely into a circum-Carib-bean theory. That this theory is correct will notbe claimed here; it is merely a suggested alternativeto the more immediately discernable thesis of directcontact between the Antilles and the Southeast viaFlorida. A highly detailed study is necessary be-fore any such far-reaching conclusions can be drawn.

A comparative study of the type deemed neces-sary must consider more than the sheer geograph-ical distribution of traits. The time element mustbe kept constantly in mind. Insofar as possible cul-tures must be considered in their entirety in theirtime, space, and functional contexts. This is to saythat while the comparisons of isolated traits tornout of context may be suggestive they can neverbe conclusive.

Neither must we forget the possibility of inde-pendent invention. No one today is such an archdiffusionist as to deny outright the possibility ofsimilar objects and institutions being developedwithout actual cultural contact. Of course the moresimple the invention, and the greater the similarityof need and environment, the stronger is the pos-sibility of an invention being twice made. Suchsimple traits as the shell bowl, the palisaded village,shell beads, thatched houses, and the like need notnecessarily indicate cultural connections.

Thus, to my mind, Stone (1939) could have ad-duced stronger evidences of Middle American-Floridian relations than shell celts, conch shelltrumpets, and busycon perversa shell cups. Al-though shell celts are replaced by those of stonefarther north, conch shell trumpets and busyconperversa shell cups are found practically through-out the Mississippi valley. Shell trumpets occur in


the Southwest. I see no need for explaining thepresence of these types in Florida by means ofcontacts with Middle America via the Antilles, asStone does. Even should we admit that there isa relationship between these Floridian objects andthose from Central America, which I do not believeis necessarily true, we might still derive them fromaround the Gulf rather than over it by way of theislands.

It is the opinion of the present author that theburden of proof still rests with those who wouldadvocate close and significant relationships betweenthe aboriginal cultures of the Antilles and thoseof Florida.

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHYFord, J. A. and G. R. Willey

1941 “An interpretation of the prehistory of the eastern Unit-ed States”, American Anthropologist, vol. 43

Goggin, John M.1939 “A ceramic sequence in South Florida”, New Mexico An-

thropologist, vol. 3, nos. 3-41940 “Distribution of pottery ware in the Glades archaeo-

logical area of South Florida”, New Mexico Anthropo-logist, vol. 4, no. 2

Gower, Charlotte D.1927 “The northern and southern affiliations of Antillean

culture”, Memoir 35, American Anthropological Assoc.Krieger, Herbert W.

1935 “Indian cultures of northeastern South America”, An-nual Report of the Smithsonian Institution for 1934.

Loven, Sven1935 Origins of Tainan Culture, West Indies, (Goteburg)

Moore, C. B.1904 “Urn burial in the United States”, American Anthropo-

logist, vol. 6Rouse, Irving

1940 “Some evidence concerning the origins of West Indianpottery making”, American Anthropologist, vol. 42.

Stirling, M. W.1936 “Florida cultural affiliations in relation to adjacent

areas”, in Essays in Anthropology Presented to A. L.Kroeber (R. Lowie, ed.)

Stone, Doris1939 “The relationship of Florida archaeology to that of

Middle America”, Florida Historical Quarterly, vol. 17, no. 3

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF SAMUEL ARNOLD,A LINCOLN CONSPIRATOR *

by ALBERT C. MANUCY

Here is exciting reading. Charles F. Heartman,well-known to bibliophiles, has in this volume editedand published two little-known manuscripts whichthrow additional light on the conspiracy to assas-sinate President Lincoln, the trial of the con-spirators, and prison life at Florida’s historic FortJefferson as well.

One of the manuscripts is Samuel Arnold’s state-ment of his part in the conspiracy, written at FortJefferson in December 1867. The other, written in1904, is an “autobiographical defense”, detailingArnold’s relations with Booth and the other con- spirators and his prison experiences and obser-vations.

After the murder of the President by John WilkesBooth in Ford’s Theatre, April 15, 1865, SamArnold and seven other alleged confederates ofBooth were arrested. Four of them were hanged.Arnold, Dr. Samuel A. Mudd and Michael O’Laugh-lin were committed to life imprisonment at hardlabor. The eighth man, Edward Spangler, receiveda six-year labor term. The penitentiary selected tohold these “state prisoners” was the already notor-ious fort in the Dry Tortugas islands off the gulfcoast of Florida. There O’Laughlin died in a yellowfever epidemic ; Mudd and Arnold were pardonedafter four years of imprisonment; Spangler served

*Samuel Bland Arnold, Defense and Prison Experiences of aLincoln Conspirator. Statements and Autobiographical Notes.

