Historical sketches of colonial Florida

HISTORICAL SKETCHES

-OF—

Colonial Florida.

-BY-

RICHARD L. CAMPBELL.

Cleveland, Ohio:

THE WILLIAMS PUBLISHING CO.

3 892.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in year 1892,
by Richard L. Campbell, in the office of the Librarian
of Congress, at Washington.

• • • •
••• • •(
• • • i

PREFACE.

The inducement to write this book was to
supply, in a slight measure, the want of any
particular history of British rule in West
Florida. With that inducement, however, the
effort would not have been made but for the
sources of original information existing in the
Archives of the Dominion of Canada, as well as
others, pointed out to me by Dr. William
Kingsford of Ottawa, author of the * History
of Canada;' to whom I take this occasion of
making my acknowledgments.

An account of British rule necessitated one of
Spanish colonial annals, both before and after i-t.

If any apology be necessary for the space
devoted to the Creeks, it will be found in the
considerations that for twenty years the body

ivi2102'^i

4 PREFACE.

of the nation was within the limits of British
West Florida; that their relations with the
British, formed during that period, influenced
their conduct towards the United States until
after the War of 1812; and above all, that the
life of Alexander McGillivray forms a part of
the history of West Florida, both under British
and Spanish rule.

The prominence given to Pensacola is due to
its having been the capital of both British and
Spanish West Florida, and therefore the centre
of provincial influence.

CONTENTS.

PAGE.

Chapter 1 9

The Discovery of Pensacola Bay by the Panfilo de Narvaez.
The Visits of Maldonado, Captain of the Fleet of Her-
nando de Soto.

Chapter II 19

The Settlement of Don Tristram de Luna at Santa Maria —
His Explorations — Abandonment of the Settlement —
The First Pensacola.

Chapter III 31

Don Andres de Pes — Santa Maria de Galva — Don Andres
d'Arriola — The Resuscitation of Pensacola — Its Conse-
quences.

Chapter IV 36

Iberville's Expedition — Settlement at Biloxi and Mobile —
Amicable Relations of the French and Spanish Colonies
from 1700-1719.

Chapter V 41

War Declared by France against Spain — Bienville Surprises
Metamoras — Metamoras Surprises Chateauqn^— Bien-
ville Attacks and Captures Pensacola — San Carlos and
Pensacola Destroyed — Magazine Spared.

Chapter VI 51

Sketch of Island Town— Its Destruction— The Third Pensa-
cola— The Cession of Florida by S])ain to Great Britain
— Appearance of Town in 1763 — Captain Wills' Report
-Catholic Church.

G CONTENTS.

ClIATTKR VII 59

British West Florida— Pensacola the Capital— Government
Kstablishcd— ^Johnstone first Governor — British Settlers
—First Survey of the Town — Star Fort — Public Buildin^^s
— Resignation of Johnstone — His Successor, Monteforte
Brown.

Chapter VIII 71

General Bouquet — General Haldimand.

Chapter IX 78

Governor Elliott — Social and Military Life in Pensacola —
Gentlemen — Women — Fiddles — George Street — King's
Wharf on November 14, 1768.

Chapter X 87

Governor Peter Chester — Ft. George of the British and St.
Michael of the Spanish — Council Chamber — Tartar
Point— Red Cliff.

Chapter XI 93

Representative Government.

Chapter XII 97

Growth of Pensacola — Panton, Leslie & Co. — A King and
the Beaver — Governor Chester's Palace and Chariot —
The White House of the British and Casa Blanca of the
Spanish — General Gage — Commerce — Earthquake.

Chapter XIII Ill

Military Condition of West Florida in 1778— General John
Campbell— The Waldecks — Spain at War with Britain —
Bute, Baton Rouge and Fort Charlotte Capitulate to
Galvez — French Town — Famine in Fort George — Galvez's
Ex])edition Against Pensacola — Solana's Fleet Enters
the Harbor — Spaniards Effect a Landing — Spanish En-
trenchment Surprised— The Fall of Charleston Cele-
brated in Fort George.

CONTENTS.

Chapter XIV 131

Fort San Bernardo — Siege of Fort George — Explosion of
Magazine — The Capitulation — The March Through the
Breach — British Troops Sail from Pensacola to Brook-
lyn.

Chapter XV 142

Political Aspect of the Capitulation — Treaty of Versailles —
English Exodus — Widow of the White House.

Chapter XVI 150

Boundary Lines — William Panton and Spain — Indian Trade
— Indian Ponies and Traders — Business of Panton,
Leslie & Co.

Chapter XVII 158

Lineage of Alexander McGillivray — His Education — Made
Grand Chief— His Connection with Milfort — His Rela-
tions with William Panton — His Administration of
Creek Affairs — Appointed Colonel b\' the British —
Treaty with Spain — Commissioned Colonel b\' the
Spanish — Invited to New York by Washington — Treaty
— Commissioned a Brigadier-General by the United
States— His Sister, Sophia Durant — His Trials — His
Death at Pensacola.

Chapter XVIII 200

Governor Folch — Barrancas — Changes in the Plan of the
Town — Ship Pensacola — Disputed Boundaries — Stiuare
Ferdinand VII. — English Names of Streets Changed for
Spa nish Names — Palafox — Saragossa — Reding — Bay lea
Romana — Alcaniz — Tarragona.

Chapter XIX 217

Folch Leaves West Florida — His Successors— War of 1812 —
Tecumseh's Visit to the Seminoles and Creeks — Conse-
quences— Fort Minis — Percy and Nicholls' Expedition.

8 CONTENTS.

Chapter XX 227

Attack on Fort Boycr by Perc}- and NichoUs— Jackson's
March on Pensacola in 1814- — The Town Captured —
Percy and Xicholls Driven Out — Consequences of the
War to the Creeks — Don Manuel Gonzalez.

Chapter XXI 243

Seminole War, ISlS^ackson Invades East Florida— De-
feats the Seminoles — Captures St. Marks — Arbuthnot
and Anibrister — Prophet Francis — His Daughter.

Chapter XXII 252

Jackson's Invasion of West Florida in 1818 — Masot's Pro-
test— Capture of Pensacola — Capitulation of San Carlos
— Provisional Government Established by Jackson —
Pensacola Restored to Spain — Governor Callava —
Treat}' of Cession — Congressional Criticism of Jackson's
Conduct.

Chapter XXIII 267

Treaty Ratified — Jackson Appointed Provisional Governor —
Goes to Pensacola — Mrs. Jackson in Pensacola — Change
of Flags — Callava Imprisoned — Territorial Government
— Governor Duval — First Legislature Meets at Pensa-
cola.

ERRATA.

Page 10. Sixteenth for Eighteenth.

61. Z)ystai2t for District.

113. Journal for ]ourney.

117. 1779 for 1789.

225. Barrataria for Banataria.

276. Domingo for Doningo.

233. During for Doing.

^9- /7/^ '/ / 7 / i-

CHAPTER I.

The Discovery of Pensacola Bay by Panfilo de Narvaez —
The Visits of Maldonado, Captain of the Fleet of
Hernando de Soto.

On one of the early days of October, 1528,
there could have been seen, coasting westward
along and afterw^ards landing on the south
shore of Santa Rosa Island, five small, rudely-
constructed vessels, having for sails a grotesque
patchwork of masculine under and over- wear.
That fleet was the fruit of the first effort at
naval construction within the present limits of
the United States. It was built of yellow pine
and caulked with palmetto fibre and pitch.
Horses' tails and manes furnished the cordage,
as did their hides its water vessels. Its freight-
age consisted of two hundred and forty human
bodies, wasted and worn by fatigue and ex-
posure, and as many hearts heavy and racked
■with disappointment. It was commanded by His

10 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Excellency' Panfilo de Narvaez, Captain-generat
and Adelantado of Florida, a tall, big-limbed,
red-haired, one-eyed man, "with a voice deep
and sonorous as though it came from a cavern."

These ^vere the first white men to make foot-
prints on the shores of Pensacola Ba}^ and to
look out upon its waters. Although the}' landed
on the Island, there is no evidence that their
vessels entered the harbor.

Narvaez, an Hidalgo, born at Valladolid about
1480, was a man capable of conceiving and
undertaking great enterprises, but too rash and
ill-starred for their successful execution, possess-
ing the ambition and avarice which impelled the
Spanish adventurers to the shores of the Gulf
of Mexico during the eighteenth centur^^, with
whom Indian life was but a trifling sacrifice for
a pearl or an ounce of gold.

Five years before his Florida expedition he
had been appointed, with a large naval and
land force under his command, by Velasquez,
governor of Cuba, to supersede Cortez, the
conqueror of Mexico, and to send him in chains
to Havana, to answer charges of insubordina-
tion to the authority of Velasquez. But Cortez

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 11

was not the man to be thus superseded. Never
did his genius for great enterprises make a more
striking display than by the measures he adopted
and executed in this emergency. By them he
converted that threatening expedition into one
of succor for himself, embracing every supply,
soldiers included, he required to complete his
conquests. Of this great achievement the de-
feat of the incompetent Narvaez was only an
incident.

No labored comparison of conqueror and
vanquished could present a more striking con-
trast between them than that suggested by
their first interview. ** Esteem it, "said Narvaez,
** great good fortune that you have taken me
captive." "It is the least of the things I have
done in Mexico," replied Cortez, a sarcasm
aimed at the incapacity of Narvaez, apart from
the gains of the victor.

The fruits of the expedition to Narvaez were
the loss of his left eye, shackles, imprisonment,
banishment, and the humiliation of kneeling to
his conqueror and attempting to kiss his hand.
To the Aztec the result was the introduction of
a scourge that no surrender could placate, no

12 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

submission, however absolute and abject, could
sta3% and, therefore, more pitiless than the
sword of Cortez — the small-pox.

After leaving Mexico, Narvaez appeared before
the Emperor Charles V., to accuse Cortez of
treason, and to petition for a redress of his own
wrongs, but the dazzling success of Cortez, to
say nothing of his large remittances to the
royal treasury, was an effectual answer to every
charge. The emperor, however, healed the
wounded pride, and silenced the complaints of
the prosecutor by a commission with the afore-
mentioned sonorous titles to organize an expe-
dition for a new conquest, by w^hich he might
compensate himself for the loss of the treasures
and empire of Montezuma, which he had so
disastrously failed to snatch from the iron
grasp of Cortez.

The preparations to execute this commission
having been made by providing a fleet, a land
force, consisting of men-at-arms and cavalry,
as well as the necessary supplies, Narvaez, in
April, 1528, sailed for the Florida coast, and
landed at or near Tampa bay.

Having resolved on a w^estward movement,

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 13

he ordered his fleet to sail along the coast,
whilst he, by rather a circuitous march, would
advance in the same direction. This parting
was at once final and fatal. He again reached
the Gulf, somewhere in the neighborhood of St.
Marks, with his command woefully wasted and
diminished by toil, battle and disease; and, as
can well be imagined, with his dreams of avarice
and dominion rudely dispelled.

No tidings of the fleet from which he had so
lucklessly parted being obtainable, despair im-
provised that fleet with motley sails which we
have seen mooring ofl* the island of Santa Rosa
in the early days of October, its destination
being Mexico — a destination, however, which
was but another delusion that the winds and
the waves were to dispel.

Narvaez found a grave in the maw of the sea,
as did most of the remnant of his followers.
Famine swept off others, leaving only four to
reach Mexico after a land journey requiring
years, marked by perils and sufferings incident
to such a journey through avast forest bounded
only by the sea, intersected by great rivers, in-
habited b\' savages, and infested by wild beasts.

14 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

One of the survivors v^as Cabega de Vaca, the
treasurer and historian of the expedition.

Twelve years elapsed after Narvaez discovered
Pensacola Bay before the shadow of the white
man's sail again fell upon its w^aters. In
January, 1540, Capitano Maldonado, who was
the commander of the fleet which brought
Fernando de Soto to the Florida coast, entered
the harbor, gave it a careful examination, and
bestowed upon it thenameof Puertad' Anchusi,
a name probably suggested by Ochus,* which it
bore at the time of his visit. In entering Ochus
he ended a voyage westward, made in search of
a good harbor, under the orders of Soto, who
was at that time somewhere on the Forida
coast to the westward of Apalachee.

Having returned to Soto, Maldonado made
so favorable a report — the first official report —
of the advantages of Puerta d' Anchusi that
Soto determined to make it his base of supply.
He accordingly ordered Maldonado to proceed
to Havana, and after having procured the

* So the name is given bj'- historians ; but, to be consistent
with the termination of other Indian names in West Florida,
it should be written Ochee or Ochusee.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 15

required succors to sail to Puerta d' Anchusi,
where he intended to go himself, and there to
await Maldonado's return before he ventured
into the interior; a prudent resolve, suggested
possibly by the sight of the bones of Narvaez's
horses, which had been slain to furnish cordage
and water- vessels for his fleet.

But the resolve was as brief as it was wise. A
few days after Maldonado's departure a cap-
tured Indian so beguiled Soto with tales of gold
to be found far to the northeast of Apalachee,
where he then was, that banishing all thoughts
of Puerta d' Anchusi from his mind, he began
that circuitious march w^hich carried him into
South Carolina, northern Georgia, and Alabama,
where he wandered in search of treasure until
disappointment, wasted forces, and needed sup-
plies again turned his march southward, and his
thoughts to his rendezvous with Maldonado.

That rendezvous w^as to be in October, 1540.
Faithful to instructions, Maldonado was at
Puerta d' Anchusi at the appointed time with a
fleet bearing all the required supplies. But Soto
did not keep the tryst. He was then at Mau-
villa, or Maubila, supposed to be Choctaw

16 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Bluff, on the Alabama river, absorbed by diiSi-
culties and engaged in conflicts such as he had
never before encountered. Through Indians
they had communicated, and intense was the
satisfaction of Soto and his command at the
prospect of a relief of their wants, repose from
their toils, and tidings of their friends and loved
ones.

Soto, however, still ambitious of emulating
the achievements of Cortez and Pizzaro, looked
upon Puerta d' Anchusi as only a base of sup-
pi}^ and refuge for temporary repose, from
which again to set out in search of his goal.
But very different were the views of his follow-
ers. By eaves-dropping on a dark night behind
their tents, he learned that to them Puerta d'
Anchusi was not to be a haven of temporary
rest only, but the first stage of their journey
homeward, where Soto and his fortunes were
to be abandoned.

This information again banished Puerta d'
Anchusi fi-om his thoughts under the prompt-
ings of pride, which impelled him to prefer death
in the wilderness to the mockery and humilia-
tion of failure. He at once resolved to march

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 17

deeper into the heart of the continent, and, un-
consciously, nearer to the mighty river in whose
cold bosom he was to find a grave.

As in idea we go into the camp at Mauvilla,
on the morning when the word of command
was given for a westward march, we see depicted
on the war-worn visages of that iron band
naught but gloom and disappointment, as, con-
strained by the stern will of one man, they
obediently fall into ranks without a murmur,
much less a sign of revolt.

Again, if in fancy we stand on the deck of
Maldonado's ship at Puerta d' Anchusi, we
may realize the keen v^^atchfulness and the deep
anxiety with which day after day and night
after night he scans the shore and hills beyond
to catch a glint of spear or shield, or strains his
ear to hear a bugle note announcing the
approach of his brothers-in-arms. And only
after long, weary months was the vigil ended,
as he weighed anchor and sailed out of the
harbor to go to other points on the Gulf
shore where happily he might yet meet and
succor his commander.

To this task did he devote himself for three

18 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

years, scouring the Gulf coast from Florida to
Vera Cruz, until the curtain of the drama was
lifted for him, to find that seventeen months
previously his long-sought chief had been lying
in the depths of the Mississippi, and that a
wretched remnant only of that proud host,
which he had last seen in glittering armor on
the coast of Florida, had reached Mexico after
undergoing indescribable perils and privations.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 19

CHAPTER II.

The Settlement of Don Tristram de Luna at Santa Maria —
His Explorations — Abandonment of the Settlement —
The First Pensacola,

Nearly twenty years passed away after
Maldonado's visit to Ochus before Europeans
again looked upon its shores.

In 1556, the viceroy of Mexico, and the bishop
of Cuba united in a memorial to the Emperor
Charles V. representing Florida as an inviting
field for conquest and religious work. Imperial
sanction having been secured, an expedi-
tion was organized under the command of
Don Tristram de Luna to effect the triple objects
of bringing gold into the emperor's treasury,
extending his dominions, and enlarging the
bounds of the spiritual kingdom by winnijig
souls to the church. For the first two enter-
prises one thousand five hundred soldiers were
provided, and for the last a host of ecclesiastics,

20 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

friars, and other spiritual teachers. Puerta d*
Anchusi was selected as the place of the projected
settlement, the base from which the cross and
the sword were to advance to their respective
conquests.

Accordingly, on the fourteenth day of August,
1559, de Luna's fleet cast anchor within the
harbor, which he named Santa Maria; the same
3^ear in which the monarch who authorized the
expedition died, the month, and nearly the day
on which he, a living man, was engaged in the
paradoxical farce of participating in his ov^n
funeral ceremonies in the monastery of Yuste.

The population of two thousand souls, which
the fleet brought, with the required supplies of
every kind, having been landed, the work of
settlement began. Of the place where the settle-
ment was made there exists no historic informa-
tion, and we are left to the inference that the
local advantages which afterwards induced d'
Arriola to select what is now called Barrancas
as the site of his town, governed the selection of
de Luna's, unless tradition enables us to identify
the spot, as a future page will endeavor to do.

The destruction of the fleet by a hurricane

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 21

within a week after its arrival threw a shadow
over the infant settlement, aggravating the
natural discontent incident to all colonizations,
resulting from the contrast between the stern
realities of experience and of expectations col-
ored by the imagination of the colonist.
Against that discontent, ever on the increase,
de Luna manfully and successfully struggled un-
til 1562 ; and thus it was, that for two years
and more there existed a town of about two
thousand inhabitants on the shores of Pensa-
cola Bay, which antedated by four years St.
Augustine, the oldest town of the United States.

Don Tristram de Luna sent expeditions into
the interior, and finally led one in person. In
these journeys the priest and the friar joined, and
daily in a tabernacle of tree boughs the hoi}-
offices of the Catholic faith were performed, the
morning chant and the evening hymn breaking
the silence and awakening the echoes of the
primeval forest.

Where they actually' went, and how far north,
it is impossible to say, owing to our inability
to identify the sites of villages, rivers, and other
land marks mentioned in the narratives of their

22 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

journeys. The presumption is strong, however,
that thev took, and followed northward the
Indian trail, on the ridge beginning at Pensa-
cola Bay, forming the water shed between the
Perdido and Escambia rivers, and beyond their
headwaters uniting with the elevated country
which throws off its springs and creeks east-
ward to the Chattahoochee and westward to
the Alabama and Tallapoosa rivers. It contin-
ued northerly to the Tennessee river ; a lateral
trail diverging to where the city of Montgom-
ery now stands, and thence to the site of We-
tumpka; and still another leading to what is
now Grey's Ferry on the Tallapoosa.

That trail, according to tradition, was the
one by which the Indians, from the earliest
times, passed between the Coosa country and
the sea, the one follow^ed in later times by the
Indian traders on their pack-ponies, and the
line of march of General Jackson in his invasion
of Florida in 1814. •

That it was regarded and used as their guid-
ing thread by de Luna's expeditions in pene-
trating the unknown country north of Santa
Maria they sought to explore, is evidenced by.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 23

two facts. They came to a large river wnich,
instead of crossing, they followed its course,
undoubtedly by the ridge, and, therefore, not
far from the trail. They also came to or
crossed the line of de Soto's march, which he
had made ten jxars previously, as following the
trail the}' would be compelled to do and found
amongst the Indians a vivid recollection of the
destruction and rapine of their people by white
men, which the\^ assigned as the cause of the
then sparsity of population, and the abandon-
ment of clearings former h' under cultivation.

So impressed v,ras de Luna with the fertility
and other attractive features of the beautiful
region of Central Alabama, which he explored,
that he determined to plant a colony there.
But in that design he was eventually thwarted
by the discontent and insubordination of his fol-
lowers, the most of whom, from the first, seem
to have had no other object in view than to
break up the settlement, and to terminate their
insupportable exile by returning to Mexico.

There were amongst those composing the
expedition two elements which proved fatal to
its success. The gold-greedy soon found that

24 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

the pine barrens of Florida, and the fertile val-
le3^s of Alabama were not the eldorado of which
they had dreamed. To the friar, the spiritual
outlook was not more promising, the Indians
he encountered being more ready to scalp their
would-be spiritual guide than to open their ears
to his teachings.

Ostensibly, to procure supplies for the colon}^
two friars sailed for Havana and thence to
Vera Cruz, to make known its necessities to the
Viceroy of Mexico, and solicit the required suc-
cor. But, as soon as they could reach his ear
they endeavored to persuade him of the futility
of the expedition, and the unpromising charac-
ter of the country as a field for colonization.

At first, his heart being in the enterprise, he
was loathe to listen to reports so inconsistent
with the glowing accounts \v^hich had prompted
the expedition and enlisted his zealous support ;
but, at last, an impression was made upon him,
and an inquiry resolved upon.