(The Book Farm. Hattiesburg, Mississippi, 1943). Heart-man’s Historical Series, Number 66. 133pp. $12.00.

Charles F. Heartman, editor and publisher of the volume, isa member of the Florida Historical Society and has presented acopy of the volume to our library.

A LINCOLN CONSPIRATOR 93

his term, then lived out the rest of his life on Dr.Mudd’s Maryland farm.

Arnold had been one of Booth’s earliest recruits.It is not generally known that the conspiracy at firstinvolved, not the assassination of the President, buthis abduction and removal to Richmond as a hostagein order to force an exchange of prisoners of war.Confederate military ranks were seriously depleted,and Booth easily convinced Arnold, who had foughtfor the Confederacy, that patriotism was inherentin the venture. But before the original plans couldbe carried out, the situation changed. Another plandeveloped in Booth’s fertile mind. The Presidentwould be kidnapped from Ford’s Theatre. ToArnold, this was a harebrained scheme. He wroteBooth urging him to abandon it. That fateful letterfell into the hands of the authorities and proved tobe one of the strongest bits of evidence against SamArnold.

Arnold claimed that his association with the con-spiracy ended several weeks before the crime wascommitted, and that he had no knowledge whatso-ever of the plan to kill Lincoln. The claim is fairlywell supported by the evidence set forth. His fur-ther insistence that imprisonment was unjust, how-ever, is open to question. In a like situation today,an admitted conspirator against established govern-ment would probably receive a similarly heavypenalty.

The book is written in remarkable detail. It be-gins with a diatribe on the membership and quali-fications of the military body before whom the con-spirators were arraigned-a military commissionwhich in Arnold’s typical phraseology becomes a“Military Inquisition”. There is a short summaryof Arnold’s early life. Then, after his fateful meet-ing with Booth in Baltimore, September 1864,


Arnold sets down the story of his activities untilthe final release from prison in 1869. He pens anilluminating description of the accomplished Booth,and his account of the meeting of seven conspirators-when Booth threatened to shoot him unless hefell in with the plan to abduct the President-isdramatic material, which, incidentally, might wellhave been used to advantage by a crusading CarrieNation.

The nearest Arnold came to action was on March17, 1865. The President was to attend a theatricalat a soldiers’ hospital on 7th Street. Several ofthe conspirators, including Arnold, made their wayto the affair, professedly with the object of seizingLincoln. Lincoln was not there.

When the assassination occurred, Arnold wasworking at his clerk’s profession in a store at OldPoint Comfort. There on April 17 he was arrested.From here on Arnold’s story is testimony of re-markable treatment as a federal prisoner. Handsand feet heavily ironed, his face often covered witha hood that had the “same effect upon the head andbrain as if it had been encased in a poultice”, takenfrom one loathsome prison cell to another, Arnoldlived in an agony of uncertainty during the trial.Finally on July 24, 1865, along with Mudd, O'‘Laugh-lin and Spangler, he reached Fort Jefferson-“ahaven of rest, altho in a Government Bastille”.

There, “beneath the burning rays of a tropicalsun", the prisoners were allowed freedom of thesmall island whereon was erected “a huge andmassive structure hexagon shaped, of brick andmortar in an unfinished condition . . . On the outerside of the fort there exists a wide and deep moat,to prevent the surging of the sea from washingagainst the main structure itself, intended at thesame time as a defense against assaulting columns.


It is ocean girt on either side, strongly protectedby coral reefs and intricate channels of approach.On our arrival the island was entirely destitute ofvegetable matter, with exception of some few bushesof small growth, natural to the soil and about adozen Cocoa nut trees, which had been planted manyyears back by the hand of man, beyond this therewas naught to gaze upon inside but the white, glit-tering coral sand which had a very injurious effectupon the eyes, in many cases causing men to becometotally blind after dark, a disease known there offrequent occurrance [sic] and termed Moon Blind.There were upward of six hundred Federal pris-oners confined there for various offences, againstmilitary rules and laws, who were compelled to labordaily from morn to night upon limited and loath-some subsistence.

“Without exception,” Arnold continued, “it wasthe most horrible place, the eye of man ever restedupon . . . Subsistence issued was horrible in theextreme. Many were suffering dreadfully fromscurvy and chronic diarrohea. The bread was dis-gusting to look upon, being a mixture of flour, bugs,sticks and dirt. Meat whose taint could be tracedby its smell from one part of the fort to the other,in fact, rotten and to such an extent that dogs ranfrom coming in contact with it. No vegetable diet,issued of any description and the coffee whichshould have been good, as good quality was issued,was made into a slop by those who had charge ofthe cook house . . .”

Upon their arrival at Tortugas, the commandanthad impressed them with the reminder that therewas a “dark and gloomy dungeon within the Fort


. . . over whose Entrance* were inscribed theseclassic words ‘Whoso Entereth here leaveth allhopes behind.” A “dungeon” was soon “fitted out”for Arnold and his companions.

The arrival of the 82 U. S. Colored Infantry wasthe signal for an attempted escape on the part ofDr. Mudd, who, said Arnold, “afterward informedme, he was fearful his life would be sacrificed undertheir rule.’’ When Mudd was recaptured, he andhis companions were shackled in a dungeon alongwith Col. George St. Leger Grenfel, an English sol-dier of fortune who was convicted of conspiracy toliberate Confederate prisoners of war. Evenharsher treatment was in store, for the War De-partment’s “Chief Detective”, Gen. L. C. Baker,soon got wind of what was said to be a conspiracyto rescue the “State Prisoners” at Tortugas.Arnold was removed from his comparatively easyjob as clerk in the office of the provost marshal andfor weeks, wrote he, “my person and the otherswere dragged here and there from morn until night,working in degrading chains, made in every instancethat presented itself, to perform the filthiest jobsthe Provost Marshal could hunt up.” FinallyArnold was made a clerk in the adjutant’s office,and there the clanking chains so annoyed the com-manding officer that they were struck off.

The worst was yet to come. With the advent ofanother garrison, “cruelty became the order of theday”, and it affected both prisoner and enlisted man.Hardly a day passed but what ten to fifteen of thenewer recruits could be seen paying the penalty fortheir inexperience in Army ways, plodding about

*National Park Service files contain a photograph of thiscelebrated door. There is a story that on one occasion the self-same legend was imprinted over the mess hall door of the fort.Incidentally, Fort Jefferson contains no dungeons as such, thoughseveral rooms can be said to partake of dungeon character.


from morning until night with heavy cannon ballsupon their shoulders.

Early in 1866 the quarters of the alleged con-spirators were again changed. The ‘‘malariousdungeon", always damp, had finally become flood-ed, so they were removed to a second tier casemateabove the fort entrance, overlooking the guard-house. Here the unfortunates hoped to enjoy thebenefits of the cooling sea breezes that sweptthrough the fort, but again they were disappointed.Their quarters were boarded up. They could seenothing but the parade of the fort and a glimpseof the sky above. Evidently, Arnold bitterly record-ed, the military “determined . . . that we shouldbecome learned in Astronomy . . .” The new quar-ters leaked so badly that the occupants had to digdeep holes and gutters to drain the water and pre-vent the flooding of their abode. The walls were“a mass of slime”. Arnold said they had “as com-panions in our misery every insect known to aboundon the island, in the shape of mosquitoes, bed-bugs,roaches and scorpions . . . But at least the ironswere soon removed for good.

From the vantage of his quarters, Arnold hadopportunity to watch treatment of garrison soldierand prisoner alike. Certain commandants and theirattending officers he branded as barbarians, “revel-ing in intoxicating beverages and frequently to suchan extent; that they dwelt on earth as in a dream. . . The prisoners and soldiers received the fullbenefit of their wandering minds. The emaciatedprisoner could be seen performing his daily laborweighed down in chains with heavy balls attached.Another for some supposed dereliction of duty,could be seen marching around a ring, under thetorrid heat of the sun weighed down by monster can-non balls upon his shoulder. I have seen them fall


within their tracks, unable to perform the inhumanduty exacted, from sheer exhaustion, thence thrustwithin the dungeon to remain until strength wassufficiently restored to resume their barbourous task. . . . There was a soldier by name of Wheeler, Com-pany ‘M’ 5th Arty. who was required to carry aball for a month both day and night, 2 hours on and2 hours off, because he altered his pantaloons fur-nished by the Government, instead of giving themto the tailor to have it done he preferring to do ithimself to save the cost of same, he being a poorman and having a family depending upon him.During the first year and a half, the Dry Tortugaswas anything but a paradise. There did not pass aday but men could be seen tied up by their thumbs,between the sky and the earth until the joints oftheir thumbs were nearly pulled from their sockets,some bound in cords and carried to the Gulf Streamand nearly drowned others tied up in the guardhouse and lashed upon their naked flesh. Many ofthese cruelties were inflicted because they followedthe example set by some of the Officers in charge ofthem, and dared like them to become intoxicated.”