But the viceroy al investigation was fore-
stalled by the visit to Santa Maria of Don
Angel de Yillafana, whom the Vicero}^ of Cuba
had appointed governor of that, at that time

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 25

undefined region called Florida, who permitted
the dissatisfied colonists to embark in his
vessels, and abandon the, to them, hateful coun-
try in which they had passed two miserable
years.

Don Tristram de Luna, with a few followers
only, remained, with the fixed resolution to
maintain the settlement, provided he could
secure the approbation and assistance of the
Viceroy. But an application for that purpose,
accompanied by representations of the inviting
character of the interior for settlement, was
met by a prompt recall of de Luna and an order
for the abandonment of the enterprise.

Don Tristram, against w^hom histor\' makes
no accusations of cruelty or bloodshed during
his expeditions into the interior, or his stay at
Santa Maria, and who, animated by the spirit
of legitimate colonization, sought only to found
a new settlement, invites respect, if not admira-
tion, as a character distinct and apart from the
gold-seeking cut-throat adventurers that Spain
sent in shoals to the Gulf shores during the six-
teenth centur}'. S\'mpathy with him in his
trials and regret at his failure, induce the reflec-

26 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

tion that, perhaps, had he been burdened with
fewer gold-seekers and only one-twentieth of the
ecclesiastics who encumbered and leavened the
colony with discontent, his settlement might
have proved permanent.

The local results of de Luna's expedition were
fixing, for a time, the name of Santa Maria
upon the Bay, and permanently stamping upon
its shores the name Pensacola ; and here narra-
tion must be suspended to determine the origin
of the latter.

Roberts says, the name was ^'ihat of an In-
dian tribe inhabiting round the bay but which
was destroyed.'* Mr. Fairbanks tells us it was
"a name derived from the locality having been,
formerly, that of the town of a tribe of Indians
called Pencacolas, which had been entirely
exterminated in conflidls with neighboring
tribes."

The first objection to this assigned origin of
the name is, that it is evidentlj^ not Indian, such
names in West Florida invariably terminating
with a double e, as for examples, Apalachee,
Choctawhatchee, Uchee, Ochusee, Escambee,
Ochesee, Chattahoochee. The *'cola" added to

COLONIAL FLORIDA

27

Apalachee, and *'ia" substituted in Escambia
for ee, indicate the difference between the ter-
minations of Indian and Spanish names.

Again, amongst savages, we should expect to
find in the name of a place an indication of a
natural object, the name being expressive of the
object, and hence as lasting. But, that the
accident of an encampment of savages upon a
localit}^ should stamp that locality with their
tribal name, as a designation that should sur-
vive not only the encampment, but the very
existence of the tribe, is incredible. An extinct
tribe would in a generation or two cease to
have a place in the traditions of surviving
tribes, because their extinction would be only
an ordinar>^ event amongst American savages.

The termination being Spanish, and no nat-
ural object existing suggestive of the name, we
naturally turn our search to a vocabulary of
Spanish names, historical and geographical.

Perched upon a rock springing 240 feet high
from the Mediterranean shore of Spain, con-
nected with the mainland by a narrow strip of
sand, is the fortified little seaport of Peniscola.
Substitute ''a" for ''i," transpose "s" and we

28 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

have the name for the original of which we seek.
The seaports of Spain furnished the great bod v
of Spanish adventurers to America in the six-
teenth and seventeenth centuries; and what
more likely than that some native of the little
town crowning with its vine-clad cottages the
huge rock that looks out upon the *' midland
ocean," should have sought to honor his home
by fixing its name upon a spot in the new
world ?

\Yhen and by whom the name was affixed to
our shores is an interesting inquiry. Neither
Roberts, nor Fairbanks, nor anj^ other author-
ity, informs us. It comes into history w4th the
advent of d' Arriola, whose settlement will be
the subject of a future page.

Three hypotheses furnish as many answers
to the question : it was original with Arriola
to the extent at least of a new application of a
Spanish name; or he found the place already'
named in some chart or document now lost to
us; or already fixed by an Indian tradition,
according to Roberts and Fairbanks.

The first hypothesis requires no comment.
The second rests upon the existence of a fact of

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 29

which we can procure no evidence. The third is
a tradition founded upon, or involving, a Span-
ish name.

Ver}^ extraordinary events or striking objects
only are the subjects of the traditions of savage
tribes; and what event can be imagined more
extraordinary and impressive to the savage
mind than to be brought suddenly in contact,
for the first time, with the white man under all^
the circumstances and conditions of de Luna's
settlement? It was one not likely to pass out
of tradition in the lapse of one hundred and
thirt^^-three years, for two long lives only
would be required for its transmission. The
settlers would be, in Indian terminology, a tribe ;
their departure would be an extinction; and
vanity would at last attribute its ending to the
prowess of the Red man.

A name that identifies a locality' and forms a
feature of a purely Indian tradition, having no
reference to or connection whatever with the
white man, must be an Indian name. Here,
how^ever, the name under discussion is a Span-
ish and not an Indian name. The conclusion
is, therefore, irresistible, that as the name is

30 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Spanish the tradition relates to Spaniards,
and that the former is a Spanish designation of
the locaHt}^ of the people to whom it relates.
The settlement of de Luna was the onl}' Span-
ish settlement with which the Indians could
have come in contact before Arriola's. That
settlement, therefore, must be the subject of the
Indian tradition, and the Spanish name Pensa-
cola must have been its name.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 31

CHAPTER III.

Don Andrds de Pes— Santa Maria de Gal va— Don Andres d'
Arriola— The Resuscitation of Pensacola— Its Conse-
quences.

In 1693, Don Andres de Pes entered the Bay,
but how long he remained, or why he came,
whether for examination of its advantages, from
curiosit}', or necessit}^ to disturb its solitude
and oblivion of one hundred and thirty-three
3'ears, history does not say. But as a memorial
of his visit, he supplemented the name de Luna
had given it with de Galva, in honor of the
Viceroy of Mexico; and thus, it comes into
colonial histor\^ with the long title of Santa
Maria de Galva.

In 1696, three years after de Pes' visit, Don
Andres d' Arriola, with three hundred soldiers
and settlers, took formal possession of the
harbor and the surrounding country, which, to
make eifectual and permanent, he built a

32 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

** square fort with bastions" at what is now
called Barrancas, which he named San Carlos.
As the beginning, or rather reconstruction of a
town named Pensacola, he erected some houses
adjacent to the fort. And there, too, was built
a church, historically the first ever erected on
the shores of Pensacola Bay, but presumptively
the second; for it is hardly credible that the
large settlement of de Luna, embracing so many
ecclesiastics, should have failed to observe the
universal custom of the Spaniards to build a
church wherever they planted a colony. Irre-
sistible, therefore, is the inference that the first
notes of a church-bell heard w^ithin the limits of
the United States were those which rolled over
the waters of Pensacola Bay and the white
hills of Santa Rosa from 1559 to 1562.

Having demonstrated that the settlement of
de Luna v^^as the original Pensacola, that of
Arriola was apparently the second, though
actually but a resuscitation of the colony of
1559 ; for the name, the people, though not the
same generation, and the place being one, mere
lapse of time should not be permitted to destroy

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 33

the unity which may be so justly attributed to
the two settlements.

The inhabitants of the town having been
largely recruited by malefactors banished from
Mexico, must be notched low in the scale of
morals. But, perhaps, in some instances at
least, actions were then adjudged crimes de-
serving banishment which might be deemed
virtues in a more enlightened age, and under free
institutions; for under the despotic colonial
governments of Spanish America in that age to
criticize the vices, or censure the lawless edicts
of a satrap, was a heinous offence, for which
transportation was but a mild punishment.

Originally, Spain's dominion was asserted
over the entire circle of the shores of the Gulf of
Mexico, as w^ell as over all the islands which
they girdled. But upon the vo\'age of La Salle
from the upper waters of the Mississippi to the
sea, France asserted a claim, under the name of
Louisiana, to the entire valley of the river from
its spring-heads to the Gulf, making to the ex-
tent of the southern limit of her claim, from
east to west, a huge gap in Spain's North
American empire.

34 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

But \Yhere were the eastern boundary' of
Louisiana, and the western limit of Florida to
be fixed? Had the French expedition under
Iberville reached Florida before Arriola's, Pen-
sacola would have been included in Louisiana,
and afterwards in the State of Alabama. But
Arriola's settlement was first, in point of time;
and it is to him must be attributed the estab-
lishment of the Perdido as the boundary line
between the F.rench and Spanish colonies, and
the consequent exclusion of Pensacola from the
limits of the great State of Alabama, her politi-
cal influence, her fostering care, "and, compara-
tively, from the vitalizing influence of her vast
mineral and agricultural resources.

The interest of history consists not in the
mere knowledge or contemplation of events as
isolated facts, but in stud^^ng their inter-
relations, and following their threads of con-
nection through all the meshes of cause and
effect. It is, therefore, an interesting reflection
that the settlement of Arriola may not have
been the absolute, though it was the apparent,
cause of the consequences above pointed out.
Behind it, in the shadow of a centurv and a

COLOICIAL FLORIDA. 35

ihird, may perchance be discerned the ultimate
and final cause of those consequences in the
settlement of de Luna. He planted the first
colony, and because he so did, Arriola settled
his on that spot upon which the lost chart and
tradition probabl} coincided in fixing the Pen-
sacola of 1559.

How illustrative of the truth that as one
human life can have but one beginning, so it is
with that aggregate of human lives w^hich we
call a people. *'In the almighty hands of
eternal God, a people's history is interrupted
and recommenced — never."*

* The last sentence of Guizot's Historv of France.

36 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

CHAPTER IV.

Iberville's Expedition — Settlement at Biloxi and Mobile —
Amicable Relations of the French and Spanish Colonies
from 1700-1719.

The Frencli expedition referred to in the
previous chapter, the delay of which was so
fateful to the growth and commercial future of
Pensacola, appeared oj6f the mouth of the har-
bor in January, 1699. But, observing the
Spanish flag flying from the mast-head of two
war vessels lying in the Ba}^ and from the flag-
staff of Fort San Carlos, they did not enter the
harbor, but cast anchor off the Island of Santa
Rosa. Thence an application was made to the
Spanish governor for permission to enter, which
was promptly refused.

After that curt refusal of the Spaniards, the
fleet, consisting of three vessels under the
command of Lemoine d' Iberville, accom-
panied by his brothers, Bienvielle and Sauville,

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 37

which was taking out a colony with the neces-
sary supplies to settle southern Louisiana,
sailed westward and took formal possession of
the country west of the Perdido river.

Iberville's first settlement was made at Biloxi
on the twent\'-seventh of February, 1699, but
it was afterwards abandoned, in 1702, and re-
moved to Mobile.

To the accession of Philip V., a Bourbon
prince, to the Spanish crown, whilst Louis XIV.
reigned in France, must be attributed the
strangely peaceful settlement of the Perdido as •
the boundary line between Louisiana and
Florida. For the politic, if not natural, harmony
existing between two kings belonging to the
same royal family, a grandfather and a grand-
son, both the objects of jealousy and suspicion
to the other nations of Europe, necessarily in-
spired a like feeling in their respective colonial
officers. Hence it was that we find that the
ineffectual expedition of Governor Ravolli of
Pensacola, in 1700, to expel the French from
Ship Island, was the last instance of hostility
between the Louisiana French and the Florida
Spaniards for a period of nineteen years.

38 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Indeed, so intimate were the relations between
the two colonies, that Iberville, coming from
France, in 1702, with two war ships taking
succor to the French colonists, terminated their
voyage at Pensacola, and thence sent the sup-
plies to Mobile in small vessels. Again, in
1703, he began a vo^^age to France by sailing
from Pensacola.

The War of the Spanish Succession, in vyrhich
England was the antagonist of Spain and
France, tightened the bonds of amity between
the colonies of the latter. In 1702, in antici-
pation of an English expedition against Pensa-
cola, Governor Martino readily procured from
Bienville a needed supply of arms and ammuni-
tion. On the other hand, in 1704, Governor
Martino promptly furnished food from his
stores at Pensacola to the famine-threatened
colonists at Mobile; that kind office being a
just requital of a like humanity which had
been exercised by Bienville, in 1702, towards
the starving garrison of San Carlos.

In 1706-7, eighteen Englishmen from Caro-
lina, heading a large body of Indians, made
inroads upon the Spanish settlements in Florida,

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 39

and, strange as it may seem, extended their
operations as far westward as Pensacola. In
the latter ^^ear, Bienville was applied to by the
Spanish governor to aid him in defending Pensa-
cola from an impending attack by the English-
men and their Indian allies. Prompt and bold
in action, Bienville at once advanced from
Mobile with one hundred and twenty Canadians
to assist the Spaniards. But no conflict oc-
curred, for after a few days of hostile demon-
strations the enemy abandoned their enterprise,
owing to the want of necessary supplies.

In other ways, too, the good feeling and inti-
mate relations of the two colonies were mani-
fested. We learn, from a letter of the mean,
jealous, and growling Governor Condillac of
Louisiana to Count Pontchartrain, that, in
1713, there existed a trade between Pensacola
and Mobile, in which the former was supplied
by the latter with lumber, poultr\' and vegeta-
bles— a petty trafiic, but not too small to excite
the jealousy of the old grumbler.

Such were the friendly relations existing
between the Florida Spaniards and the Louisi-
ana French up to 1719, being the year after

40 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Bienville had founded the city of New Orleans ;
relations which must be borne in mind to enable
us to form an enlightened judgment upon the
actions of the men engaged in the blood}'
drama which was ushered in by the nineteen
years of kind offices and good fellowship which
have been mentioned.

Lemoine d' Iberville, a Canadian, esteemed the most
skillful officer of the French navy brilliantly distinguished
on manj^ occasions, was selected to command the expedition
to southern Louisiana, designed to perfect by colonization
the claim France founded upon the voyage of La Salle. He
and his brothers, Bienville, the founder of New Orleans,
Sauville, Sevigny and Chateaugne presented a group of
men seldom accorded to one famih'.

During a visit to Havana, d' Iberville died on the ninth
of July, 1706, leaving to his brothers the task of perfecting
the great enterprise to which the last seven years of his own
life had been devoted.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 41

CHAPTER Y.

War Declared by France against Spain — Bienville Surprises
Metamoras — Metamoras Surprises Chateaugne — Bien-
ville Attacks and Captures Pensacola — San Carlos and
Pensacola Destroyed — Magazine Spared.

On the thirteenth of April, 1719, two French
vessels brought to the French colony the intelli-
gence that in the previous December, France had
declared war against Spain ; an event of which
Don Juan Pedro Metamoras, governor of
Pensacola, who had just succeded DonGregorio
de Salinas, had no information.

Bienville at once organized, with all possible
secrecy, an expedition by land and water to
capture Pensacola b\^ surprise. The land force,
consisting of four hundred Indians and a body
of Canadians, was collected at Mobile. The
naval force, composed of three vessels, two of
them^ the Philippe and the Toulouse, carrying
twenty-four guns each, under the command of
Sevigny, had its rendezvous at Dauphin Island.

42 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

The movement of Bienville, who marched
across the country with his land force, and that
of the fleet were so well timed that on the
fourteenth of May, at 5 o'clock in the afternoon,
as the vessels presented their shotted broadsides
to San Carlos, Bienville, his Canadians, and
Indians, appeared on its land side. There was,
of course, nothing for Metamoras to do but to
order the chamade to be beaten and to settle
the terms of capitulation. He surrendered the
post and all public property within his jurisdic-
tion. It was stipulated that he and his garrison
should march out of the fort with the honors of
war, retaining a cannon and three charges of
powder, that they should be transported to
Havanain French vessels, that the town should
be protected from violence, and that the property
of the soldiers and that of the inhabitants
should be respected.

The victim of such a ruse, it was natural that
Metamoras should have directed his thoughts
to retaliation; and it is probable that during the
voyage to Havana he meditated for his captors
a surprise as complete and prompt as that
which he had just suffered from them.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 43

After the French vessels, the Toulouse and the
Mareschal de Villars had reached Cuba and
landed their prisoners, the}^ were seized by order
of the governor of Havana, who had at once,
upon learning of the disaster at Pensacola,
determined upon its prompt reparation by a
recapture. He accordingly prepared a fleet, con-
sisting of a Spanish war ship, nine brigantines
and the two French vessels. In this fleet
Metamoras and his lately captured troops,
besides others, embarked for Pensacola.

On the sixth of August, the Spanish fleet was
off the harbor. The two French vessels, flying
the French flag, first entered as decoys, to
enable them to secure favorable positions for
attacking San Carlos in the event of a refusal
to surrender. Immediatelv after them came the
Spanish war vessel. The ruse for position suc-
ceeded, but the demand to surrender was
peremptorily refused by Chateaugne, the com-
mander of the fort. To an almost harmless
cannonade there succeeded an armistice, which
the French sought to have extended to four, but
which the Spaniards limited to two days.

After the expiration of the armistice, another

44 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

ineffectual exchange of cannon shots was fol-
lowed b}' the surrender of the fort ; the terms
being that the garrison of one hundred and
sixty men should march out with the honors of
war and be sent to Havana as prisoners.
Chateaugne also was to be sent there and
thence to Spain to await exchange. They were
accordingly all taken to Havana. Chateaugne,
however, instead of being sent from there to
Spain, was imprisoned in Moro Castle, where
he remained only a short time, in consequence
of the energetic preparations which his brother,
Bienville, was then making for his deliverance.

Metamoras, once again in command at Pensa-
cola, fully realized that the stake for w^hich he
and Bienville had been playing was not to be
finally won by such strategems, as each in turn
had been the other's victim, and that the two
which had been achieved were but preludes to
a trial by battle. Appreciating, too, the
bold, prompt and enterprising Bienville, he well
calculated that his time for preparation would
be short, and he accordingly^ improved it to the
best of his abilities and resources.

He erected a battery on Point Seguenza, the

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 45

western extremity of Santa Rosa Island, which
he named Principe d' Asturias, to aid San
Carlos and the Spanish fleet in resisting an
attack by sea. To guard San Carlos from a
land attack, he built a stockade in its rear. To
man all his works he had a force of six hundred
men.

The Fort was captured by Metamoras early
in August, and on the eighteenth of the follow-
ing September Bienville was ready to settle by
arms his right to retain it.

The celerity of Bieneville's preparations was
due, however, to the accidental arrival at
Dauphin Island of a French fleet under Champ-
meslin, who at once relieved him from the care
and preparation of the seaward operations
of his expedition.

The naval force of the French consisted of six
vessels, under the command of Champmeslin,
the ifercu/es of sixty-four guns, the Mars of sixty,
the Triton of fifty, the Union of thirty-six, the

of thirty-six and the Philippe of twenty. The

land force, commanded by Bienville in person,
consisted of two hundred and fifty troops lately
arrived from France, besides a large number of

46 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Canadian volunteers, which, when it reached
Perdido, was joined by five hundred Indians
under Longueville.

Whilst Bienville was moving towards Pensa-
cola, Champmeslin, having sailed from Dauphin
Island, entered the harbor on the eighteenth of
September with five of his vessels, and was
soon engaged in a fierce conflict with Principe
d' Asturias, the Spanish fleet, and San Carlos.
At the time the five vessels went into action, it
was supposed that the Hercules was following
them, but her commander hesitated to cross the
bar, owing to her draught of twent^^-one feet, a
hesitation which almost proved fatal to her
consorts, for, relying upon the support of her
heavj^ batteries, they now found themselves
without it, whilst they were under the concen-
trated fire of the Spanish fleet and the two forts.

In that conjuncture, however, they were saved
by one of those inspirations which sometimes
come to a man in the supreme hour of trial,
making him for the occasion the soul of a host.
A Canadian pilot, being inspired himself, in-
spired the commander of the Hercules with con-
fidence in his ability to take her over the bar

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 47

and into the action. With a cheer from her crew
and all the canvas she could bear, the gallant
ship sped under the guidance of the bold Canad-
ian to the rescue of her consorts.

Speedily her sixty-four guns turned the tide of
battle. Whilst her heavy broadside of thirty-
two guns soon battered Principe d' Asturias
into silence, her consorts poured their fire into
the Spanish fleet, which, now short of powder,
struck its colors.

After a conflict of two hours, San Carlos was
the only point of defense left to the Spaniards,
and that too, threatened by anewfoe. Bienville
was in its rear ready for an assault, which he
soon boldly made. He was, however, so much
impeded by the stockade that he withdrew his
men until he could be better prepared for another
attack. In the assault, it is said, his Indian
allies emulated the French soldiers in daring and
in their efforts to tear away the impeding
stockade. But their war-whoop was more
effectual and decisive than their valor. Impress-
ing the Spaniards, as it did, with visions of
blood-dripping scalps, it disposed them to
obviate by surrender the dire consequences of a

48 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

successful assault, for they felt that Bienville,
however so disposed, would be powerless to
stay the Indian's scalping knife when his blood
was at battle heat. Accordingly, before the
assault was repeated, Metamoras signaled for
a parW, which resulted not in a capitulation
on terms which he asked for, but in a surrender
at discretion.

Even after the cooling process of the time re-
quired for the parley and arranging the sur-
render, the Indians were so loath to forego their
scalping pastime, the precious boon of victory,
that it was necessary for Bienville to redeem the
scalps of the Spaniards by bestowing one-half
of their effects upon his allies, and reserving the
other half only for his own soldiers.

When Don Alphonso, the commander of
the Spanish fleet, surrendered l^is sword to
Champmeslin, the latter returned it with the
complimentary assurance that the Don was
worthy to wear it. But Bienville would not
even condescend to accept that of Metamoras,
but directed him to deliver it to a by-standing
soldier.

But the real hero of this battle, like the real

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 49

heroes of many other fields of glory, must be
unnamed, for though it is recorded that the
pilot of the Hercules was rewarded with a
patent of nobility for his skill and daring, there
is no accessible record of his name.

Having won a surrender at discretion, it was
Bienville's pleasure to send Metamoras and a
sufficient number of Spanish troops to Havana,
in a Spanish vessel, to be exchanged for the
Frenchmen who had been sent there in August;
and thus it was that he worked the deliverance
of his brother Chateaugne from his imprison-
ment in Mora Castle. The rest of the Spaniards
were sent to France as prisoners of war.

It was his will and pleasure likewise to burn
the town of Pensacola, and to utterly destroy
San Carlos by blowing it up with powder. The
only structure left undestroyed was the maga-
zine which stood about half a mile from the
fort.

Upon the ruins of San Carlos there was fixed
a tablet announcing: ''In the year 1718, on
the eighteenth day of September, Monsieur Des-
nard de Champmeslin, Commander of His

50 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Most Christian Majest}', captured this place
and the Island of Santa Rosa by force of arms."
Thus did the Pensacola of Arriola, after hav-
ing been a shuttlecock in the cruel game of war
— captured, recaptured and captured again
within four months — perish utterh^ in the
throes of a convulsion and the glare of a confla-
gration ; a fate which may be traced to the
intrigues of Cardinal Alberoni, the ambitious
and crafty minister of Philip V., resulting in a
war in which Spain, without an ally, w^as con-
fronted by the united arms of France, Great
Britain, Holland and Austria. **I quickened a
corpse" was the vain boast by which he ex-
pressed the change he had effected in Spanish
polipy, one of the many disastrous consequences
of which was the ending in fire and blood of a
little settlement on the far-off shores of the new
world.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 51

CHAPTER VI.

Sketch of Island Town— Its Destruction— The Third Pen-
sacola — The Cession of Florida In^ Spain to Great Brit-
ain—Appearance of Town in 1763— Captain Wills' Re-
port— Catholic Church.

Ox February 17, 1720, five months after the
destruction of Pensacola, a treaty of peace be-
tween France and Spain was signed. But it
was not until early in January, 1723, that
Bienville, under orders from the French govern-
ment, formally restored Pensacola to the Span-
iards, or rather its site and surroundings.

Of the first settlement of the Island town
there exists no account, but it is probable it
began immediately after the destruction of the
Pensacola of Arriola. Its origin may be ac-
counted for by the natural precaution of Gover-
nor Metamoras upon his recapture of that place
and preparation for a struggle with the French,
to remove the non-combatants to a place of

52 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

safety, or rather the safest in the vicinity, and
there was none possessing such great ad-
vantages as Santa Rosa island. It was a
narrow, uninhabited strip of land, separated
from the main land in its western portion by
three miles of water, rendering a settlement
there comparatively free from the danger of sur-
prise by the Indians. The deepest water for
landing on the bay-side, and a supply of fresh
water obtainable by digging wells, would
naturally determine the location of the settle-
ment; and these conditions were met by a
place about two miles from the western point
of the island, not far from the present bay-
wharf of the life-saving station.

The progress the settlement made in the course
of a quarter of a century is presented by the
annexed engraving, v\^hich is taken from a
sketch made in 1743. The artist, Don Serres,
who was a resident during that year, came
there in the service of the Havana Company in
a schooner with a cargo for the town.

He paid New Orleans a visit, and did some
profitable trading there with six thousand
dollars which he had at his command. He also

A North View of Pknsacola on the I

1— The Fort. 2— The Chnrch. 3— The Govenor's Hous

0 OF Santa Rosa.— Drawn hv Dom Serres.

1 4— The Commandant's House. 5— A Well. G— A Hun.Lio.

» » , > ■

. ,• ; *

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 53

secured a quantity of pitch and turpentine for
his Company, as well as two pine spars, each
eighty-four feet long, which he sent to Havana
in the schooner. This was the beginning of the
timber trade of Pensacola, its first known
business transaction with New Orleans, and the
last authenticated instance of one of its timber
dealers engaging in the elegant pastime of
sketching.

In vain has information been sought of its
progress during the period between the time
Don Serres made the sketch and 1754, which
embraced the last eleven years of its existence,
for in that year it was destro^'cd, together with
many of its people, by a terrific hurricane.
And thus it was that, as the Pensacola of
Arriola perished in the conflict of human pas-
sions, its offspring was destroyed in a war of
the elements.

The survivors, removing to the north shore of
the Bay, settled upon a crescent-shaped body of
dry land, about the eighth of a mile wide in its
widest part, formed by the Bay and a titi
swamp, which, extending from the mouth of an
estuarv on the west, curved landward to a

54 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

marsh just below the outlet of another on the
east. These estuaries, though seemingly the
outlets of two, were in fact those of one and
the same stream flowing through the swamp,
and navigable by canoes for some distance from
the bay. The bay-shore also curved deeply, the
indentation being in fact the remnant of a cove,
which, as old maps show, extended to and be-
yond the northern edge of the swamp.

That settlement v^as but a removal of Pensa-
cola to its present site, like that by which it
was removed to the island. Each settlement,
in its order of time, like d' Arriola's town, being
a continuation of the Pensacola founded by de
Luna in 1559, four years before Menendez
founded St. Augustine.

Of the history of the present Pensacola, be-
yond its bare existence, from 1754- to 1763, we
have no information further than that its in-
significance shielded it from the trials and suffer-
ings of the seven years war ended by the treaty
of Paris, February 10, 1763.

By that treaty Florida became a British
colony. On July 6 of that year Captain Wills,
in command of the third battery of Royal

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 55

Artillery, then at Havana, forming a part of
the British force which had captured the city
during the late war, was ordered by General
Keppel to proceed with his command to Pensa-
cola for the purpose of taking possession of the
place. Arriving there on the seventh of August,
Captain Wills having presented the order of the
king of Spain to the Spanish commander for the
surrender of the post, it was promptly obeyed.
It was the duty of Spain under the treaty to
remove her troops from Pensacola. Her sub-
jects, however, were, under the Ninteenth article,
entitled to remain in the full enjoyment of their
personal rights, religion and property ; but, re-
solving to remove to Mexico, they applied to
the Spanish government for transportation,
which was promptly promised. Accordingly,
on September 2, transports for the removal of
the garrison and people arrived ; and, on the
third, the Spanish troops and the entire popu-
lation, to the last man, woman and child,
sailed for Vera Cruz, leaving Captain Wills and
his command the only occupants of the town.
It is to a report written b}' him a few days
after the Spanish exodus that we owe all the

56 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

information we possess of the character and
appearance of the town at that time.

It consisted of *'40 huts, thatched with
palmetto leaves, and barracks for a small
jjarrison, the whole surrounded by a stockade
of pine posts."

The report says: ''The countr^^ from the
insuperable laziness of the Spaniards, still re-
mains uncultivated. The woods are still near
the village, and a few paltr^^ gardens show the
only improvements. Stock, they have none,
being entireW supplied by Mobile, w^hich is
pretty well cultivated and produces sufficient
for export."

Of the Indians we are presented with the fol-
lowing glimpse: "The Indians are numerous
around. We had within a few days a visit from
about two hundred of five different nations. I
was sorry not to have it in my power of making
them any presents. I onl}^ supplied them with
• some rum, with which they seemed satisfied,
and went off assuring me of their peaceful in-
tentions and promising to come down soon
wath some of their principal chiefs."
The church, which is so hallowing a feature

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 57

in the sketch of the Island Town, is suggestive
of the persevering devotion of the Catholic
Faith to the spiritual welfare of her children.
In 1559, when de Luna raised his national flag
upon the shores of Santa Maria, his spiritual
mother raised her cross beside it. With that
sacred symbol she followed him in his explora-
tions through the limitless wilderness, beginning
and ending each day with her holy rites. She
returned wath Arriola, and, as he built his fort,
her children under her pious promptings built
her church. As the drum beat the reveille to
call the soldier to the activities of life, the notes
of her bell reminded him of her presence to
admonish and console him. The engraving
presents the next effort of her zeal. Afterwards,
when the wing of the hurricane and the wild
fury of the waves had swept away her island
sanctuary, and left her children houseless on a
desolate shore, she followed them to that
hamlet which has just been described, where,
around a rude altar, sheltered by the frail
thatch of the palmetto, they enjoyed her con-
soling offices. When, in 1763, their national
flag fell from the staff" and her people went into

58 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

voluntary exile, her cross went with them as
their guide and solace. She returned with
Galvez, and never for a day since then has she
been without her altar and her priest on these
shores to perform her rites for the living and the
dead. For many years after the establishment
of American rule, that altar and that priest
were the only means by which the Protestant
mother, more obedient to the Divine word than
sectarian prejudice, could obey the sacred
mandate: ''Suffer the little children to come
unto Me, and forbid them not."

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 59

CHAPTER VII.

British West Florida— Pensacola the Capital— Government
Established— Johnstone first Governor— British Settlers
—First Survey of the Town— Star Fort— Public Build-
ings— Resignation of Johnstone — His Successor, Mon-
teforte Brown.

The little settlement, mentioned in the last
chapter, soon attained an importance in strik-
ing contrast with its appearance and condition.

By the treat}' of Paris, France had ceded to
Great Britain Canada, and that part of Louis-
iana east of a line beginning at the source of
the Mississippi river and running through its
centre to the Iberville river, thence through the
middle of this river, lakes Maurepas and Pont-
chartrain, to the Gulf. That acquisition, with
Florida, extended the British North American
empire from the Gulf of Mexico to the Arctic
Sea, bringing alike the Seminoles and Esqui-
maux under its dominion.

On the seventh of October, 1763, by a royal

60 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

proclamation the limits of the governments of
East and \Yest Florida were established; the for-
mer extending from the Apalachicola river east-
ward; the latter embracing all the territory-
lately acquired from France and Spain south of
the parallel of 31° from the Mississippi to the
Chattahoochee river ; and by another exercise of
royal authority, in February, 1764, the north-
ern boundary was pushed to 32°, 28'. This
line was also the southern boundary of the ter-
ritory of IMinois, and it brought Mobile and
Natchez within the limits of West Florida.

Of that province, so extensive and so rich in
natural resources, Pensacola became the estab-
lished capital ; a natural result of the high esti-
mate placed by the British upon the advantages
of the harbor. When Lord Bute's ministry was
assailed in the House of Commons for having
procured Florida, by the surrender of Cuba,
which Great Britain had conquered in the v^ar
ended by the treaty of Paris, the acquisition of
the Bay of Pensacola figures as a prominent
feature in the ministerial defense.

The first step towards the establishment of
civil government in West Florida was taken

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 61

Upon the arrival, in February, 1764-, at Pensa-
cola, of Commodore George Johnstone of the
Royal Navy, who came as the governor of the
province ; his first official act being a proclama-
tion announcing his presence, powers, jurisdic-
tion, as well as the laws which were to be
in force. There came with him the Twenty-first
British regiment as a garrison for the post, and
also a number of civilians in search of fortune,
or new homes ; some as paravsites, who are never
absent where public money is to be distributed,
and others attracted by the charms of the dis-
trict, under the delusive misrepresentations of
which the immigrant is so often the victim.

In November, 1764, Governor Johnstone, un-
der instructions from the British government —
which from the first seems to have taken a deep
interest in the development of its late acquisi-
tions— published a description of the province
for the purpose of attracting settlers. By
efforts like this, a tide of immigration soon be-
gan to flow into West Florida, which, during
the British dominion of nearly twenty years, it
is estimated, brought into it a population of
25,000. In this inflow were observable a large

62 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

number of Africans, imported under official en-
couragement, to clear the forests and till the
fields of the province; the British conscience
being, then, still enthralled by the greedy slave-
traders of Bristol, Liverpool and London, was
patientW awaiting the advent of Clarkson and
Wilberforce, to quicken it into resistance to the
cruel traffic.

In the early days of Governor Johnstone's ad-
ministration, Pensacola was surve^-ed and a
plan established. The main street was named
George, for King George IIL, and the second
street eastward Charlotte, for Queen Charlotte.
The area between those streets as far north as
what is now Intendencia street was not sur-
veyed into blocks and lots, but reserved as a
public place or park. The lots south of Garden
street had an area of 80 feet front and 170 in
depth. North of that street they were 192 feet
square, known as arpent or Garden lots, and
numbered to correspond with those lying south
of Garden street, which were, strictly speaking,
town lots. In order to furnish each familvwith
a garden spot, each grantee of a town lot was
entitled, upon the condition of improvement, to

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 63

receive a conveyance of an arpent lot of the
same number as his town lot.

That plan, which was the work of Elias
Durnford, appointed, on the twenty-sixth of
Juh', 1764, civil engineer of the province, is still
the plan of the old part of Pensacola, with some
changes in what was the English park, or
public place; and therefore the plan of the town
is, strictly speaking, of English origin.

The park, however, though excluded from
private ov^nership, w^as not intended to be va-
cant, but on the contrary, was devoted to pub-
lic uses. In the centre of it w^as a star-shaped
stockade fort, designed as a place of refuge for
the population in case of an Indian attack.
Near it were the officers' quarters, barracks,
guard house, ordinance store-house and lab-
oratory, two pow^der magazines, the King's
bake-house, cooperage shelter, and government
store-house. This park w^as, therefore, in the
early da^^s of Pensacola, the liveliest and busiest
part of the town.

The star-shaped fort was, from 1764 until
after 1772, the only fortification of the town,
as may be inferred from the official report of

64. HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Captain Thomas Sowers, engineer, on the fifth
of April of the latter year.

The first street pushed through the crescent-
shaped swamp, was George street, involving
much labor in building a causeway and cover-
ing it with earth. It extended to the elevation,
then named Gage Hill, in honor of General Gage,
of Boston memory, and who, as the command-
er-in-chief of all the royal forces in the British
North American colonies, had much to do wnth
Pensacola in its early days. Upon the highest
point of this hill was established a lookout
from which the approaches of the town land-
ward and seaward could be observed.

Governor Johnstone, v^ho was a commodore
in the royal navy, in the second year of his ad-
ministration, found himself in jarring relations
with the military, resulting from circumstances
which, at this distance of time, seem to be trifles,
but magnified, when they occurred, into im-
portance by that jealous sensitiveness which
appears to exist alwa3^s between those two
arms of the public service. As might be expected,
whisperers, busybodies, and parasites, throng-
ing the seat of patronage, ready to catch any

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 65

stray crumo of official favor, aggravated the
conflict, which at last became so bitter and
widespread that we find it figuring in the records
of the courts-martial of a major, a lieutenant,
and even an ensign. Naturally, too, the colonists
at length became partisans of the official strife,
thereby contributing to bring about a condition
of affairs rendering the governor's further con-
tinuance in office so uninviting to himself and
so unsatisfactory to the people that, in Decem-
ber, 1766, he resigned.

An incident which occurred shortly after his
appointment, manifests his impatience of criti-
cism— a weakness w^hich may have been the
cause of his troubles in Florida. He and Grant,
governor of East Florida, were appointed at
the same time by the Bute administration, w^hen
Scotch appointees to office were so ill-favored
by the English. The announcement were made
in the North Briton with a sarcastic allusion to
them as a brace of Scotchmen. At this John-
stone was so much incensed that he sent to the
publishers what was equivalent to a challenge.
Moreover, on meeting with a Mr. Brooks, who
was connected with the North Briton, John-

66 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

stone insisted on his stating whether he was the
author of the article. Brooks refusing to an-
swer, Johnstone drew his sword to use on him
when by-standers interfered. Brooks instituted
legal proceedings under which the governor was
bound to keep the peace.

In after j-ears, Johnstone became a member of
Parliament, and attracted much attention by
casting, in the House of Commons, one of the
only two negative votes on the Boston Harbor
Bill, Edmund Burke casting the other. His
course on that memorable occasion secured him
such consideration with the Americans as to
induce the British government to sielect him as
one of the five commissioners who were sent to
America in 1778, under Lord North's concilia-
tory bill, intended to concede to the colonies all,
and even more, than they had demanded at the
beginning of the controversy with the Mother
country. But the sequel of his mission proved
his unfitness for the position. Besides ventur-
ing to enter into correspondence with Robert
Morris and Francis Dana, he attempted, through
a lady, to bribe General Joseph Reed of Pennsyl-
vania by an offer of £10,000 and the highest

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 67

office within the gift of the crown in America in
the event his efforts at conciliation proving suc-
cessful. To that offer Reed made the memorable
reply : "I am not worth purchasing, but such as
I am the King of Great Britain is not rich
enough to do it."

The other commissioners, Mr. Eden, General
Clinton, and Lord Carlisle, at least, disavowed
all knowledge or connection with Johnstone's
course. His conduct became the subject of reso-
lutions passed by Congress, in which it was de-
clared : '' That it is incompatible with the honor
of Conoress to hold anv manner of intercourse
with the said George Johnstone, especially to
negotiate with him upon affairs in which the
cause of liberty is interested."

From that reflection he sought to vindicate
himself by an ill-tempered address, which was
followed by his resignation from the commis-
sion.

Though a Scotchman, he seems in this affair
to have acted with more of the impulse of a
Frenchman, like Genet, than with the cool delib-
eration characteristic of his race. Though he
had been a commodore in the British navv, after

68 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

his appointment of governor of West Florida
his historical designation is '* Governor John-
stone."

B\' virtue of his being lieutenant-governor,
Monteforte Brown became Johnstone's succes-
sor.

The troops stationed at Pensacola during
Governor Johnstone's time were the Thirty-first
regiment of infantry and the second battalion of
Royal Artillery, under General Taylor. In 1765,
these troops suffered from scurvy, as a remedy
for which the governor undertook means to
provide them with fresh meat, a provision which
it would seem a thoughtful and considerate
ruler would have employed as a preventive, in-
stead of waiting until disease required it as a
remedy.

The scourge, however, proved a blessing in
the end, as our ills often do, by turning attention
to the necessity of securing regular supplies of
vegetable food, the acids of which science had
determined to be the preventive of scorbutic
affections. This led to the clearing, draining
and cultivation of large bodies of the Titi
Swamp, a process which, once begun, was con-

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 69

tinued throughout the period of English rule,
until the town was surrounded by smiling
gardens, extending westward almost to Bayou
Chico, of which this generation has evidence in
the absence of forest from the district and its
meadow-like appearance, as well as its intersec-
tions of choked up ditches and drains.

In October, 1766, there was an exhibition in
Pensacola of the cruelty with which the British
soldier was treated in the last centur3\ For
absence without leave, James Baker Mattross
of the Royal Artillery received 100 lashes under
sentence of a court-martial. Harsh as this sen-
tence may seem, it was mild and humane com-
pared with what was inflicted in other instances
at other militarj^ posts. Soldiers of the Royal
American regiment, stationed at Detroit, were
punished for rioting, as follows :* James Wilk-
ins, Derby McCaffn}-, and Sargeant Deck 1000
lashes each, whilst fortunate Corporal Saums
escaped with only 500, but who, even in his
luck, was yet five times less lucky than the
roval artillervman at Pensacola. These terrible

Canadian Archives (Haldimand Collection ), B. 22. p. 262.

70 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

inflictions provoke inquiry as to the dermal tex-
ture of the backs of the British soldiery of the
eighteenth century.

With the possibility of such suffering before
them, we can appreciate the joy with w^hich
Richard Harris of the Thirty-first regiment,
charged with stealing chickens, and Lewis Crow
on trial for selling liquor, who were tried by
court-martial at the same time as Mattross,
received their respective findings of not guilty.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 71

CHAPTER VIII.

General Bouquet — General Haldimand.

Early in 1765 General Henry Bouquet hav-
ing been assigned to the command of the
southern military district of the colonies, of
which Pensacola was the headquarters, sailed
from Philadelphia in a small schooner for that
place. He arrived there in the early spring,
and on the following September died.* Of the
day and cause of his death nothing seems to be
known. Of the fact that his grave was marked
by a monument, there is the most conclusive
pro of. t

Where is that monument ? That time and the
elements are responsible for its disappear-
ance is improbable. That it is not even a

*Kingford's History of Canada, Vol. V., p. 110.

fA statement of the English grey bricks used in the
monument exists in the Canadian archives at Ottawa,
dated February 1, 1770. Haldimand Papers, K. 15, p. 84-.

72 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

subject of tradition suggests the painful sus-
picion that it was willfully destroyed; a sug-
gestion which explains the absence of all memor-
ials of the people who must have died in Pensa-
cola during the nearly twenty years of the British
dominion, and removes from their generation the
reproach of having had no respect for the mem-
ory and ashes of their departed friends and
comrades.

An exodus of the English occurred in 1783, as
a future page will show, like that of the Span-
iards in 1763 already mentioned. The town
was filled by a new and strange population,
whose needs for building material were urgent,
and their reverence for the dead too feeble, per-
haps, to resist the temptation of supplying
their wants by plundering tombs deserted by
their natural guardians.