Page after page is devoted to graphic descriptionof the cruelties practiced at Tortugas. Arnold in-dicts man after man, officer, doctor and noncom-missioned officer. To them he assigned the respon-sibility for “Every kind of cruelty the mind couldconceive", and with but few exceptions, condemnedthem all. Most of the enlisted men, he said, weresympathetic toward the prisoners. But not all. Oneof the soldiers made himself so obnoxious to aprisoner named James Orr, that Orr attacked himwith a pen-knife. As a result of the incident, thecommandant promulgated Special Order No. 78: “ifa prisoner refuses to obey orders, the sentinel mustshoot him and then use his bayonet, at the same


time calling for the guard.” It meant that the lifeof every prisoner was held within the hands of theguard, and it actually brought death for one of theprisoners-a fellow described by Arnold as a“harmless man”, but at the time drunk enough tobe boisterous and too drunk to obey orders.

Then came the yellow fever epidemic of 1867.One of the first men to die was Dr. Joseph Smith,the post surgeon. Smith was one of the few officersfor whom Arnold had words of praise. Into thegap left by the surgeon’s death, stepped Dr. Mudd,the prisoner. One of his first acts was to abolisha hospital on distant Sand Key: “Sick patients,”wrote Arnold, “seated in a small boat were con-veyed over [to Sand Key], confronted by coffinswhich were piled up in the bow of the boat. Thisof itself, was sufficient to cause alarm and even tokill the faint hearted . . . With but few exceptionsthose who were conveyed to Sand Key in the smallboat fell victims to the disease and are entombedbeneath its sandy soil.”

For a while after discontinuance of the Sand Keyhospital, things progressed favorably, with no moredeaths. But soon after the arrival of Dr. D. W.Whitehurst from Key West, the epidemic becamemore virulent.

Arnold’s account gives additional clarity to thealready known facts about that awful summer atTortugas. “No sooner had the breath left the body,but that it was coffined and hurried over to its lastresting place, there being a boat, with a crew de-tailed as the burrying party, always awaiting inattendance. In many instances coffins were broughtinto the hospital, and placed along side of the bedto receive the body of some one expected to die, andhad to be removed again, the patient still tenaciouslyclinging to life. . . . The island which before was


more like a place peopled by fiends, than anythingelse it could be compared with, suddenly becamecalm quiet and peaceful. Fear stood out in boldreleif [sic] upon the face of Every human soul.Some attempted to assume the tone of gayiety andindifference . . . We felt from the first, we had beentransported to the Dry Tortugas, to fall victims tothe many deadly poisons of maleria generating inthat climate. Happily we lived through it all and Iam permitted to give to the world at large someinkling of the many wrongs, tortures and sufferingsinflicted upon us . . .”

The epidemic lasted from August to November.When it was over, the "State Prisoners” foundthemselves with more freedom than they had everhad theretofore. But not for long. Back to theisland as commandant came Maj. C. C. McConnell.Between McConnell and Grenfel, the English pris-oner, there was extremely bitter feeling. The com-mandant and his provost marshal, according toArnold, “studied out the most cruel measures toadopt, in persecuting prisoners and what the onecould not devise, the other would.” Grenfel de-cided that they were determined to kill him “inchby inch”, so on the night of March 6, 1868, togetherwith some other prisoners and an enlisted man, hestole a small boat and sailed out into the stormynight. The escape was completely successful-butArnold does not divulge whether Grenfel and hisfellows ever reached land.

On March 1, 1869, President Johnson signed Ar-nold’s pardon : “it is apparent that the said Arnoldrendered no active assistance whatever to the saidBooth and his confederates in the actual executionof said abominable crime; And whereas the pardonof said Arnold is strongly recommended by the City


Council and more than two hundred other citizensof Baltimore and vicinity;

“Now, therefore be it known, that I, AndrewJohnson . . . do hereby grant to the said, Samuel B.Arnold, a full and unconditional pardon. . . .”

“I was at last,” wrote Sam Arnold, “a free man.”He left Fort Jefferson on March 29 to meet his

father in Key West.Arnold’s manuscripts are published with a mini-

mum of editing. “The first printing of this Docu-ment Humaine,” writes editor Heartman, “shouldnot be defiled by footnotes, etc. Only a barbarianwould do so.” The Arnold accounts can probably be called rea-sonably reliable. Most of the narrative, Arnoldindicated, was compiled from his diary. Further-more, there are numerous corroborations in otherunimpeachable sources. It seems almost unneces-sarily obvious, however, to point out that manyof the events Arnold recorded were seen throughthe naturally jaundiced eye of a prisoner-a maninclined to believe that the entire world was againsthim, and who perhaps saw intended injury in everymove by his jailers. And after a lapse of so manyyears between the imprisonment at Fort Jeffersonand the writing of this last version of his exper-iences, it is likely that certain of his earlier “opin-ions’’ crystallized into dogma.

Setting aside those portions of the book which donot relate directly to Florida history, we are con-fronted with one major question. Is the narrativean accurate portrayal of post-war life at the Floridaprison? Arnold has painted a picture of a veritableDevil’s Island. Yet he hints that his clerical abilitiesmade him somewhat of a favorite among the officersat the fort, and did, in fact, relieve him from chainswhen others of his companions remained shackled.


Too, in numerous instances he mentions certain nor-mal conditions and quite human activities. Butthey are mentioned so casually as to go unperceivedby the average reader.

It is difficult to accept the premise that officersat Fort Jefferson spent many of their waking hoursdevising schemes for tormenting the island inhab-itants. Arnold has made many of the military over-seers into Machiavellian characters comparable tothe sergeant who dogged Mudd’s footsteps in themotion picture The Prisoner of Shark Island. Andthe sergeant is a character from Victor Hugo, asfictitious as the “man-eating” sharks which sup-posedly infested the moat around the fort. All inall, it seems reasonable to conclude that while theaccuracy of most incidents in Arnold’s narrativecan be accepted, as a whole this picture of Tortugaslife and customs is distorted. A comparison withother sources such as the letters of Dr. Mudd, thecontemporary articles by Dr. J. B. Holder andothers will prove the point. *

Nevertheless, Arnold tells a story to which peoplewill listen, even if they shudder at the gruesome de-tails. And because such stories are so seldom re-corded in sufficient detail to lend them authenticity,editor Heartman’s publication becomes the morevaluable.

As an atrocity story, the narrative compares fav-orably with many current books. The bitterness,the sarcasm and the irony are there. Written inless verbose style, and with less repetition, SamArnold might have had a best seller.

* N. Mudd (ed.), The life of Dr. Samuel A. Mudd (N. Y.,1906) ; J. B. Holder, “The Dry Tortugas”, Harper’s Magazine(July 1868) ; “Thirty Months at the Dry Tortugas”, The GalaxyMiscellany [Magazine] (Feb. 1869).

FLORIDA MATERIAL IN THE W. L.CLEMENTS LIBRARY

There has been published a Guide to the Manu-script Collections in the William L. ClementsLibrary, compiled by Howard H. Peckham, curatorof manuscripts. (Ann Arbor: University of Mich-igan Press, 1942) 403 p. $5.

The most important source of historical materialrelating to British East and West Florida is, ofcourse, the Public Record Office in London. Mostof the Florida documents there have been copiedfor the Library of Congress where they are avail-able. Next in importance are the documents in theWilliam L. Clements library of the University ofMichigan, which contains the papers of General SirHenry Clinton (15,000 pieces), General ThomasGage (12,000), the Earl of Shelburne (11,000), LordGeorge Germain (2,000), William Knox, under sec-retary of state for America (650), Sir Jeffery Am-herst (700), and Viscount Sydney, colonial secre-tary, (1,100) ; all of which contain Florida material.

In research for his work on British East Florida,now in press, Dr. Charles L. Mowat made a studyof all of these collections; and in an article writtenfor this Quarterly (XVIII 46-60 : July 1939) hegave us a brief description of their contents. Thepresent volume contains none of that detail, but itsvalue to the student of Florida’s history is that itcontains a list of the names of the writers or signersof all of the documents.

There are letters and other documents of courserelating to West Florida also, with which Dr. Mowathad no especial concern. These are mostly in thesame collections, but there are one or two others.For example there are 461 papers of GeneralFreiherr von Jungkenn, to whom all the comman-

103


ders of the Hessians and other German troops inthe British army in America reported. A regimentof these (Waldecks) was at Pensacola during itsseige and capture by Bernardo de Galvez in 1781.