Nature, too, conspired with man in the work
of desecration. The necropolis of the English
was at the western extremity of the town, ex-
tending southward and embracing a slight
bluif on the Bay. From 1860 to 1870 the water
abraded that place, washing out human bones,

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 73

and thus compelled the earth to surrender its
'dead to the sport of the waves.

General Bouquet was born at RoUe, in the
canton of Berne, Switzerland. That he attained
so high a rank is evidence of his merit. His
masterly campaign, in 1763, against the Ohio
Indians, including the Delawares,theShawnees,
and Mingoes, as related by the classic pen of Dr.
Kingsford, in his History of Canada,* is a most
interesting and striking chapter of our colonial
annals. The result was the removal of a terri-
ble scourge from the western borders of Penn-
sylvania and Virginia, and the restoration to
liberty and to friends of three hundred white
men and women by a treat}-, the terms of
which were left to the discretion of General
Bouquet by General Gage. So highly appreci-
ated were his skill and courage at the time that
both colonies honored him with votes of thanks
for his ''great services," which were supple-
mented by a compHmentary letter from the
king.

But the royal letter and his promotion were

♦Volume v., pp. 93-113.

74 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

only Dead Sea apples . Their result was a voyage
in a small vessel to the distant shores of the
Gulf of Mexico, where he was to die in a few
months in a little garrison town with his
laurels vet fresh on his brow, awav from the
friends and that admiring social circle he had
left so recently at Philadelphia. Had he been
the son, or cousin, whether first, second or third,
would have mattered not, of a minister, he
would have won a pension and obtained an
enviable appointment.

General Bouquet was not only a distinguished
soldier, but he also left behind him another
claim to distinction in the thirt}^ volumes of
manuscript in the British museum, known as the
** Bouquet Collection," which now calendared
is available to the historical student.

His monument has perished^ his bones, per-
haps, have been the sport of the unpitying
waves ; generations have unconsciously tram-
pled on his dust; but, in **the Pantheon of
histor}^" his name and his fame are as fresh as
when on these shores he drew his last breath
and heaved his last sigh.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 75

A letter* from his confidential friend Ourry
inspires the suspicion that a romantic passion,
nourished by exile and inaction, contributed to
his early death. He was devoted to a Miss
Willing of Philadelphia, and supposed to be her
affianced. A Mr. Francis, a wealthy Londoner,
wooed and won the lady whilst the soldier was
winning laurels on the western frontier. But
for vandal hands his tomb would be a shrine
where disappointed love could make its votive
offerings.

General Frederick Haldimand was the suc-
cessor of General Bouquet in the command of
the southern district. He, too, was a Swiss,
and a native of the Canton of Berne. He had

*J'ai lu mon cher ami, et rehi avec attention votre triste
lettre du premier, et suis sensiblement touche de votre etat.
Je vois que votre esprit agit^, comme la mer aprps une rude
secousse de tremblement de terre, n'a pas encore repris son
assiette. Je n'avois que trop bien pr^vu I'effet funeste;
pliit a Dieu que je I'eusse aussi bien pu prevenir ! . , . Je
suis attendri du recit tonchant que vous me faites de votre
situation douloureuse, et je vous conjure par ce que vous
tenez du plus cher et de plus sacr^, de ne vous pas laisser
aller k la merci d'une passion qui vous mene, et qui vous
privera bientot, si vous n'y prenez garde, des moyens qui
vous restent encore pour la dompter (Kingsford Hist, of
Can., Vol. v., p. 110).

76 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

held important commands in Canada before he
came to Florida. In 1773 he was appointed
governor of New York. In the same 3^ear, dur-
ing General Gage's absence in England, he was
commander-in-chief of the colonies. He was,
from 1778 to 1784, governor-general of Canada.
To the qualities of a distinguished soldier, he
added ability for civil affairs and the statesman-
like qualities which great crises sometimes re-
quire in a military commander, as appears from
Lord Dartmouth's correspondence with him
during Gage's absence.*

There is an interesting coincidence in the lives
of Bouquet and Haldimand. Drawn to each
other, doubtless, by the tie of nativity and pro-

* I trust the designs of those who have apparently from
self-interested motives endeavored to spread an alarm, and
create fresh disturbances in consequence of the importa-
tion of tea by the East India company will prove abortive.

. . . In the present state of uncertainty with regard to
what maj'^ be the issue of this disagreeable business, I can-
not sa3' more to you ; and, indeed, the sentiments you have
expressed in your former dispatches in respect to the pro-
priety or impropriety'- of employing a military force in case
of civil commotion are so just, and your conduct in that
delicate situation so temperate and prudent, as to render
any particular instructions from me on that head unneces-
sary. Dartmouth to Haldimand — Canadian Archives. Series
B., Vol. 35, p. 64.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. < t

•

fession, similarity of disposition, interests and
fortunes, a life-long friendship was the natural
consequence. They were associates in land
investments. Bouquet bequeathed his entire
estate to his native brother-in-arms, including
the valuable collection before referred to. More
fortunate than the former, the latter lived to be
made a Knight of the Bath, and to die in his
native town of Yverdun.*

*Kmgsford's Hist, of Can., Vol. 4, p. 318.

78 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

CHAPTER IX.

Governor Elliott — Social and Military' Life in Pensacola —
Gentlemen— Women — Fiddles — George Street — King's
Wharf on November 14, 1768.

There exists evidence in the Canadian archives
that, in July, 1767, Mr. Elliot was appointed
to succeed Governor Johnstone, but careful
search has failed to discover any official act
upon which to rest the conclusion that he ever
came to the province.

In a note dated eighteenth of October, 1768,
at Pensacola, General Haldimand tells Gov-
ernor Brov^n that '^assistance will be given to
land Governor Elliot's baggage, and put the
garden in order," in answer, evidently, to a re-
quest of Governor Brown, made in expectation
of the new governor's early arrival. But these
preparations were manifestly made in vain, for
in a letter written at Pensacola, in January,
1769, by the general to Mr. John Bradley of

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 79

New Orleans, he says : ''I hope that these mat-
ters will be settled on the arrival of Governor
Elliot, daily expected." And numerous papers
in the Canadian archives, as well as documents
in the American state papers, show that from
the eighteenth of December, 1766, up to the ap-
pointment of Governor Peter Chester, in 1772,
Brown was the acting governor of the province.
The evidence is therefore conclusive that though
Elliot was appointed, he either died or resigned
without ever having gone to the province.

The coming of officers and others from the
military posts of the province to headquarters,
as well as the frequent courts-martial held there,
especially numerous and exciting in 1766-7,
enlivened military life at Pensacola.

Of the social life of the town during John-
stone's and Brown's administrations, we have
but little information. If, however, the opinion
of an official high in rank is to be accepted as
evidence, gentlemen were not numerous up to
1767, as will be seen from an extract from a
letter of his to a friend : ''A ship lately arrived
from London, has brought over the chief justice
and the attorney-general of the province, and

80 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Other gentlemen, who are very much wanted ^
But who are and who are not gentlemen? Let
the moralist, the sectarian, partisan, votary of
sport or fashion, dude, friend, enem^^ the preju-
diced, the just, the harsh, and the charitable
successively^ sit in judgment upon the same man;
what a very chameleon in character will he not
appear, as he is reviewed by each of his judges?
Of this variety of judgments, an occurrence, at
Pensacola during this period, is illustrative.

Major Farmer of the Thirty-fourth regiment
of infantry, stationed at Fort Charlotte,* was
by the Johnstone party accused of embezzlement
and fraud. But a court-martial w^hich sat at
Pensacola honorably- acquitted him, and upon a
review of the record the finding of the court was
approved by the King.

Another letter, in 1770, gives the following un-
inviting picture of the civil as well as the social
condition of the place: ** Pensacola has been
justly famed for vexatious law-suits. It is con-
trived, indeed, that if a poor man owes but five
pounds, and has not got so much ready money,

Formerly Fort Conde at Mobile.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 81

or if he disputes some dollars of imposition that
may be in the account, or if he is guilty of shak-
ing his fist at any rascal that has abused him,
he is sure to be prosecuted, and the costs of
every suit are about seven pounds sterling. . . .
I have know^n this province for a little more than
four years, yet I could name to you a set of men
who may brag of one governor resigned, one
horse-whipped and one whom they led by the
nose and supported while it suited their purpose,
and then betrayed him. What the next turn of
affairs will be, God knows."

Perhaps, however, the writer owed a shop-
keeper who sued him ; or he had been fined for
offering violence to some other importunate
creditor; and as to the costs of litigation, it is
likely, that in this year of grace some luckless
litigant, in the modern Pensacola, can be found
who would heave a sympathetic sigh on reading
the complaint which comes to us from a suitor
in its early days.

Besides, the reference to the treatment received
by three governors, in a letter written in 1770,
is rather puzzhng, for though three governors
had been appointed for West Florida up to that

82 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

time, but two, Johnstone and Brown, adminis-
tered its government. Johnstone resigned and,
therefore, Brown must have been the man, if
any, w^ho was horsewhipped and led by the nose.
As ''led by the nose," however, is a metaphor,
** horsewhipped" may, perhaps, be regarded as
a figure of speech likewise.

Strange though it be, yet so it is, in the mass
of Pensacola correspondence, from 1763 to 1770,
we find mention made of military officers of
every grade, governors, secretaries, surveyors,
judges, male Indians, ships, boats, bricks, lum-
ber, shingles, wine, swords, muskets, cheese,
cannon and fiddles, but of a woman or any of
her belongings, never, with onl}^ two exceptions.

One comes to us like an attractive mirage on
the far-off" horizon of this Sahara of masculinity
and soulless things in the person of Mrs. Hugh
Wallace of Philadelphia, a friend of General
Haldimand, in respect to whom, in a letter to
her husband, he says : *' I beg my best respects
may be acceptable to Mrs. Wallace." The other
is a nameless moral w^reck, of whom the writer
of a letter exclaims : ''I wish I could make the
mother of my children my wife!" forcing upon

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 83

the imagination the shadow of a wronged wife,
with one's heart touched b}^ the probable sor-
rows of a blighted life.

But, though excluded from men's letters, we
do not need their correspondence to inform us
that wives, mothers, sisters and nurses formed
no inconsiderable part of the population of Pen-
sacola in those early days, for we know it as
certainly, fully, and confidently as we know^
the town must have been blessed with air, light,
food, and all the other vivifying conditions of
human existence.

It has been intimated that fiddles were the
subject of correspondence, and thuswise. It
appears that General Haldimandwas the owner
of two fiddles. Whether fiddling was one of his
accomplishments does not appear. But as own-
ership of one fiddle ordinarih^ creates the pre-
sumption that the owner is a performer in some
one of the three degrees of good, bad or indiffer-
ent, the ownership of two would seem to be
conclusive of the fact.

However that may be, it seems that Governor
Thomas Penn of Pennsylvania had knowledge
of the instruments, and, presumabh', knowing

84 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

their merits, coveted them to such a degree that
the general induced him to pay $360 for them.
As the bargain was made by letter, after the
general and the fiddles had been in Pensacola
for several years, we may infer that their dulcet
tones must have made a deep and ineffaceable
impression upon the governor, which no other
fiddles could remove. By a vessel sailing from
Pensacola to Philadelphia, the general sent a
box containing the two fiddles to Mr. Joseph
Shipping of that place, agent of Governor Penn,
and also a letter to Hugh Ross, his own agent,
whom he tells (evidently witH the chuckle of a
trader wHo has made a good bargain) of the
$360 he is to collect from Shipping, closing the
letter with the exclamation, "I wish I had more
fiddles to sell!"

Correspondence in 1767 shows courtesies ex-
changed between Pensacola and Philadelphia.
A Pensacolian sends a sea turtle, and the Phila-
delphian returns a cheese.

The town was accused of being hot and inhos-
pitable. But the letter of complaint tells what
a specific wine is for the prevention of all
climatic diseases and the other ills of life. One

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 85

gentleman, to be sure of a supply of the panacea,
orders a pipe of old Madeira.

On November 14, 1768, we are walking down
the east side of George street from the gardens
to the Ba}'. After passing two blocks we find
ourselves on the Public Square and in front of a
large building. Going in and out of that build-
ing are many people, the most of them soldiers
and Indians, and somewhere in or about it we
find a Mr. Arthur Neil. Upon inquiry we are
informed the building is the king's store-house,
and Mr. Neil its keeper. Leaving the store, a
short walk brings us to the shore and after-
wards to the king's wharf, which we see covered
with troops, some of them getting into boats,
whilst others, already embarked, are going to
a ship lying at anchor. That ship is the Pensa-
cola bound for Charleston, South Carolina.
The troops are the Thirty-first regiment, lateK-
stationed at Mobile, whence they have just ar-
rived, after an overland march, for the purpose
of embarking in the Pensacola. Whether they
shall remain at Charleston in winter quarters
will, according to a letter of General Haldi-

86 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

mand to Colonel Chisolm, ''depend upon the
conduct of the Bostonians."*

Can. Archives, B. 14, pp. 31, 37, 41.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 87

CHAPTER X.

Governor Peter Chester — Fort George of the British and
St. Michael of the Spanish— Tartar Point— Red Cliff.

Peter Chester, having been commissioned
governor of West Florida in 1772, came to Pen-
sacola, the capital of the province, and entered
upon the administration of the office. He was
recognized and deferred to by General Haldi-
mand as a man of capacity and experience, a
reputation which was not impaired by his nine
years' rule in Florida.

The first days of his administration were
marked by a determination to reform the public
service, and to supersede the old star fort by
more stable and efficient defenses for the town
and harbor, and the spirit which animated him
w^as at once communicated to the military com-
mander of the province.

Early in his administration, after much dis-
cussion by engineers of several plans for the de-

88 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

fense of the town, a fort was built, under orders
from General Gage, on Gage Hill, and named
Fort George for his majesty George III.*

In the centre of the fortress was the council
chamber of the province and the repository of
its archives, where the office duties of the gov-
ernor and the military commander were per-
formed, where audience was given to Indian
chiefs and delegations, and where really centered
the government of West Florida, according to
its English boundaries.

In that chamber on one occasion could have
been seen a man in the prime of life, partly in
Indian dress, in earnest conversation with Gov-
ernor ChCvSter and William Panton, the million-
aire and merchant prince of the Florid as. By
the evident admixture of white and Indian blood
in his veins, his skin had lost several shades of
the hue, his hair the peculiar stiffness, and his
cheek bones somewhat of the prominence of
those of his aboriginal ancestry. He was tall
and slender ; his eyes, black and piercing, beamed

* Mr. Fairbanks, in his ' History of Florida,' calls the fort
St. Michael ; but that was, in fact, a name bestowed upon
it after 1783, when Florida became a Spanish colon5\

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 89

with the light that belongs to those of the cul-
tured ; the Indians said his high forehead was
arched like a horse-shoe ; the fingers which hold
the pen with which he is writing, during a pause
in the conversation, are long and slender; he
speaks and then reads what he has written ; all
is in the purest English, to which he is capable
of giving point by an apt classical quotation.
On a future occasion he will enter that chamber
with the commission of a British colonel. A
few 3'ears later he will hold a like commission
from the King of Spain. A fev/ years later still
will find him a brigadier-general of the United
States. That man is Alexander McGillivray, of
whom much is to be written.

In that chamber three men were once seated
at a table, attended by two secretaries busih-
writing, one in English, the other in Spanish.
One of the three is Governor Chester, another is
General John Campbell, a distinguished English
officer whom fortune has just deserted. The
third, a young-looking Spaniard, too young for
his insignia of a Spanish general, is Don Ber-
nardo de Gal vez, 'the governor and military com-
mander of Louisiana. Those three men are

90 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

closing a drama and writing the last paragraph
of a chapter of histor3\ The two papers the
secretaries are writing, when signed, will sepa-
rate, one going to London, the other to Madrid,
to meet again at Versailles. At Versailles they
will be copied substantially into the duplicates
of the treaty of 1783 between Spain and Great
Britain, and constitute its V Article.

A pigeon-hole on the side of that chamber once
contained an order from Lord Dartmouth, dated
January, 1774, to the commander-in-chief of
West Florida, to forward a regiment from Pen-
sacola to revolutionary Boston to quell the tea-
riots. This book is debtor to many documents
which once rested in other pigeon-holes of the
chamber.

Fort George was a quadrangle with bastions
at each comer. There w^ere within the fort a
pow^der magazine and barracks for the garrison,
besides the chamber above mentioned. The
woods north of it, for an* eighth of a mile, and
within a curve bending around it to the bay,
were felled, in order to give play to its guns land-
ward, whilst they could bear,upon an enemy in
the bay by firing over the town. By a system

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 91

of signals, intercommunication was kept up with
Tartar Point and thence with Red CHff.

Tartar Point, now the site of the Navy Yard,
■where a battery and barracks were erected by
the British, is the only existing name in this
part of West Florida which carries one's
thoughts back to the days of British rule. The
name of the point under the second Spanish
dominion, which lasted about forty years, was
Puntade la Asia Bandera— the Point of the Flag-
staff. It seems strange that an English name
w^hich had been superseded for that period by a
Spanish designation, should after that lapse of
time be restored.

The locality of Red Cliff was for a time a puz-
zle. Such a name for a locality at once induced
a search for a suggestive aspect. No red blufl,
however, not too far eastward to serve as the
site of a work for the defense of the town or
harbor, could be found, and yet, no blulf west-
ward of the former could be observed to suit the
designation. But at length, a letter in the
Canadian archives fixed Barrancas as the local-
ity by stating that there was at about the dis-
tance of a half to a quarter of a mile from Red

92 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Cliff a powder magazine, built by the Spaniards,
capable of holding 500 barrels of powder, which
was then being used as the powder depot of the
province, evidently the relic of old San Carlos,
destroyed by the French in 1719, and stood on
the site of the present Fort Redoubt.

The defenses of Red Cliff consisted of two bat-
teries, " one on the top and the other at the foot
of the hill.'' There were quarters for the officers
and barracks for the soldiers in one building, so
constructed as to be proof against musket balls
and available as an ample defense against an
Indian attack.*

* Canadian Archives — Rept. of T. Sowers, Capt. Engineers
Series B., Vol. XYII., page 302.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 93

CHAPTER XI.

RepresentatiYe Government.

When the governments of West and East
Florida were established, as before related, their
governors were, severally , vested with authority,
their councils consenting and the condition of
the provinces being favorable, to call for the
election of general assemblies by the people.

In 1773, Governor Chester concluded that the
time had arrived when it would be expedient for
him to exercise this power. He, accordingly,
issued writs authorizing an election, fixing the
time it was to be held, the voting precincts, the
qualifications of voters, and the number and
qualifications of assemblymen to be chosen, as
well as the day of the sitting of the general
assembh^ at Pensacola.

But the writs, unhappily, fixed the terms of
assemblymen at three years; a provision
which proved fatal, not only to this first at-

94 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

tempt, but likewise to all future efiforts to
establish representative government in West
Florida. The election was held throughout the
province, and the members of a full general
assembly elected. But whilst the people went
to the polls with alacrity, and hailed with
pleasure the advent of popular government,
they were opposed to the long tenure fixed by
Governor Chester; and so determined was that
opposition that they resolved that it should not
receive the implied sanction of their votes.
They accordingly cast ballots which declared
that they were subject to the condition that the
representative should hold for one year only.
To that condition the governor refused to con-
sent. The people, on the other hand, were
equally unyielding in their opposition. Efforts
were made, but in vain, to induce a concession
by one side or the other ; consequently, during
the following years of English dominion, as be-
fore, the province kne^v no other civil govern-
ment than that of the governor and his council.
It is difficult to understand the motives which
prompted the people to so stubborn an opposi-
tion. The tenure of three years might, indeed,

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 95

seem long to voters who had probably lived in
colonies, where it was a third or two-thirds less.
But still, if there was any value to a people in
representative government, surely an assembly
holding for three years was better than none ;
especially as it would have so concentrated the
influence and power of the community as to en-
able it at some auspicious conjuncture to re-
move the one popular objection to the system.

On the other hand, we can better appreciate
the conduct of Governor Chester. An English-
man with the Tory conservatism of that day,
he w^ould, naturally, fear the effect of short
terms and frequent elections, aside from econom-
ical considerations. All the northern colonies
were in a state of ferment bordering on revolu-
tion, and that consideration, doubtless, intensi-
fied his opposition to anything that savored of
opposition to the wishes of the king or his
representatives. Indeed, from his stand-point,
to yield to the popular wishes in array against
his own will and judgment, was to leaven the
province with a pestilent political heresy which
was seeking to substitute the power of the
people for the authority of the crown.

96 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Governor Chester seems to have possessed
superior talents for government, the best
evidence of which is found in the prosperity of
the colony during his administration, the
harmony that existed between him and the
military, and the high respect and deference he
received from General Haldimand.

Such a man, conscious of his rectitude and
good intentions towards the province, evinced
by his readiness to afford it the privilege of
representative government, somewhat at the
expense of his own authority, would naturally
feel that the condition attached to the ballots,
and adhered to with much insistance, manifested
such a want of confidence in him as to justify
his distrust of the people.

But what Governor Chester's zealous en-
deavors could not accomplish in West Florida,
the reluctant efforts of Governor Tonyn achieved
in the eastern province. In 1780, the latter,
against his own wishes, and solely at the sug-
gestion of others, called for the election of a
general assembly. The call having been promptly
obeyed, the first popular representative body in
Florida met at St. Augustine in January, 1781.*

♦Fairbank's Florida, p. 232.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 97

CHAPTER XII.

Growth of Pensacola — Panton, Leslie & Co.— A King and
the Beaver — Governor Chester's Palace and Chariot —
The White House of the British, and Casa Blanca of
the Spanish — General Gage — Commerce — Earthquake.

There is evidence of great improvement in
the town within a few years from Governor
Chester's advent; a progress which was acceler-
ated as the revolution in the Northern Colonies
advanced. That great movement, ever widen-
ing its area, extended at last from the Gulf
to Canada, leaving no repose or peace for those
who, living within it, were resolute to remain
loyal to their king.

Some entered the royal military service; mul-
titudes left America, and others, to nurse their
loyalty in quietude, removed to Florida.
Though most of that emigration went to East
Florida, yet West Florida, and especially Pen-
sacola, received a large share. St. Augustine,

98 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

however, was the tor^' paradise of the revolu-
tionary era. She can, without question, supple-
ment the glory of her antiquit}^ with the boast
of having once seen her streets lighted up b}^ the
blazing effigies of John Adams and John
Hancock.*

The most important commercial acquisition
of Pensacola hy that tory immigration was
William Panton, the senior of the firm of Pan-
ton, Leslie & Co., a Scotch house of great
wealth and extensive commercial relations.
They had an establishment in London, with
branches in the West India Islands. During the
English dominion in Florida thej^ established
themselves in St. Augustine; later, during Gov-
ernor Chester's administration, at Pensacola,
and afterwards, at Mobile. Other merchants
also came to Pensacola about the same time,
attracted principally by the heav^^ disburse-
ments of the government. But these expendi-
tures were not the attraction to the Scotchmen.
Their object w^as to grasp the Indian trade of
West Florida. A building which they erected

*Fairbank's History of Florida, p. 223.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 99

with a wharf in front of it is still standing, or at
least, its solid brick walls are now those of the
hospital of Dr. James Herron, whose dwelling
house stands on the site of the Council Chamber
of Fort George.

In that building was, carried on a business
which grew steadily from year to year during
the British dominion, and afterwards attained
great magnitude under Spanish rule, as we shall
have occasion to notice in a future page. In
building up that business, Panton had a most
able and influential coadjutor in General Alex-
ander McGillivray, whom we lateh^ saw in the
Council Chamber of Fort George. Through
him their business comprehended not only West
Florida, but extended to and even beyond the
Tennessee river. In perfect security, their long
lines of pack horses went to and fro in that
great stretch of country, carrying all the sup-
plies the Indians needed, and bringing back
skins, peltry, bees-wax, honey, dried venison,
and whatever else their savage customers
would provide for barter. Furs were a large
item of that traffic, for the beaver in those days

100 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

abounded throughout West Florida, and was
found even in the vicinity of Pensacola.

One of their ponds, still existing on Carpen-
ter's Creek, four miles from the town, is sugges-
tive of an instructive comparison between the
fruits of the life-work of its humble construc-
tors, and those of the twenty years rule, of a
might}^ monarch. Of the British dominion of
his Majest}^ George III, in this part of Florida,
the millions of treasure expended, and the thous-
ands of lives sacrificed to establish and main-
tain it, there exists no memorial, or result,
except a fast disappearing bank of sand on the
site of Fort George. From that barren outcome
of such a vast expenditure of human life ana
money, we turn with a blush for the vanity and
folly of man, to contemplate that little pool
fringed with fairy candles,* v^^here the water
lilies bloom, and the trout and perch flash in the
sunlight, as the memento of a perished race.

" A name which the children of the neighborhood have
bestowed on the bloom of a water plant, suggested by its
•wax like stem and its yellow point, and here mentioned to
suggest to our people that it is time we should have popu-
lar designations for'others of our beautiful wild flowers.

> > » »

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 101

whose humble labors have furnished pastime
and food to successive generations of anglers.

An unsuccessful effort has been made to
obtain reliable information as to the number
and description of the houses Pensacolacontain-
ed in its most thriving days during Governor
Chester's administration. But the only account
v^^e have, is that of William Bertram, who
though reputed an eminent botanist is
hardly reliable, for he describes Governor Ches-
ter's residence as a '* stone palace, with a cupo-
la built by the Spaniards;" * and yet, accord-
ing to the description of the town in Captain
Will's report, at the close of Spanish rule,
it consisted of ''forty huts and barracks, sur-
rounded by a stockade;" and he witnessed at
that time, the exodus of the entire Spanish pop-
ulation. Besides, persons whose memories
went back within thirty years of Governor
Chester's alleged palatial residence, neither saw,
nor even heard, of the ruins of such a structure.

Upon the same authority rests the statement,
that the Governor had a farm to which he took

Fairbanks Florida, p. 219.

102 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

morning rides in "his chariot. " '^^ But a travel-
er whose fancy was equal to the transforma-
tion of a hut into a palace, may have trans-
formed his excellency's modest equipage into a
more courtly vehicle.

It is probable, however, that although Governor
Chester was not the occupant of a stone palace
wnth a cupola, he lived in a sightly and comfort-
able dwelling built of brick or wood, or perhaps
of both. One such dwelling of his time, that of
William Panton, was familiar, forty years ago
to the elders of this generation. It stood near
the business house of Panton, Leslie & Co.
Taking its style and solidity as a guide, there
existed several houses in the town within the
last half century that could be identified as
belonging to Governor Chester's day.

One of them was the scene of a tragedy ; a
husband cutting a wife's throat fatally, his own
more cautiously, or perhaps her cervical verti-
brae had taken off the edge of the razor, for he
survived. Thereafter, none would inhabit it,
and consequently it rapidly went to ruin. It

*Pickett, Vol. II. p. 25.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 103

stood on the north side of Government street, a
block and a half from Palafox. A jury acquit-
ted him. Why? No one could conjecture,
unless because she was his wife, and therefore
his chattel, like the cow or sheep of a butcher.

In Governor Chester's time there existed a large
double story suburban residence, which was a
distinguished feature in the landscape looking
southwesterly from Fort George, or from any
part of the Bay. It stood on the bluff between
the now Perdido R. R. and Bayou Chico.
Painted white, it became the 'Svhite house" of
the English, and ''Casa Blanca" of the Spanish
dominion.

It was the home of a family of wealth and
social standing, composed of three— husband,
wife, and daughter, the latter a child. Gardens
belonging to it covered much of the area of that
meadow-like district already mentioned. That
home was to be the scene of a drama in three
acts; the death of a child, the death of a hus-
band, and a struggle of strong, martyriike
womanhood in the toils of temptation, tried
to the lowest depth of her being, but coming
forth triumphant.

104 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

In examining the calendar of the Haldimand
collection by Mr. Douglas Brymner, Archivest
of the Dominion of Canada, we are impressed
with the great and varied responsibility, labor,
and care, attending the office of commander in
chief of the American colonies, especially after
Great Britain's, Canada, Florida, and Louisiana
acquisitions. His administration involved not
merely general superintendence of the military
department, but likewise embraced the minutest
details requiring expenditures of public money.
We accordingly find General Gage, during Gov-
ernor Chester's administration, dictating letters
in respect to carpenter's wages "" in Pensacola.
Again w^e find him busy over a controversy
which had sprung up there in respect to the
employment of a Frenchman, Pierre Rochon, f
to do carpenter's work, and furnish shingles, to
the exclusion of Englishmen. Upon economical
grounds his excellency decided in favor of
Rochon. Pierre was evidently an active and
enterprising man. Before he came to Pensacola

* Canadian Archives B. Vol. 15, p. 267.
tid. 15 p. 195.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 105

to secure for himself all the public carpentering
and shingle business there, he had enjoyed the
like monopoly at Mobile.

Again we find the General engaged with a
small matter at Red Cliff.* Lieutenant Cambell,
of the engineer department, had furnished some
carpenters who were employed there with
candles and firewood, doubtless because thev
could not otherwise be procured by the men.
That act ofkindness brought the benevolent lieu-
tenant the following scorching reproof: "I am
sorry to acquaint you that his excellency, General
Gage, is greatly displeased at 3'our giving of the
carpenters candles and firewood; and he desires
to know by what authority you assumed to
give those allowances, or by what order they
were given ? For his excellency declares, that a
shilling shall not be paid on that account."
New York, 16 Feb. 1773. S. Sowers, Captain
of Engineers.

Even the quahty of bricks used on the public
works at Pensacola was a matter of interest to
the commander in chief In 1771, a brick man-

*Id. 17 p. 267.

106 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

ufactured by the British, and one by the Span-
iards, nearly a century before, as General Haldi-
raand says, were sent to headquarters at New-
York, for the judgment of his excellency as to
their comparative merits.

These letters impress us the more with the cares
of General Gage, when we reflect they were
written at the time of the troublesome tea busi-
ness at rebellious Boston; and when the flowing
tide of the revolution, as may be discerned from
almost every page of the calendar, was daily
rising, and threatening to sweep away the sup-
ports of British authority in the colonies.

In a former page mention is made of a Phila-
delphia lady, whose name occurs in the Pensacola
correspondence of an earlier day. It is but fair,
therefore, that we should not leave unnoticed
a New York lady who is mentioned in letters of
Governor Chester's time ; the more so, because
she seems to have been one of those thrifty
housewives, who do not entirely depend upon
the tin can, and green glass jar of the shop to
supply their families with preserved fruits and
vegetables; besides, there can be brought in
with her extracts from letters, exemplary of the

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 107

courtly style, with which in Governor Chester's
day, a gentleman returned, and a lady received
his thanks for a small courtesy.*

General Haldimand, at Penascloa, writes
Captain S. Sowers, the husband of the lady,
who is in New York :

"I most respectfully ask Mrs. Sowers, to per-
mit me, through you, to tender to her my most
grateful thanks for the three jars of pickels. "

The Captain replies: **Mrs. Sowers, with
pleasure, accepts your thanks for the pickels,
and when ye season comes for curing of them,
she will send you another collection which she
hopes will be acceptable. "

In this stirring, short-hand, type-writing age,
the form of a like exchange of courtesies would
probably be : '* Pickels received. Thanks. "

Though there was no lack of lawyers and
doctors, who it is said, lived in fine style, there
was a sad want of clergymen or preachers in the
province. There was but one of whom we have
any account up to 1779, and he was stationed
at Mobile. Stuernagel, the Waldeck Field

•Canadian Archives B. Vol. 15 p. 161.

108 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Preacher, on his arrival in Pensacola, in that
3'ear, christened a boy whose parents had been
waiting eight years to make him the subject of
the hoi}' office. He also baptized men who had
been watching from their bo3^hood for an
opportunit}' to make their baptismal vows.
Nor can there be found a reference to church or
chapel during the English dominion.*

The most prosperous and promising days Pen-
sacola ever saw, except those since the close of
the civil war, were from 1772 to 1781. As the
American revolution advanced, additions w^ere
made to the numbers, intelligence and v^realth
of its population, owing to causes already men-
tioned. It was the capital of a province rich in .
its forests, its agricultural and other resources.
Its Bay was prized as the peerless harbor of the
Gulf, which it was proposed by the British gov-
ernment to make a great naval station, a
beginning in that direction having been made
by selecting a site for a navy yard adjoining the
town to the westward. Its commerce was
daily on the increase; not only in consequence

Von Elking Vol. 11 p. 139.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 109

of the extension of Panton, Leslie & Co.'s trade
with the Indians, but other enterprising mer-
chants who had been added to the population,
were engaged in an export trade, comprising
pine timber and lumber, cedar, salt beef, raw
hides, cattle, tallow, pitch, bear's oil, staves,
shingles, honey, beeswax, salt fish, myrtle wax*
deer skins, dried venison, furs and peltry. This
trade, and the £200,000 annually extended by
the British government, as well as the disburse-
ments of the shipping, constituted the sources
of the prosperity of the town.

This period, besides being a season of growth
and prosperity to Pensacola, as well as the rest
of the Province, was one of repose, undisturbed
by the march of armies, battles, and the other
cruel shocks of war that afflicted the northern
colonies. But it was not to remain to the end
a quiet spectator of the drama enacting on the
continent. It, too, had an appointment with
fate. Though not even a faint flash of the
northern storm was seen on its horizon, yet

* This is the product of the wild m3'rtle, obtained by putting?
the seed into hot water, when the wax liquifies and floats
on the surface.

110 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

there had been one for long brooding for it in
the southwest.

The earthquake, too, that visited it on the
night of Februar}^ 6, 1780,* was but a presage
of that which on May 8, 1781, was to shake it to
its center; and prove the signal of an exodus of
the English almost as complete as was that of
the Spanish population in 1763.

*Oii the sixth of Febuary 1780, at night, a fearful storm
arose with repeated thunder and lightning. An earth-
quake was accompanied by such a violent shock, that in
the barracks the regimentals and the arm racks fell from
the walls in a great many places, and everything was
moved in the rooms. The doors were sprung, chimneys
were thrown together, and from the fires burning on the
hearths, a conflagration threatened to burst forth.
Neighboring houses clashed together, and those buried in
the ruins cried for help. The sea foamed and raged ; the
thunder continually rolled. It was a terrible night. Only
towards one o'clock, the raging elements in some measure
again became subdued. Wonderful to relate, no human
life was lost. "—Von Elking, Vol. 11, p. 144.

COLONIAL FBORIDA. Ill

CHAPTER XTII.

MiHtar\' Condition of West Florida in 1778 — General John
Campbell — The Waldecks — Spain at War with Britain —
Bute, Baton Rouge and Fort Charlotte Capitulate to
Galvez — French Town — Famine in Fort George — Gal-
vez's Expedition against Pensacola — Solana's Fleet
Enters the Harbor — Spaniards Effect a Landing — Span-
ish Entrenchment Suqjrised — The Fall of Charleston
Celebrated in Fort George.

The military condition of West Florida was
changed as the revolutionary war progressed.
There were no longer seen two or more regi-
ments at Pensacola, one or two at Mobile, and
one at Fort Bute, Baton Rouge, and Panmure.
The call for troops for service in the northern
colonies had, by the latter part of 1778, reduced
the entire effective force of the province to five
hundred men.

That such a reduction was thought prudent,
was due to the peaceful relations of the Span-
iards and the British, as well as those of the
latter with the Creek and Choctaw Indians, at-

112 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

tributable to the influence of McGillivray, now
a colonel in the British service.

In the latter part of 1778, however, the
British government becoming suspicious of
Spain, and anticipating her alliance with
France, ordered General Clinton to reinforce
West Florida. Accordingly, General John
Campbell, a distinguished oflicer, was sent to
Pensac'ola, with a force of 1,200 men, composed
of a regiment of Waldecks, and parts of two
regiments of Provincials from Maryland and
Pennsylvania. They did not arrive, however,
until the twenty-ninth of January, 1779.*

* It is to the presence of these Waldecks at the siege and
capture of Pensacola, that we are indelited for the only de-
tailed account we possess of those events. The Waldeck
regiment was one of the many mercenary bodies of German
troops which Great Britain hired to conquer her revolted
colonies. On the return of the commands to Gennanj',
after the close of the war, each commander was required to
make to his government a detailed report of its experiences.
In 1863, Max Von Elking published, at Hanover, two vol-
umes containing the substance of those reports, entitled :

["Die deutchen Hiilfstruppen im Nordamerikanischen
Befrenings Kriege, 1776 bis 1783. " ]

The German Troops in the North American War of Inde-
pendence, 1776 to 1783.

Those of the Waldecks extended from the day the regi-
ment was completed at Corbach, where it was reviewed by
the widowed Princess of Waldeck, and her court ladies,

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 113

Early in 17^0, General Campbell sent two
companies of Waldecks to reinforce Fort Bute,
which brought its garrison up to about 500
men under the command of Lt. Colonel Dickson.

At length Spain threw off the mask, and
adopted a course which justified the suspicions
of the British Court as to her inimical inten-
tions. On June 16, the Spanish minister, the
Marquis d' Almodovar, having dehvered to
Lord Weymouth a paper equivalent to a dec-
laration of war, immediately departed from
London without taking leave. Spain thereupon
became an ally of France, but not of the United
States. Nevertheless, under the influence of the
Court of Versailles, Don Bernardo de Galvez,

on May 9, 1776, up to the return of its small remnant
in 17S3. The princess entertained them, and furnished
them besides 100 guelden for a jollification— doubtless out
of the hire she received for the hapless creatures. The re-
mark of a courtier, that he would see " all those who came
back riding in carriages," indicates the delusive hopes with
which it was sought to inspire them. Nevertheless, it was
thought prudent by the Princess, that the departing mer-
cenaries should, to prevent desertion, l)e guarded during
their journey to the llescr, where they were to embark, by
the Green Regiment of Sharpshooters. The regiment con-
sisted of 640 men, under the command of Colonel Yon
Hanuxleden. Stuernagel was the Field Preacher, or chaj>
lain, to whose journey Von Elking makes many references.

114 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

the Governor of Louisiana, on June 19,
published, at New Orleans, the proclamation
of the Spanish King, acknowledging the
independence of the United States. The dates
of these transactions furnish conclusive evi-
dence of a pre-arrangement, designed to
enable the Spaniards to assail the British
posts in West Florida before they could be
succored by the home government.

In pursuance of that polic}^ Galvez at once
began his preparations for offensive operations
against Forts Bute, Baton Rouge and Pan-
mure, in the order in which they are mention-
ed. The great distance of Pensacola from them,
as well as the want of facilities of communica-
tion, assured him that with an adequate force
at his command, General Campbell's first inti-
mation of his operations w^ould be the news of
their capture.

In August, with a force of 2,000 men, Galvez
began his advance on Fort Bute. As soon as
Dickson was informed of his movement, he re-
solved to concentrate his forces at Baton Rouge,
leaving at the former post a few men to
man the guns, and to make such a show of

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 11

O

resistance as would give him time to perfect the
defenses of the latter.

On August 30, Galvez appeared before Bute.
After a contest of some hours, its handful of de-
fenders arrested his movements by the time con-
sumed in an honorable capitulation. Bute hav-
ing been secured, Galvez pushed on to Baton
Rouge. In his first attack, he was repulsed
with the heavy loss of 400 men killed and
wounded, which was within 100 of Dickson's
entire force. In the next attack which was
made on the following day, the Spanish loss
was 150. Although the loss on his side was in
both attacks only 50 men, Dickson realizing
that he was cut off from all succor, and that he
must either surrender, or see his command grad-
ually waste away under the repeated attacks
of an overwhelming enem}', capitulated upon
the most honorable terms. The command was
pledged not to fight against Spain for eighteen
months unless sooner exchanged. With loaded
guns and flags flying the garrison was to march
to the beat of the drum 500 paces from the fort
and there stack arms. The officers were to re-
tain their swords and every one his private

116 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

property. All were to be cared for and trans-
ported to a British harbor by the Spaniards.*
Fort Panmure, from which the garrison had
been withdrawn for the defense of Baton Rouge,
was included in the surrender.

It was not until the twentieth of October that
a courier brought to Pensacola intelligence of the
fall of the Mississippi Posts, although Baton
Rouge had surrendered during the first days of
September. When it was received it was not
credited, but regarded as a false report coming
from the Spaniards to entice the British com-
mander from Pensacola in order that it might
be captured in his absence. Even the report of
a second courier coming, on the twenty-third,
failed at first to work conviction; but at last
all doubt was dispelled, and every effort directed
to putting Pensacola in a defensive condition.

Why Galvez did not follow up his success at
Baton Rouge by an immediate advance on
Mobile, it is difficult to conceive, except upon
the presumption of his ignorance of the weak-
ness of the military forces there, and at Pensa-
cola.

*Von Elking, Vol. 11, p. 142.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 117

In December, 1779, Clinton's expedition
against Charleston sailed from New York; its
destination veiled in such secrecy, that even
General Washington, as well as the rest of the
world outside of the British lines, was
in the dark respecting it. Aliralles, the Spanish
agent, feared it was intended to recover the con-
quests of Galvez in West Florida, and signified
so much in a letter to General Washington. By
the time the letter was received, however, the
General had become convinced "that the Caro-
linas were the objects, " and in reply so tells the
Spanish agent.

It was during the interval of Galvez's inaction
between the capture of Baton Rouge, and his
attack on Mobile, that Chevalier de la Luzerne
had a conference with General Washington, on
the fifteenth of September, 1789, at West Point,
with the view of bringing about such concert of
m.ovement in the American forces in the Caro-
linas and Georgia, and the Spanish forces in
Florida, as would be a check on the British in
their movements against either. * But with

Sparks, Vol. 6, p. 542.

118 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

ever\^ disposition for such co-operation, the lat-
ter being without authority to that end, went
no further than to show his sympathy with
the Spaniards, and his readiness to afford ad-
vice and information, which he afterwards man-
ifested in the letter to Miralles above mentioned.

In that letter, referring to the capture of Fort
Bute and Baton Rouge, he says : "I am happy
of the opportunity of congratulating you on the
important success of His Majesty's arms. " Itis
hardly probable, however, that General Wash-
ington would have been so ready to congratu-
late Miralles on those successes, had he known
that in consequence of Galvez's bad faith, their
result would be to increase the ranks of the foe
he was fighting.