There is a small amount of Florida material otherthan in these collections. For example, among thepapers of Dr. John W. Monette, author of the well-known History of the Discovery and Settlement ofthe Mississippi Valley (which itself contains someFlorida material) there is the draft of an essay onThe Indians of Florida 300 Years Ago. But suchodd pieces would be difficult to locate unless thename of the writer were known.

Of almost as great interest as the documents, arethe manuscript maps in the same collections, es-pecially those in the Clinton papers. Their highhistorical value is recognized when it is recalledthat the Gage, the Clinton, and the Amherst papersare the files of the commanders-in-chief of the Brit-ish armies in America, The Clinton maps are listedand described in Randolph G. Adams, British Head-quarters Maps and Sketches (Ann Arbor 1928).

THE ST. JOHNSA new volume in the “Rivers of America” series

is The St. Johns, A Parade of Diversities, by BranchCabell and A. J. Hanna.

Portions of the narrative are new, authentic, andinteresting ; and Floridians who feel that the riveris ‘an inseparable part of our past, and those withany affection for it, might well wish there were moreof that’ and less of smart, irrelevant and inconse-quential writing, and imaginary and garbled history.Such, often, is the result of collaboration ; but inthis case there might be a remedy.

BRITISH WEST FLORIDA 105

GOVERNOR CHESTER’S BOUNDARY OBSERVATIONS, ANDROBERT FARMAR’S JOURNAL

The Louisiana Historical Quarterly includes inits issue of January last “Governor Peter Chester’sObservations on the Boundaries of British WestFlorida” (c. 1775, 7 p.) This is printed from aphotostat copy in the Library of Congress of a re-port by Governor Chester to Lord Dartmouth.

In the following issue (April, 1943) is printedfrom the same source (Library of Congress Manu-script Division, Florida Papers, Miscellaneous 1535-1821) the important “Journal” of Robert Farmar(15 p.) relating to the seige and capture of Pensa-cola by Bernardo de Galvez in 1781.

It will be recalled that a translation of Galvea’sown “Diary” of these operations was published inthe first issue of the same periodical (v. I, no. 1,1917).

THE FLORIDA HISTORICAL SOCIETYACCESSIONS TO THE LIBRARY

A scrapbook donated by W. A. Pratt of LakeWorth, begun by his mother in Tallahassee in 1841.Contains poems, obituaries, and newspaper clip-pings, some on Florida; with a few biographicalsketches of Floridians: Call, Downing, Brocken-brough, Broom, Walker, Forward and severalothers; and a sketch of Manatee, published in 1880.

MS. map of Titusville, 14” x 70” 1881, from a sur-vey of J. F. LeBaron. Donated by A. J. Hanna.

“Defense of a Lincoln Conspirator” by S. B.Arnold. Donated by Charles F. Heartman.

Annual Report of American Historical Associa-tion 1936. Vol III contains “Instructions to theBritish Ministers to the United States, 1791-1812”,with various notes on East and West Florida.

Typescript copies donated by Dr. Louise B. Hillthrough courtesy of Miss Emily Wilson:

Clavreul, “Notes on the Catholic Church in Florida, 1565-1876.”Inventories, assessments, and sales at auction of houses and

lots of the king, Florida, 1790.Will of George J. F. Clarke.

“The Barefoot Mailman” by Theodore Pratt, do-nated by the author. This is a tale of the mail whichwas carried by foot along the shore to Miami inthe 1880’s.

CONTRIBUTORS 107CONTRIBUTORS TO THIS NUMBER

T. Frederick Davis is the author of “History ofJacksonville.” His numerous contributions to thisQuarterly include our special “Ponce de LeonNumber.”

Wilbur H. Siebert is professor in history, emer-itus, in the University of Ohio. He is the authorof “Loyalists in East Florida, 1774-1785,” 2 vols,and of other historical works including several con-tributions to this Quarterly.

Clinton N. Howard is assistant professor of his-tory in the University of California, Los Angeles.He has contributed several articles on British WestFlorida to this Quarterly.

Albert C. Manucy, secretary-treasurer of the Flor-ida Historical Society, is historical technician forthe southern national monuments of the NationalPark Service. He has contributed several articlesto this Quarterly.

John W. Griffin is doing advanced work in thedepartment of anthropology of the University ofChicago. His special interest within his field isAmerican archeology.

the florida historical quarterly - …22309...ings and conditions in the florida of territorial days...

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