In the beginning of March, 1780, Galvez
again began militarj^ operations, by advancing
against Fort Charlotte. On the twelfth, after
his demand for a surrender had been refused by
Captain Durnford, the British commander, the
fort was assailed by six batteries.

B}^ the fourteenth, after a conflict often days,
a practicable breach having been made, Durn-
ford capitulated upon the same terms which

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 119

Dickson had exacted at Baton Rouge. Hunger
had conspired with arms to make capitulation
a necessity. For several days before that event
the garrison had been comparatively without
food. When the gallant Durnford marched out
of the breach at the head of a handful ofhunger-
smitten men, Galvez is said to have manifested
deep mortification at having granted such
favorable terms to so feeble a foe. An effort
was made by General Campbell to relieve Fort
Charlotte, but it fell just as succor was at hand.
The delay in rendering it was occasioned by
rain storms, which, having flooded the country,
greatly impeded the movements of the reliev-
ing force. *

The gallant defense of Fort Charlotte by Durn-
ford seems to have lead Galvez to reflections
which ended in the conclusion that he was not,
then, strong enough to attack Pensacola. He,

* Von Elking, Vol. 11, pp. 144-5. " It proved a horrible
^ march. It almost continually rained. The men were forc-
ed to wade up to their ankles through the soft ground, or
through mud. It was only possible to cross the greatly
swollen streams by means of the trunks of the trees. The
men could only pass singly on them, and the one who miss-
ed his footing, and stept into the water below was irretriev-
ably lost. "

120 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

accordingly, made no further movement, until
he had procured from Havana a supply of
heavy artiller\% and a large additional force.

That it was a part of his plan to advance
upon Pensacola immediately after the capture
of Mobile, is evidenced b}' the Spanish Admiral
Solana's fleet appearing, and anchoring ofl*the
harbor, on March 27, hovering about as if in
expectation of a signal from the land until the
thirtieth, and then sailing away. The appearance
of a scouting party of Spaniards about the same
time, on the east side of the Perdido, likewise
pointed to such a design.

Be that as it mav, Galvez made no further
movement in West Florida until February, 1781,
the eventful year of the great American rally ; the
year that witnessed Morgan's brilliant victory,
on the seventeenth of January at the Cowpens;
and Green's masterly strategy, culminating on
the fifteenth of March at Guildford Court
House in an apparent defeat, but in sequence, a
victory, for it sent Cornwallis to Yorktown for
capture on the nineteenth of October.

As we contemplate that year, big with the
fate of empire on this continent, the imagina-

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 121

tion is captivated by the spectacle of a line of
battle extending from the northern limits of
Maine to ihe mouth of the Mississippi ; the in-
tense points of action being Cowpens, Guildford
Court House, Pensacola and Yorktown.

That no reinforcement was sent to General
Campbell, although the fall of Fort Charlotte
was a warning that Galvez's next effort would
be against Pensacola, manifests the strain
which Britain's contest with her colonies and
France had brought upon both her naval and
militar\^ resources. When, therefore, in Febru-
ary, 1781, Gal vez was aboutto advance against
the place with a large fleet and an army of 15,-
000 men, according to the lowest estimate, the
British force numbered about 1,000"" regular
troops, besides some provincials.

The British looked for some aid from the
Creek, Choctaw and Chickasaw Indians. It
ivas a body of the latter which drove the vSpan-
ish scouts across the Perdido shortly after the
capture of Mobile.
The three tribes were loyal to their white

*Von Elking, Vol. II., p. 152.

122 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

allies, even when the latter were no longer able
to furnish them with their customary supplies.
The Spaniards, on the other hand, with ever^'-
thing to offer them, utterly failed to shake their
British loyalty. As illustrative of their devo-
tion, it is related when the Wal decks landed at
Pensacola, the Indians, inferring from their
strange language that they were enemies, in-
clined to attack them. They had the prudence,
however, to call upon Governor Chester for an
explanation. After he had satisfactorily an-
swered the question "whether the men of
strange speech were the friends or foes of their
Great White Brother on the other side of the
big water," they inanifested great joy and hon-
ored the strangers ^with a salute from their
rifles.

When, however, the advance on Pensacola by
the Spaniards was abandoned in the spring of
1780, and thence up to the followingDecember
General Campbell found his savage allies rather
an encumbrance than a benefit. That time was
devoted to strengthening Fort George and the
defenses of the harbor, a labor in which no
reward could induce them to assist. The excit-

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 123

ing occupation of taking Spanish scalps, for
which £3* were paid, however, was one in which
they could render a barbarous service to the
British.

The Indians w^ere under the command of a
Marylander, formerly an ensign in the British
army, who, whilst stationed at Pensacola, had
been cashiered for misconduct. He afterwards
went to the Creek Nation, where he married the
daughter of a chief. Though vainly styling him-
self General William Augustus Bowles, he was
content to accept restoration to his rank of
ensign as a reward for the service, which, at the
head of his band of Creeks, Choctaws and
Chickasaws, he was expected to render to the
British during Galvez's operations in West
Florida.

In the latter months of 1780, Pensacola and
the garrison of Fort George were on the point
of starvation. All the resources of the British
government seem to have been required for the
great struggle of 1781 on the Atlantic coast,
and Galvez's conquest had cutoff the customary

Von Elking. Vol. II., p. 140.

124 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

supplies from the rich countr}' lying between
Mobile Bay and the Mississippi.

Field-preacher Stuemagel says in his journal :
*' This morning we drank water and ate a piece
of bread with it. At mid-day we had just noth-
ing to drink but water. Our evening meal con-
sists of a pipe of tobacco and a glass of water.
A ham was sold for seven dollars. A pound of
tobacco cost four dollars. A pound of coffee
one dollar. The men have long been without
rum. From hard service, and such want, dis-
eases were more and more engendered."*

But that state of want was suddenly changed
to superabundance. A British cruiser captured
in the gulf a number of merchant vessels loaded
with supplies, embracing ''rum, meal, coffee,
sugar and other welcome provisions," and an-
other exclusively with powder. f Not long
afterwards a more brilliant, although not as
useful, a prize was captured. It contained
$20,000 in coin, a large collection of silver-plate,
fine wines, "all sorts of utensils for the kitchen
and things of the same kind, being General

* Von Elking, Vol. II., p. 146.
t Id. 147.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 125

Galvez's outfit and requirements" for his in-
tended campaign of 1781.* Fortune thus
feasted and gilded the victim for the coming
sacrifice.

Having perfected the defenses of Fort George,
General Campbell turned his attention to Red
Cliff, in which, on November 19, he placed a
small garrison of 50 Waldecks, under the com-
mand of Major Pentzel, at the same time pro-
viding it with some heavy artillery, which could
be spared from Fort George.

Apparently, tired of waiting for Galvez's at-
tack, or presuming from his delay in making a
movement that he had abandoned the intention
of attacking Pensacola, General Campbell sent
an expedition against a Spanish post, on or
near the Mississippi, called French Town by
the British. The force consisted of 100 in-
fantry of the Sixtieth regiment, and 60 Wal-
deckers, besides 300 Indians, commanded by
Colonel Hanxleden, the senior officer of the
Waldecks, and next in command to General
Campbell. It was an unfortunate enterprise,

♦Von Elking, Vol. II., p. 149.

126 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

resulting in the death of the gallant Hanxleden,
as well as other veteran officers and soldiers
who were soon to be greatly needed at Pensa-
cola. In the retreat, the body of their brave
commander was borne by his men from the field
of battle to a large oak in its vicinity under the
shade of which it was buried. Gratefully did
the Waldecks, on their return to German}^ re-
member and record the chivalric conduct of
*'the gallant Spaniards who honored fallen
ofallantrv bv enclosino^ the oTave with a rail-
ing."* On January 9 the remnant of the expe-
dition reached Fort George.

On the ninth of March General Campbell's
impatient waiting for Galvez v^as brought to
a close. On that day a preconcerted signal of
seven guns from the war-ship Mentor told the
British that the Spaniards were at last ap-
proaching for the final struggle for master}^ in
West Florida. t B^^ 9 o'clock of the next morn-
ing, thirty-eight Spanish ships, under Admiral
Solana, were h^ing off the harbor, or landing
troops and artillery. During the night a British

*Von Elking, Vol. II., p. 148.
tVon Elking, Vol. II., p. 148.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 127

vessel glided out of the harbor with dispatches
to the commandant of Jamaica, pleading for
reinforcements, which however were not to lie
had, for the movements of de Grasse on the
Atlantic coast required all the attention of the
British navy, whilst Comwallis and Clinton
had drawn, or were drawing, there every avail-
able man to meet the great American rally.

On March 11, the Spaniards opened fire upon
the Mentor J then \y'mg in the harbor, from a
batterj' on Santa Rosa island. She replied to
the attack until she had received 28 shots from
twenty-four pound guns, when she retired near-
er the town.

After this affair there were no further move-
ments by the Spaniards until the eighteenth,
when a brig and two galleons, taking advan-
tage of a very favorable wind, sailed past the
batteries defending the mouth of the harbor,
without receiving any perceptible injury. Think-
ing the}' might sail up to the town, and find
cover from some structures on the beach, Gen-
eral Campbell caused them to be burned down.

On the nineteenth, the entire Spanish fleet,
excepting a few vessels, sailed past the batter-

128 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

ies, though subjected to a heavy fire from Red
Cliff, which lasted for two hours.

Galvez, even after he found himself in posses-
sion of the harbor with a fleet of 38 vessels, and
a large land force, consisting not only of troops
brought directly from Havana, but those also
with which he had captured the posts west of
the Perdido, sent to Havana for reinforcements ;
and remained inactive until they reached him
on April 16. The reinforcement consisted of
eighteen more ships, and an additional land
force, with heavy siege artillery.

Whilst awaiting that addition to his strength,
a landing was attempted. The attempt was re-
sisted by a body of Indians and a part of the
garrison of Fort George with two field pieces
ofartiller3\ The Spaniards, taken by surprise,
were driven to their boats. In the attack many
were killed, and in the confusion of re-embarking
others w^ere drowned. On April 22, however,
a second and successful attempt to land was
made by the invaders, followed by the estab-
lishment of camps where batteries were to be
erected.

One ofthe camps, nearer the Fort and the town

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 129

than the others, bj' its temerity invited rebuke.
Accordingly, a surprise for it, to be executed on
the twenty-third, was prepared, but defeated by
a fanatic. On the night of the twenty-second,
a Waldeck private reported to his captain, that
a Waldeck corporal was missing, under circum-
stances which implied desertion; that the de-
serter was a Catholic, the only one in the regi-
ment, the rest being Protestant ; and that it had
been suspected by his comrades that his fanat-
icism would lead him, on the first opportunity,
to desert to his co-religionists. That the sus-
picion was well founded was manifested by the
movements of the enemy the next morning.

The enterprise, however, though arrested, was
not abandoned. The British commander, shrewd-
ly calculating on the improbability in the ene-
my's conception, that a surprise defeated on the
twenty-third would be attempted on the twenty
fifth, actually executed the mo vement on the lat-
ter day. The attacking force, composed of apart
of the garrison, and a body of Indians, was com-
manded by the general in person. The Spaniards
were driven from their entrenchments with
considerable loss, and their works hastily de-

130 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

stroved. This proved, however, the last ag-
gressive act of the British. By the twenty-
seventh of April, batteries mounted with heavy
siege artiller}' completely invested Fort George.
On the twenty-fourth, the day before the at-
tack on theSpaniards, General Campbell learned
for the first time, that Charleston had been cap-
tured by General Clinton on the eleventh of May,
1780. We are not informed of the channel through
which the information came to him; but as it
could not have come by sea, it must have reached
him through the Indians, who obtained it, pro-
ably, from traders of the Atlantic coast. His
ignorance for nearl}^ a year of so important an
event impresses us w4th his isolation, and the
courage with which he bore it. The event was
duly celebrated in Fort George by an illumina-
tion and a discharge of rockets.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 131

CHAPTER XIV.

Fort San Bernardo— Siege of Fort George — Explosion of
Magazine — The Capitulation — The March Through the
Breach— British Troops Sail from Pensacola to Brook-
lyn.

The Spanish operations against Fort George
were conducted with extreme caution. What,
in the beginning, was one of a circle of intrench-
ments, developed into a fort as extensive and
strong as the former. Like Fort George, it was
built of earth and timber. Its position was
about one-third of a mile to the northward
of the latter. During its construction it was
hidden from observation by a dense pine forest
and undergrowth, which, after its completion,
were cleared to give play to its guns. It was
named San Bernardo, for the patron saint of
the Spanish commander.

The magnitude of San Bernardo indicated
that it must have been constructed for exigen-
cies besides that of assailing the British works.

132 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Galvez probably feared an attack in his rear
from the Indians coming to the relief of their
allies, or that he might have to encounter a
relieving expedition coming by sea. In either
event his fortress would be a place of security
for his supplies and a rallying point in case of
disaster.

The siege was a struggle between two forts,
with the advantage to one of them in being
supported by intrenchments which with itself
formed a circle around its antagonist. The
latter began the contest.

Among the works constructed by the British
to strengthen their position, was a redoubt,
named Waldeck. On April 27, a Spanish in-
trenchment was seen to be in the course of con-
struction opposite to Waldeck, under cover of
the woods. Against that intrenchment the be-
sieged directed a heavy fire, but wnth little effect,
as the work was nearly completed when discov-
ered. This attack upon the besiegers was the
signal for all their batteries to open fire upon
Fort George and its defenses.

The firing was incessant on both sides until
May 1, when that of the British was almost

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 133

entirely suspended, for the purpose of enabling
the garrison to make some indispensable repairs
on their works. On the second, however, the
British guns were again in full pla^^

But the demand for repairs was so continu-
ous and urgent as to impose a heavy tax upon
the limited numbers of the besieged. Short re-
liefs frOm dut}' became a stern necessit}-, and
Avant of rest, as well as overexertion, so im-
paired their strength that men were seen fall-
ing prostrate beside their guns from fatigue
and exhaustion.

Galvez's failure to storm the British works,
during the silence of their guns on Mav 1,
seemed to indicate his determination to reduce
the contest to the question, how long the am-
munition of the besieged would last and their
artillery remain serviceable ? He may, however,
have regarded the suspension of the British
firing as a strategem to invite an assault.

There was a vital spot in the defenses for
which the Spanish shot and shell had been
vainly seeking— the powder magazine. But as
the gunners were without requisite information
to enable them to procure its range, it was but

134? HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

a wild chance that a shell would strike it. That
its position was not drawn from the Waldeck
corporal, is an impeachment of the military
sagacity of the Spanish officers, and an act of
gross negligence which would have prolonged
the siege indefinitely, but for an imprudence of
the British commander equally as gross.

A provincial colonel for infamous conduct — of
what character we are uninformed — was drum-
med out of the Fort, instead of being, as
prudence required, carefulh^ kept within it dur-
ing the siege. The man, as should have been
expected, went to the Spaniards and informed
them of the condition of the garrison and de-
fenses, and especialh^ of the angle in which the
magazine was situated. That disclosure sealed
the fate of Fort George. Thenceforward, that
angle became the mark of every Spanish shot
and shell. For three days and nights did those
searching missiles beat upon it, until at last on
the morning of May 8, there occurred an ex-
plosion that shook Gage Hill to its deep foun-
dations as though once again in the throes of
an earthquake.

A yawning breach was made in the Fort.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 135

Fifty men were killed outright and as many
more wounded fatalh' and otherwise.

At that thunder-like signal 15,000 men are
marshalled for the assault. But there is no
panic in Fort George. Calmly the British com-
mander orders every gun to be charged, and
many to be moved so as to sweep the breach.
That work done, he hoists a white flag and
sends an officer under another to the Spanish
general with a communication, which doubtless
had been prepared in anticipation of the conjunc-
ture in which he at last found himself. It was
an offer to capitulate upon the following terms:
"The troops to march out at the breach with
fiying colors and drums beating, each man with
six cartridges in his cartridge box ; at the dis-
tance of 500 paces the arms were to be stacked;
the officers to retain their swords; all the
troops to be shipped as soon as possible, at the
cost of the Spaniards to a British port, to be
designated by the British commander, under
parole not to serve against Spain or her allies,
until an equal number of the same rank of
Spaniards, or the troops of her allies, were ex-
changed by Great Britain , and the best care to

136 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

be taken of the sick and wounded remaininjr
behind, who were to be forwarded as soon as
the}' recovered. "

Knowing that those were the terms which
the gallant Dickson and Dumford had demand-
ed and obtained at Baton Rouge and Mobile,
the spirit in which General Campbell dictated
the terms of the capitulation can be readily im-
agined. To submit to less than had been con-
ceded to his inferior officers would be dishonor.

Galvez answered, that the terms proposed
could not be conceded without modification.
General Campbell replied that no modification
was permissible ; adding, that in case they were
not conceded he would hold "the Fort to the
last man." That bold reply was followed by
the consent of Galvez to the capitulation pro-
posed by the British commander.

It would be a grateful task to record human-
it}^ or chivalry as the motive for the concession;
and it would be the duty of history to assign it,
in the absence of facts, inconsistent with such a
conclusion. But the victor, by his own confes-
sion, has precluded such a presumption.* In a

Sparks, Vol. 8, p. 175.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 137

letter of General Washington's to Don Francis-
co Rendon, agent of the Spanish government in
the United States, written at ''Headquarters
before Yorktovvn, twelfth of October, 1781,"
occurs the following: "I am obliged by the
extract of General Galvez's letter to Count de
Grasse, explaining at large the necessity he was
under of granting the terms of capitulation to
the garrison at Pensacola, which the command-
ant required. I have no doubt, from General
Galvez's well known attachment to the cause
of America, that he would have refused the arti-
cles, which have been deemed exceptionable,
had there not been very powerful reasons to
induce his acceptance of them. "

What, it may be asked, were "those very
powerful reasons? " He had an army at his
command only one thousand less in number
than General Washington had before York-
town, when he wrote the letter to Rendon; he
had ample supplies of every description ; he was
backed by a powerful fleet; he had selected
for his expedition a time when de Grasse's
movements on the Atlantic coast required
the presence, in that quarter, of the whole

138 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

British naval force on this side oi the
Atlantic; and hence, we can find no " necessity-
he was under of granting terms, " which Gen-
eral Campbell "required," unless we find it in
his want of faith in his ability by force of arms,
to compel the British commander to modify his
requirements.

In order to fully appreciate the transaction,
it should be borne in mind that there was an
understanding between Galvez and the French
commanders in America, that he should not
grant to British troops that might fall into his
power during his operations in West Florida,
such terms as would enable them to become a
part of the armies operating against the United
States.

This understanding Galvez violated at Baton
Rouge and Mobile, and again for the third
time, in conceding the terms demanded by Gen-
eral Campbell; for the articles bound the gar-
rison not to serve against Spain and her allies
only, and the United States was not her ally,
but only a sympathizer.

To say that the ''powerful reasons," to quote
from General Washington, w^ere not in Fort

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 139

George, would be to accuse Gal vez of bad faith
to his French ally, and untruth, as to the exist-
ence of any necessity for his concession to the
British.

Such being the conclusions that impartial his-
tory must draw, impressive was the spectacle
presented, on the ninth of May, 1781, upon
that hill now crowned by the monument to the
Confederate dead. In a circle around Fort
George the Spanish army stands in array. The
roll of a drum breaks the stillness, followed by
the sound of mustering in the Fort. Again as
it beats to the fife's stirring military air, the
British commander, in the dress of a major-gen-
eral, sword in hand, emerges from the breach,
followed by his less than eight hundred heroes.
Proudly does the gallant band step the five hun-
dred paces; then successively come the orders to
halt, fall into line, and stack arms.

The scene would have thrilled the heart of
every soldier whose memory is consecrated by
the shaft that springs from that historic hill,
then the centre of a landscape, whence, north-
ward, the e3^e could rest on a limitless expanse
of verdure; eastward and westward upon the

140 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

far-sweeping curves of the shore ; southward
upon the glorious mirror of the Bay, with the
hills of Santa Rosa rising out of the blue waters
like snow-clad peaks above the azure of a dis-
tant horizon, and far beyond them upon the
tremulous sky-line of the heaving gulf.

The formal signing of the articles of capitula-
tion in the Council Chamber of Fort George,
which occurred on the ninth of Ma^^, immediate-
ly before the British marched out, was antici-
pated in a former page.

On June the fourth the British troops sailed for
Havana, where the^^ arrived on the fourteenth
of the same month ; and thence the same vessels
transported them to Brooklyn. A further ad-
dition was made to the strength of the British,
by the garrisons of Baton Rouge and Fort
Charlotte, which after many obstacles, and
several voyages from point to point, finally
reached Brooklyn about the time the Pensacola
troops arrived there.. And thus, in consequence
of Galvez's breach of faith, a force of 1,200 vet-
erans, with their gallant officers, was added to
the British army.

It was doubtless this accession of British

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 141

strength, at New York, in that rallying year,
when each side required every available man,
that caused de Grasse to complain to the Span-
ish government of the capitulation at Pensa-
cola, and called forth the apology of Galvez
referred to by General Washington in his letter
to Rendon.

142 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

CHAPTER XV.

Political Aspect of the Capitulation — Treaty of Versailles —
English Exodus — Widow of the White House.

The terms of the surrender of Fort George, as
stated in the previous chapter, present the
strictl}^ military side of the capitulation. But
there was also a political aspect to the formal
articles, signed on the ninth of May, by General
Campbell, Governor Chester, and General Gal-
vez. West Florida was surrendered to Spain,
and it was stipulated, that ''the British inhabi-
tants, or those who may have been subjects oi
the King of Great Britain in said countries,
may retire in full security, and may sell their
estates, and remove their effects as well as their
persons ; the time limited for their emigration
being fixed at the space of eighteen months. "

It was that political feature of the capitula-
tion which made Governor Chester's signature
necessary, and to that it related exclusively.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 143

That of General Campbell referred to the strictly
military- stipulations only. In the former we
may find one of General Galvez's inducements
to submit to the British general's ''require-
ments."

The object of the Spanish government in di-
recting the invasion of West Florida was to per-
manently regain the territory which Spain had
surrendered to Great Britain in 1763 ; and in
addition, to obtain that part of Louisiana on
the Gulf of Mexico which the latter had acquired
from France. Consequently, the large expedition
so long in preparing against Pensacola, and so
disproportionate to the mere capture of the
place, was intended for colonization, as w^ell as
conquest. Such being the policy of his govern-
ment, Galvez necessarily subordinated all other
considerations to its achievement. Accordingly,
his overwhelming numbers designed to over-
awe opposition ; his ponderous siege artillery
intended to batter Fort George into ruins with-
out danger to the town; avoidance of all move-
ments by his fleet against it as well as all injury
to it by his artillery during the siege ; and, lastly,
the article above quoted pointed to the coloni-

14-4? HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

zation of a Spanish population, for the accommo-
dation of which the English homes were [to be
vacated, and their inmates forced into exile. If
that object could be obtained by the capitula-
tion, there was nothing within the lines of Span-
ish policy to be gained by taking Fort George
bv storm, at the fearful sacrifice of human life
which it would have cost. The French might,
indeed, complain that the agreement with them
respecting British troops in Florida was vio-
lated by conceding the terms demanded by
General Campbell ; but diplomacy, the science of
excuses and pretexts, would be equal to the task
of satisfying them. As to the Americans, it was of
little consequence to Spain that General Clinton's
forces would be strengthened by the reinforce-
ment of the Florida troops, albeit at a con-
juncture when every available man was required
to sustain Britain's tottering North American
empire. For though Spain became an ally of
France in order to place herself in a position to
claim a fragment of that empire when it fell, yet
her purpose was to attain that end with the
least possible inconvenience or sacrifice to her-
self.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 145

That General Washington was satisfied with
the apology of Galvez made through de Grasse
may well be doubted. His dignity, however,
forbade complaint. Besides, the promise violated
was made to the French; if they were satisfied,
respect for them imposed silence upon the Ameri-
cans. But there is in the paragraph of the letter
to Rendon, before quoted, a vein of irony, the
sting of which, coming from such a man, Galvez
must have keenly felt.

As already intimated, the above quoted pro-
vision of the capitulation became substantially
the Fifth Article of the treaty between Great
Britain and Spain, signed on the twenty-eighth
of January, 1783, at Versailles.''

The condition in which that treaty placed the
Florida-English was peculiar. Spain was not
opposed to foreigners living in her colonies, pro-
vided they were Catholics ; and it was well un-
derstood, that any English who were, or should
become, such would be at liberty to remain in
Florida in the full enjoyment of their liberty
and property. t

♦White's Recopilacion, Vol. 11. , p.298.
fWhite's Recopilacion, Vol. II., p. 301.

146 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

History does not afford a more striking con-
trast between the conduct of two nations under
similar circumstances, to the honor of one, and
the reproach of the other, than that between
Spain and Great Britain, as they are presented
b^' the treaties of Paris and Versailles. In the
former, Spanish subjects were secured in their
persons, religion, liberty and property. In the
latter. Great Britain virtually stipulated for the
banishment of hers, and the confiscation of their
estates. The privilege of selling their property
within eighteen months was but a mockery; for
purchasers were not only few, but \veil aware,
likewise, that a trifling consideration would in
the end be preferable to a total sacrifice.

The British government professed to compen-
sate the victims of her policy ; but her justice
was confined to those whose claims upon it
were the slightest; to the absentees owning
large tracts of land which had been granted by
the crown, and who did not see fit to go to the
provinces to attempt to effect sales. *But no
indemnity was provided for those who had

*Id. p. 300.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 147

made their homes in the provinces, under
the gilded representations and inviting promises
of their governors in the name of His Protestant
Majest}', George HI., Defender of the Faith,

The conduct of Spain in this matter is hardly
censurable, when it is remembered that it oc-
curred in an age of religious intolerance. She was
a Catholic power and wanted no Protestant
subjects. Her own had left Florida in 1763, as
soon as the Spanish flag was lowered. In the
articles of capitulation and the treaty of 1783
she had enforced her traditional policy. And
to her credit, be it said, that she did not enforce
banishment and confiscation after eighteen
months had expired under the former ; and when
that period had elapsed under the latter, she
granted an extension of four months. Great
Britain, on the other hand, in ^-ielding to Spain's
demands was false to her faith, false to hertra"
ditions, and false to that boasted principle of
her constitution that her aegis covers every
Englishman, in every land.

Eighteen months is but a fleeting span to a
people, when it is but a respite from confisca-
tion and exile, avoidable only by apostasy.

148 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Of the heartaches of the exodus of the Florida-
English we have an illustration in the widow
of the White House. She had lived out the
eighteen months under the capitulation, and
the like period under the treaty, when the ex-
tension came to her like a respite to the con-
demned.

Those four months embraced the days and
nights of her struggle in the toils of temptation,
foreshadowed in a previous page. Can she leave
that home, consecrated by the graves of her hus-
band and her child ; that home where every ob-
ject, tree, vine, shrub, sea, sky, and the very
wild violets at her feet, brought up hallowed as-
sociations and sacred memories which made them
all parts of her very being ? No ! The surrender
would be at the cost of as many bleeding heart
strings. There is, however, an escape in apos-
tasy. She has but to signify her wish to re-
nounce her faith; that faith, however, with which
she had consoled a dying husband, and in w^hich
she had buried a darling child. Home triumphs.
The governor is notified.

Time wanes to the day of sacrifice. The bell
tolls the sacrificial hour. The priest stands at

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 149

the altar ready for the offering. But the vic-
tim fails the tryst. Faith triumphs. The bonds
of temptation are snapped. Turning her back
upon home, she goes forth an exile; crowned,
we may well believe, with the promise to all the
true of every creed who leave ** lands" and
''houses" for His name's sake, to swell the
mighty host of woman martyrs ; time's woeful
harvest of blighted lives and broken hearts;
victims of man's ambitions, his wars, his poli-
cies, and his laws.

150 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

CHAPTER XYI.

Boundary Lines — William Panton and Spain — Indian Trade
— Indian Ponies and Traders — Business of Panton,
Leslie & Co.

The treaty of Versailles re-adjusted the brok-
en circle of Spain's empire on the shores of the
Gulf of Mexico, by restoring to it the segment
taken from it by d'Iberville's settlement, as well
as that cut from it by the Treaty of Paris in
1763.

But British West Florida was not in its en-
tirety acquired by Spain . By the Treaty of Paris
of the third day of September, 1783, acknowl-
edging the independence of the United States,
the 31° parallel of north latitude was made the
southern limit of the latter from the Mississippi
river to the Appalachicola. Thence the boundary
line was that river up to the Flint, thence in a
straight line to the head waters of the St. Mary's
and down that river to the Atlantic ocean. The

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 151

Treaty of Versailles, on the other hand, made
that line the northern boundary of the territory
ceded to Spain. Those treaties therefore cut oflf
a huge slice from British West Florida.

But, even within that narrow strip of terri-
tory, Pensacola lost its primacy ; for in the es-
tablishment of the Spanish colonial governments
within it, the Perdido was made the western
limit of West Florida. Pensacola was, there-
fore, .by that arrangement placed geographic-
ally in reference to boundary lines as it stands
to-day; the result, as before shown, of d'Arriola
having: made his settlement three vears before
the advent of d 'Iberville to the gulf coast.

Those territorial changes dealt a withering
blow to Pensacola. Instead of being the capital
of a province, bounded by the Mississippi and
the Chattahoochee, and a line from one to the
other some miles north of Montgomery, it be-
came but the chief town of a narrow strip of
wilderness between the Perdido and the Appa-
lachicola rivers. Lately regarded and fostered as
the future commercial base on the gulf of Brit-
ain's North American empire, it now became a
garrison town, valued by Spain as only an out-

152 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

post to guard against encroachments by other
powers on the shores of a sea over which she
sought supremac3\

Left to Spanish influences exclusively, it must
have rapidly dwindled to the condition, com-
mercially at least, in which Captain Wills found
it in 1763. But from that fate it was saved
by two men who have already been introduced
to the reader.

The narrow religious prejudices of the Spanish
court demanded the banishment of all Protes-
tant British under the Fifth Article of the Treaty
of Versailles ; and they were rigidly obeyed by
colonial officials with one exception. They knew
that to banish William Panton was to insure
for the town the fate above indicated, and they
were equally aware that his presence w^ould be
more effective in the preservation of the peace of
the provinces than a large military force, owing
to his influence over Alexander McGillivray, and
of the latter's over the powerful Creek Indians.
Indeed, it is unquestionable, that without those
influences, the Spanish government could not
have been maintained in West Florida. But it
would have been idle to hope that a man who

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 153

had been loyal to an earthly monarch, under
pain of confiscation and banishment, would in-
cur the guilt of apostasy from a faith that was
to him, at least, the symbol of allegiance to the
King of Kings. Accordingly, the religious test
was waived as to him, and for it was substituted
an oath of allegiance to the Spanish King, whilst
his residence and influence were secured by means
the most inviting to his interest and flattering
to his pride.

A treaty was entered into with him, as a
quasi-sovereign, securing his firm in all its pos-
sessions and rights, and bestowing upon its
houses at Pensacola, Mobile and Appalachee a
monopoly of the Indian trade. For these con-
cessions the firm became the financial agent of
the government at those points, and bound to
wield its influence in promoting peace and good
will between the Spaniards and the Indians.

The stipulations on both sides were faithfully
fulfilled. At one time Spain was indebted to the
firm in the sum of $200,000 for advances, and
the debt was afterwards faithfullv discharsred.
In humiliating contrast with the honor and
fidelity which marked the dealings of the Scotch-

15-4 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

men and Spaniards with each other, is the fol-
lowing advice of an American agent, James Sea-
graves, *to his government. "I think if the
Spanish court were pushed in the business they
will readily sacrifice Panton & Co., especially
as they owe the concern $200,000 for Indian
supplies."

This advice was given at a time when com-
plications had arisen between the Spanish gov-
ernment of Florida and the United States, grow-
ing out of the energetic struggle of the Atlantic
Indian traders to divert the Creek trade from
Pensacola to Charleston and Savannah. The
step suggested was, in effect, to transfer a com-
mercial contest from the Indian wilds to Mad-
rid, where an American minister was Expected
to perform the degrading task of attempting to
induce the Spanish court to commit a fraud
upon agents who had served it so long and
faithfully, as well as to violate all its other
obligations to them.

Panton, Leslie & Co. were engaged in that
trade at Charleston and Savannah long before

•American State Papers, Vol. III. p. 311.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 155

the American revolution ; a trade which, even
then, extended through the Coosa country in
the heart ofthe Creek nation. With a full knowl-
edge of it, in all its details, they established
themselves at Pensacola with a view of draw-
ing a part of it there. This was the beginning
of the commercial struggle which is continued
to this day, between the gulf and Atlantic ports
for the trade of Central Alabama. It began
with the Indian ponies as a means of transporta-
tion ; it is carried on now by the steam horse ;
and a future generation may see it continued by
electricity.

The pony used by the trader was a strong,
hardy little creature, which with ease carried
one hundred and eighty pounds and travel-
ed twenty-five miles a day. The rich and abun-
dant pasturage in those times enabled him to
supply himself with sufficient food at noon and
at night to meet his requirements. There was
often oddity in his load. It might be a minia-
ture chickenhouse, or two kegs of taffi, hung to
his sides, with a pack of merchandise on his
back; or two pendant firkins of honey-comb,

156 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

with a pile of hides, skins, or beeswax towering
between.

One driver for ten animals was the usual pro-
portion of man and beast. The companies were
generally from five to ten, making a long line of
march, following the main and lateral trails
mentioned in a previous chapter. But as all
the Indian settlements were visited, their move-
ments could not always be on the ridge. Some-
times creeks and rivers had to be crossed. On
such occasions, when the stream was not ford-
able with safety to the packs, they were ferried
over on rafts composed of logs or masses of
matted cane, guided where the current was
strong by a grapevine rope stretched across the
stream.

Regarded by their savage customers as friends,
who came periodically to administer to their
wants, and gratify their taste for taffi, the
traders made their journeys in perfect security.
Like their class everywhere, they were joyous
men, full of fun and jokes, news and gossip, to
which full play was given, under the spur of a
cup of taffi, when caravans met.

Beside the trade thus carried on, there was one

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 157

equally as great, if not greater, carried on by the
Indians themselves, without the intervention of
the traders. The business required Panton,
Leslie & Co. to keep up a stock of $50,000 at
least, and a large corps of clerks to wait on
their savage customers.

Other business sprung up and brought popu-
lation. Sawmills were erected, brickyards opened
and a t any ard established, which added leather
to the exports of the town.

Such were the fruits of William Panton's pres-
ence in the province. Idle, however, would have
been his labor, his wealth and talents, though
backed by the Spanish Government, but for the
co-operation of McGillivray. Had the great
Chief pointed his long, slender finger to Savan-
nah and Charleston as the sources of supply for
his people, the commercial life of Pensacola
would have withered and perished like a tree
girdled by the woodman's axe.

158 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

CHAPTER XVII.

Lineage of Alexander McGillivray — His Education— Made
Grand Chief— His Connection with Milfort— His Rela-
tions with William Panton — His Administration of
Creek Affairs— Appointed Colonel by the British-
Treaty with Spain— Commissioned Colonel by the
Spanish — Invited to New York by Washington— Treaty
— Commissioned a Brigadier-General b^' the United
States— His Sister, Sophia Durant— His Trials— His
Death at Pensacola.

The people who have been called Creeks in
previous pages, received that name after their
settlement in Alabama and Georgia ; a name, it
is said, they derived from the number and
beauty of the streams or creeks of the country
they inhabited. Before that the^^ were known
as Muscogees according to English, and Otho-
mis or Otomies, according to Castilian orthog-
raph3\

Their original seat was in northern Mexico.
They were a warlike and independent tribe,
which, though lacking the comparative civiliza-

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 159

tion of the Aztecs and the Tlascalans, had yet
received some ra^^s of its light. Thej^ had been
confederates of the latter in their conflicts for
existence with the former. They had afterwards
aided in the defence of Tlascala against Cortez.
Surviving warriors, however, carried back to
their people such accounts of that field of
slaughter, and the prowess of the foe, who seem-
ed to be armed with supernatural weapons,
that the tribe became panic-stricken, and in a
council, resolved upon a flight beyond the reach
of the invincible invader. The determination
was promptly put into execution.

The entire tribe, bearing off its movable effects,
took its line of march in an easterly' course.
After a journey which consumed many months,
they found themselves on the head waters of
Red river. Reaching that river, and following
it, they at length found a suitable place for a
settlement, where thev felt thev were sufficient-
ly remote from the terrible foe who had inspired
their flight. There they accordingly' establish-
ed themselves, and remained for several 3'ears.
Abandoning that settlement, they proceeded
northward to the Missouri, thence to the Mis-

160 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

sissipi, and from there moved to the Ohio. That
progress, however, was not by a continuous
march, but by periodic advances, interrupted
by settlements more or less long, and marked
by conflicts with other tribes, in which, accord-
ing to their traditions, they were always victo-
rious.

They must have been living on the banks of
the Ohio, when Soto made his devastating march
through the Creek country which was after-
wards to be their home. There they must have
been likewise, when de Luna made his explora-
tions, and noted the sparseness of population,
and abandoned fields as before narrated ; or,
perhaps, they were then making one of their in-
termittent advances southward, which were to
bring them eventually to the Coosa, Tallapoosa,
and Chattahoochee.

Like other Mexican tribes, the Muscogees
were divided into septs or fratries, the most
notable of them being those of the Ho-tal-gee,
or the Wind, the Tiger, the Bear, and the Eagle.
In the first, however, resided the primacy, or
hegemony of the tribe.

The traditions of their Mexican origin and em-

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 161

igration, collected by Le Clerc Milfort under the
most favorable conditions, as will be seen here-
after, are fortified by their form of government,
with its dual executive for civil and military
affairs ; their glimmer of civilization, as well as
their federative tendency.

Soon after their settlement in the Creek
country, they are found absorbing other tribes;
not by enslavement or incorporation, but as
confederates. They had their national councils,
composed of the principal chiefs of the confeder-
acy, and suitable buildings at fixed places for
their accommodation. The head of the confeder-
acy for civil affairs was the Grand Chief, as the
Tustenuggee, or Great Warrior, was for war.
They also had Town Governments, the Chief of
each being the Micco, an elective officer, and not
a King, as often misrepresented. Each town
had its council house, in which local affairs were
administered.

The Grand Chief of the Muscogees held the
position, and exercised the functions which
recent criticism has assigned to Montezuma, as
the head of the Aztec confederacy, to whom the
Spaniards erroneously gave the title, and attrib-

162 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

uted the powers of an emperor, in accordance
with their own habits of thought, as the sub-
jects of an emperor.

The Indian trade that existed between the
Creeks and the Atlantic coast, which has
alread}' been mentioned, was an inviting field
to cupidity and enterprise, and many were the
young adventurers from the old world who en-
gaged in it soon after their landing at Charles-
ton or Savannah. Some of them, too, fasci-
nated by the wild life of the forest, made them-
selves homes in the Creek nation, and found
wives amongst the Creek maidens, who in form,
feature and habits, w^ere superior to those of
other tribes.

Amongst those adventurous spirits w^as
Lachlan McGillivray, a youth of good Scotch
family, of Dumglass, Scotland. A few years
found him a successful trader. On one of his
visits to the Hickory Ground, a prominent
Creek town on the Coosa, situated near the
present site of Wetumpka, Alabama, he became
acquainted with Sehoy Marchand, a young
woman w^hose mother was a full blood of the Ho-
tal-gee, or Wind family, and whose father was a

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 163

French captain who had been murdered by mu-
tineers at Fort Toulouse, a few miles from Hick-
ory Ground. That meeting resulted in marriage.
Shortly afterward, McGillivray made a hom.e,
and established a trading house, not far from
where he had first met his Indian wife.

Of that marriage, Alexander McGillivray was
the first born, Sophia the next, and Jenette the
third.

The father became exceedingly^ prosperous,
partly in consequence of his alliance with the
chief family of the Creeks, and in a few years
found himself the owner of two plantations on
the Savannah river. His trading journeys,
however, still had their attractions for him.
When Alexander was fourteen years old he in-
duced his wife to let the boy go with him to
Charleston, and remain there to be educated.
After having been instructed sufficiently for the
purpose, he was placed in a counting-house;
but having acquired a taste for learning, that
occupation became intolerable to him. His
father, accordingly, determined to yield to the
bent of the boy's mind, and found him a highly
educated teacher in a clergyman of Charleston.

164 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

With that assistance, and sedulous application,
he became a Greek and Latin scholar, and
besides, made rapid and extensive progress in
other departments of knowledge. He appears
to have been a student up to the age of thirty,
which he reached about the year 1776. In that
year he left Charleston, an educated man, to
return to his people, whom he, a little semi-sav-
age of fourteen, had left sixteen years before.
The impelling motive to that movement prob-
ably was, that being like his father, a loyalist
residence in a rebel colony was no longer agree-
able. Possibly, however, he had purposely
deferred his return to the Indian nation until
he had arrived at such an age as would justify
him in looking to the position of Grand Chief.
But, be that as it may, the time for his return
was judiciously chosen, and consistently with
that sagacity which characterized his whole life,
of acting opportunely in all exigencies.

The white settlers of Georgia were beginning to
press through what the Creeks claimed as their
frontier; and to that pressure was added the
hostility engendered by the revolution, now in its
second year, against any semblance of favor to

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 165

the enemies of the patriotic cause. The West
Florida-English and their government were on
the most friendly terms with the Creeks ; and
that in itself was sufficient to beget hostility to
the latter on the part of the Whigs of Georgia
and the Carolinas. This was a new and com-
plex condition of things to the Creeks, present-
ing questions for solution with which their
great council felt its inability to deal. To
whom could they look for guidance? They
knew no disinterested advice could come from
the government at Pensacola, and it v^ould be
folly to seek counsel from the Georgians, who
regarded them as enemies because they desired
to be neutrals, living in peace between hostile
communities, engaged in a conflict in which the
Indian could feel no interest.

It was just at this juncture that Alexander
McGillivray found himself amongst his people.
Long and impatiently had the}' awaited the
advent of the representative of the Ho-tal-gee,
the grand chieftan, who for so man\' years had
been studying that wisdom of the white man,
which made him the Indian's superior; that
wisdom which now acquired by him, was to be

166 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

exercised for the salvation of his people. Great,
therefore, was the satisfaction produced by the
advent of such a disinterested counselor and
^uide.

He is hardly well within the nation before a
grand council is called at Coweta, on the Chat-
tahoochee, over which he was to preside, and
formally assume the hegemony of the Ho-tal-
gee.

To a thoughtful mind there is a pathos in
this scene which appeals to every generous
nature ! It comes like the despairing appeal of
infancy to manhood for help ! It is the ignor-
ance of the savage stretching out its supplicat-
ing hands to the white man's wisdom as his
only refuge.

One of the most striking powers which Mc-
Gillivray possessed, was his ability to win and
retain the childlike confidence of his people, and
thereby exercise boundless control over them.
He was not a soldier, or a man of blood, in any
sense of the term. He was essentially a states-
man and a diplomat. The conquests of peace
only had any fascination for him. His ambition
was to save and civilize his people. That such

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 167

a man should bend to his will in the paths of
peace a numerous population of warlike sav-
ages, to whom the war-whoop was music, and
scalping the most inviting pastime, is a domi-
nation over brute instincts of which history
contains very few examples.

A remarkable instance of that influence occur-
red shortly after the council at Coweta. He
there made the acquaintance of LeClercMilfort,
mentioned in a previous page ; an adventurous
Frenchman, highly educated, and possessing
military qualities of no ordinary kind, as well
as bodily strength and endurance equal to any
exertion. Their mental culture was a mutual
attraction.

Milfort went with him from Coweta to Hick-
ory Ground, the home of McGillivray's child-
hood, where his mother and his sisters Sophia
and Jenette were living. He at once entered
into Creek life, and united his fortunes with
McGillivray's. The bright e3^es of Jenette
were not long in winning Milfort 's heart, nor
was there much delay in his winning hers. The}'
were married. By the marriage he acquired
great consideration amongst the Creeks.

16S HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

As previously remarked, McGillivray was not
a soldier himself; but as a wise ruler, he felt the
necessity of having an able commander in war,
when the exigenc^^ for it arose. Moreover, his
policy as a civilized ruler, was to have war con-
ducted b\" a civilized leader, who might by his
example and influence, control the brutal
instincts of his savage forces. Milfort w^as the
man for the place. An obstacle to his appoint-
ment, seemingly insuperable, however, existed.
The office of Tustenuggee was an honor to
which the Indian braves looked as the highest
attainable; and presumptively, they would re-
fuse their consent that this coveted prize should
be conferred upon a stranger. But, that stranger
had married a Ho-tal-gee, and itw^asthe wish of
the Grand Chief that he should receive it. It
was, accordingly, conferred upon Milfort with
the sanction of the tribe.

McGillivray soon attracted the attention of the
British government at Pensacola, as well as that
of the British officers in Georgia, with whom he
carried on an extensive correspondence. They
at once saw that it would be impossible for
him to keep the Creeks in a state of neutrality,

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 169

founded, as it must be, upon good feeling for
each of two bitter foes, marked by such strict
in^partiaHty of conduct as to avoid any ground
of exception b}^ either belHgerent. McGilHvray's
judgment soon led him to the same conclusion;
a conclusion which imposed upon him the ne-
cessity of choosing one of the belligerents for the
all}^ of his people. He, accordingly, decided in
favor of a British alliance, for which the reasons
were too obvious for hesitation.

The Americans could reach his people upon
one frontier only, and even then their attention
w^ould be distracted by their contest with the
British. The British, on the other hand, could
without danger of interference, assail the Creeks
from Pensacola; and in case they crushed, the
Georgians would be at liberty to attack them
from the east. But, although he sided with the
British, it was with the secret resolution that
the alliance should be maintained at the least
possible sacrifice to his people. His policy was,
not to permit their spirit to be broken, or their
numbers diminished, b3' entering with their full
strength into a conflict with which they had
no concern. Nor would he permit them to

170 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

inflict such extensive injuries upon Georgia as
would be a barrier to future reconciliation.

In order to spur the Creeks to great efforts
against the Americans, Tait, a British colonel,
was stationed on the Coosa; and at the same
time McGillivray received from the British gov-
ernment the commission and pay of colonel in
its service. But both expedients proved in-
effectual to materially change the policy the lat-
ter had adopted. Raids, it is true, were made
upon the Georgians, necessarily attended by
some blood-shed and rapine, but they were lim-
ited in number, character, and consequence, by
the mental reservation with which McGillivray
had entered into the British alliance. With that
limited exertion, however, the British were fain
to be content, as it was better for them than
strict neutrality, and still more so than the hos-
tility of such a powerful tribe directed against
themselves.

Milfort was the commander intrusted with
the expeditions against the Georgia settlements;
and, doubtless, being fully aware of the con-
servative policy of the Grand Chief, he made
every effort to observe it. A Frenchman, of his

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 171

ability, was the very man to make such a show
of warfare as would impose on the British, and
at the same time to render it so barren in
results as to make but a transient impression
upon those against whom it was directed.
That a man should have been selected so emi-
nently qualified to execute such a singular task,
affords the highest evidence of the capacity of
the mind that made the selection. Such ability,
is, indeed, after all, the surest test of the capac-
ity of a ruler.

Though a band of the Creeks, as already men-
tioned, assisted the British at the time of Gal-
vez's operations against Pensacola, it is re-
markable, that neither McGillivray, who was a
colonel in the British army, nor Milfort, the
Great War Chief, seem to have taken any part
in the contest. Such a force as could have been
raised by the Creeks and their confederate
tribes, could have rendered great service to the
British in resisting, if not, indeed, in defeating
Galvez's invasion. But an explanation is
readily found in the Grand Chiefs policy of
preventing his people from taking any large
part in the quarrels and conflicts of the whites.

172 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Besides, he was doubtless impressed with the
smallness of the British force in West-Florida,
compared with the host the Spaniards had at
their command; justifying the conclusion, that
as the latter had been able to conquer the coun-
try west, they would prove equal to the con-
quest of that east of the Perdido. He, therefore,
wisely refrained from such an interference as
would array the Spaniards against his people,
after they had expelled the British from the
country. If the British proved victorious, the
assistance rendered by the Creeks, aided by the
Choctaws and Chickasaws, could be urged as
the fulfillment of the obligations of an ally.
On the other hand, if the Spaniards were suc-
cessful, it was an easy matter to disavow the
action of an adventurer like Bowles, at the head
of a handful of Creeks and other Indians, as
one in which the tribe had no concern ; an expla-
nation the more acceptable, as the conqueror
would naturally seek to cultivate the like
friendly relations with the Indians which the
conquered had enjoyed.

Soon after McGillivray became Grand Chief
of his tribe, he met William Panton at Pensa-

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 173

cola. Panton was deeply impressed with his
ability. It is probable, too, that he was ac-
quainted with the elder McGillivray, and sym-
pathized with him as a fellow victim, who, like
himself, had suffered banishment and confisca-
tion, for no other crime than loyalty to their
King. That sympathy with the parent natur-
ally inspired good will toward the son. But,
aside from such a sentimental consideration,
each soon discovering the great advantage he
could be to the other, it was not long before
they were united by the more practical bonds
of mutual interests. McGillivray likewise saw
great advantages to his peojjle in dealing exclu-
sively with a house of such great w^ealth and
influence as that of Panton, Leslie & Co., whilst
Panton was as quick to see, that by the man-
agement of the Grand Chief the firm could secure
a monopol}^ of the entire Indian trade. It w^as
immediately after this understanding between
them was reached, that they had that meeting
with Governor Chester in the Council Chamber
of Fort George, of which a glimpse was had in
a previous page.
The war in Georgia and South Carolina had

174 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

cut off the Creek trade with the Atlantic coast;
and consequently, McGillivray had no difficulty
in directing the whole of it to Pensacola. But
after peace was established, the Atlantic traders
were again ready, with their pack ponies, to
take the trails that led to western Georgia
and eastern Alabama. Panton at once saw .
that the monopoly of his house was in danger;
and that to avert it, he must bring about an
understanding between the Spanish govern-
ment, himself, and McGillivray, like that which
he had previously effected with the British. He,
accordingly, entered into the treaty with the
Spaniards, of which mention was made in the
previous chapter. To be effective, however, he
knew that treaty must be supplemented by
another between the Indians and the Spaniards.
In playing his cards, Panton was looking
solely to the advantage of his house. But it
was far otherwise with McGillivray^ If he in-
duced his people to make such a treaty, it was
because he saw clearly it w^as to their advan-
tage. He rejoiced, too, to find that he w^as
about to reap the fruit of that policy by which
he had brought them through the period of the

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 175

Revolutionarv War, stronger, and more numer-
ous than they ever were before; a condition
which excited the fears of the Spaniards, and
disposed them to seek the alHance of such a
powerful tribe b\" Hberal concessions. Accord-
ingly, a treaty between the Creeks and the Sem-
inoles represented by McGillivra^^ and Spain
by Governor Miro of New Orleans, assisted by
O'Niell, Governor of West-Florida, and Don
Martin Navarro, Intendent General of Florida,
was entered into on the first of June, 1784?, at
Pensacola. ^ The relations created b\' that
treaty between the Indians and Spaniards were
close and intimate, and seem to have been
observed substantially, although not alwaj^s
in form, up to the last day of Spanish rule in
Florida.

Its conclusion was followed b\' McGillivra}'
obtaining a commission with the pa}' of Colonel
in the Spanish army.

By that treaty he felt, as he had reason to
feel, that he had secured for his tribe an alliance
with a strong European power, one that had

* American State Papers, Vol. 10, pp. 223-227

176 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

just expelled the British from the Floridas;
and, that thus fortified, he was in a condition
to meet the Americans on the eastern frontier
in a manner that would prevent their threaten-
ed encroachment upon the rights of his people ;
not by war, however, in which the Creeks were
to engage with the United States, for such a
course, his judgment told him, would end in
their destruction. His treaty with the Span-
iards was but a card which he proposed to use,
to give his nation the imposing aspect of one to
be courted rather than despised. To render its
attitude still more imposing, he announced his
determination to prevent any further encroach-
ments by the whites upon the Indian territory
in Georgia.

These cards won the game, according to the
calculations of the sagacious brain which con-
ceived it. The United States met the threaten-
ing aspect of affairs in Georgia, by appointing
commissioners in 1785, to treat with the
Indians. One of them, Andrew Pickens, ad-
dressed a letter to McGillivray, expressing the
w^ish of the government amicably '*to adjust
matters on an equitable footing. " This was

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 177

the point for the attainment of which the treaty
with the Spaniards, and the threats of hostility
against the Georgians had been made. For it
was the strength of the Creeks, which his poH-
cy had so successfully fostered in the midst of
war, backed by the Spanish alliance, that in-
duced the United States, exhausted by the Rev-
olutionary struggle, to resort to peaceable means
to avoid a conflict with such a powerful tribe.

The reply of McGilli vray so clearly illustrates
his profound policy, which previous pages have
endeavored to unfold as the moving spring of
all his actions as Grand Chief, that it must be
given in extenso, especially as any attempt to
present it by extracts would prove a mutilation
in which its force would be impaired, if not
destroyed.

Little Tallasee, 5th Sept., 1785.

Sir:— I am favored with A'our letter by Brandon, who,
after detaining it near a month, sent it by an Indian, a few
days ago. He, perhaps, had some reasons for keeping him-
self from this region.

The notification you have sent us is agreeable to our
wishes, as the meetin^is intended for the desirable purpose
of adjusting and settling matters, on an equitable footing,
between the United States and the Indian nations. .\t the

178 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

same time, I cannot avoid expressing m3'' surprise that a
measure of this nature should have been so long dela^-ed,
on 3'our part. When we found that the American Independ-
ence was confirmed by the peace, we expected that the new
government would soon have taken some steps to makeup
the difierences that subsisted between them and the Indians
during the war; to have taken them under their protection,
and confirmed to them their hunting-grounds. Such a course
would have reconciled the minds of the Indians and secured
the States their friendship, as thev considered j'our people
their natural allies. The Georgians, whose particular in-
terest it was to conciliate the friendship of this nation, have
acted, in all respects, to the contrar3% I am sorr)' to
observe that violence and prejudice have taken the place of
good policy and reason, in all their proceedings with us.
They attempted to avail themselves of our supposed dis-
tressed situation. Their talks to us breathe nothing but
vengeance, and, being entireW possessed with the idea, that
we were w^holly at their mercj', they never once reflected
that colonies of a powerful monarch were nearly surround-
ing us, to whom, in an extremity, we might apply for
succor and protection, and who, to answer some ends of
their policy, might grant it to us. However, we yet deferred
any such proceeding, still expecting that we could bring
them to a true sense of their interest ; but still finding no
alteration in their conduct towards us, we sought the pro-
tection of Spain, and treaties of friendship and alliance
were mutually entered into— they guaranteeing our hunt-
ing-grounds and territory, and granting us a free trade in
the ports of the Floridas.
How the boundarv and limits between the Spaniards ani

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 179

the States will be determined a little time will show, as I
believe that matter is now on foot. However, we know
our limits, and the extent of our hunting-grounds. As a
free nation, we have applied, as we had the right to do, for
protection, and obtained it. We shall pay no attention to
any limits that may prejudice our claims, that were drawn
by an American and confirmed by a British negotiator.
Yet, notwithstanding we have been obliged to adopt these
measures for our preservation, and from real necessity, we
sincereh' wish to have it in our power to be on the same
footing with the States as before the late unhappy war, to
eflfect which is entireh* in your power. We ^vant nothing
from you but justice. We want our hunting-grounds pre-
served from encroachments. Thej' have been ours from the
beginning of time, and I trust that, with the assistance of
our friends, we shall be able to maintain them against every
attempt that ma\' be made to take them from us.

Finding our representations to the State of Georgia of no
effect, in restraining their encroachments, we thought it
proper to call a meeting of the nation, on the subject. We
then came to the resolution to send our parties to remove
the Georgians and their effects from the lands in question,
in the most peaceful manner possible.

Agreeably to your requisition, and to convince you of mj'
sincere desire to restore a good understanding between us,
I have taken the necessary steps to prevent any future pre-
datorj' excursions of my j^eople against an\' of your settle-
ments. I could wish the people of Cumberland showed an
equal good disposition to do what is right. The\' were
certainly the first aggressors, since the peace, and acknowl-

180 historicXl sketches of

edged it in a written certificate, left at the Indian camp
they had plundered.

I have only to add, that we shall meet the commissioners
of Congress whenever we shall receive notice, in expectation
that every matter of difference will be settled, with that
liberalitj' and justice worthj' the men who have so gloriously
asserted the cause of liberty and independence, and that we
shall, in future, consider them as brethren, and defenders of
the land.*

I am, with much respect, sir.

Your obedient servant,

Alexander McGillivray.
Hon. Andrew Pickens.

How politic and graceful the allusion to
American independence ! Could the alliance with
Spain have been touched more artfully ? How
firm is the insistance of the rights of his people !
How striking is the regulation of the force ex-
erted in the removal of trespassers from the
Indian domain! How worthy of the spring
days of republican America is the closing para-
graph !

The reader must be induced to read another
letter, not merely as illustrative of the style
and springs of action of the Grand Chief, but

* Indian Affairs, Vol. I., pp. 17-18.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 181

as a narrative of events bearing upon his life,
which, no pen can so well narrate as his own.
It is in reply to a letter of James White, super-
intendent of the Creek Indians.

Little Tallasee, 8th April, 1787.

Sir: — It is with real satisfaction, that I learn of your
being appointed b_v Congress, for the laudable purpose of
inquiring into and settling the diflferences that, at present*
subsist between our nation and the Georgians. It may be
necessar}' for 3'ou to know the cause of these differences,
and our discontents, which, perhaps, have never come to
the knowledge of the honorable body that sent you to our
country.

There are Chiefs of two towns in this nation, who, during
the late war, were friendly to the State of Georgia, and had
gone, at different times, among those people, and once, after
the general peace, to Augusta. They there demanded of
them a grant of lands, belonging to and enjoyed as hunt-
ing-grounds by the Indians of this nation, in common, on
the east of the Oconee river. The Chiefs rejected the de-
mand, on the plea, that these lands were the hunting-
grounds of the nation, and could not be granted by two
individuals ; but, after a few daj's, a promise was extorted
from them, that, on their return to our country, they
would use their influence to get a grant confirmed. Upon
their return, a generalconvention washeldat Tookabatcha,
when these two Chiefs were severel}' censured, and the

182 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Chiefs of ninety-eight towns agreed upon a talk, to be sent
to Savannah, disapproving, in the strongest manner, of the
demand made upon their nation, and denying the right of
any two of their country to make cession of land, which
could only be valid bj' the unanimous voice of the whole,
as joint proprietors in common. Yet these two Chiefs, re-
gardless of the voice of the nation, continued to go to
Augusta, and other places within the State. They re-
ceived presents and made promises ; but our customs did
not permit us to punish them for the crime. We warned the
Georgians of the dangerous consequences that would
certainly attend the settling of the lands in question. Our
just remonstrances were treated with contempt, and these
lands were soon filled with settlers. The nation, justly
alarmed at the encroachments, resolved to use force to
maintain their rights, A^et, being averse to the shedding of
the blood of a people w^hom we would rather consider as
friends, we made another effort to awaken in them a sense
of justice and equity. But we found, from experience, that
entreaty could not prevail, and parties of warriors were
sent, to drive off the intruders, but were instructed to shed
blood, only, where self-preservation made it necessary.

This was in Maj^ 1786. In October following we were
invited by commissioners, of the State of Georgia, to meet
them in conference, at the Oconee, professing a sincere desire
for an amicable adjustment of our disputes, and pledging
their sacred honors for the safetj^ and good treatment of all
those who should attend and meet them. It not being
convenient for many of us to go to the proposed conference,
a. few, from motives of curiositj-, attended. They were sur-
prised to find an armed body of men, prepared for and pro-

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 183

fessing hostile intentions. Apprehensions for personal
safetv induced those Chiefs to subscribe to every demand
that was asked by the army and its commissioners. Lands
were again demanded, and the lives of some of our Chiefs
were required, as well as those of some innocent traders, as
a sacrifice to appease their anger. Assassins have been
employed to effect some part of their atrocious purpose. If
I fall by the hand of such, I shall fall the victim of the
noblest of causes, that of maintaining the just rights of
my country. I aspire to the honest ambition of meriting
the appellation of the preserver of my countrj', equally
with the Chiefs among a'ou, whom, from acting on such
principles, j'ou have exalted to the highest pitch of glory.
And if, after every peaceable mode of obtaining redress of
grievances proved fruitless, a recourse to arms to obtain it
be a mark of the savage, and not of the soldier, what
savages must the Americans be, and how much undeserved
applause has your Cincinnatus, j-^our Fabius, obtained. If
a war name had been necessary to distinguish that Chief,
in such a case, the Man-Killer, the Great Destroyer, would
have been the proper appellation.

I had appointed the Cussetas, for all the Chiefs of the Lower
Creeks to meet in convention. I shall be down in a few
days, when, from j'our timely arrival, you will meet the
Chiefs, and learn their sentiments, and I sincerely hope that
the propositions which you shall offer us will be such as we
can safely accede to. The talks of the former commissioners,
at Galphinton, were much approved of, and your coming
from the White Town (seat of Congress) has raised great
expectations, that you will remove the principal and almost
only cause of our dispute, that is, by securing to us our

184 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

hunting-grounds and possessions, free from all encroach-
ments. When we meet, we shall talk these matters over.

Meantime, I remain,
With regard, your obedient servant,

Alexander McGillivray.*
Hon. James White,

The foregoing letter illustrates the troubles
the Georgians were giving the Creeks,
and the call they made upon McGillivray's
abilities and influence over his people, in order
to avoid a state of war. No result was reached
by the Cussetas talk. Matters remained in the
same unsatisfactory condition after as before it,
and so continued until after General Washington
became President of the United States in 1789.

He appointed a new set of commissioners to
effect a settlement, but these, like the others,
failed to reach a favorable result. On the other
hand, their reports were so alarming that he at
first regarded war as the only remedy for the
troubles existing between the Georgians and
the Creeks. But, wisely concluding that the
country was not then able to bear the burden
of such a costly corrective, he determined to

* Indian Affairs, Vol. I., pp. 18-23.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 185

make another effort at conciliation. In this
frame of mind the happ}^ thought occurred to
him, that a personal interview between him
and McGillivray might be attended by results
which commissioners had failed to reach.
Acting upon it, he sent an agent to the Creek
nation, in the person of Colonel Marius Willet,
to induce McGillivray to visit New York. The
mission was successful. McGillivray in June,
1790, at the head of thirt}' of the principal
chiefs of the confederacy, set out on their long
journc}^ mounted on horses.

A stage of the journey brought them to Guild-
ford Court House, where they were honored by
a large assembly of the neighborhood. Sudden-
ly the throng around the Great Chief opens to a
woman, who rushes up to him, her face bathed
in tears, and then, with blessings upon him,
expresses her gratitude for a good deed done by.
him 3'ears before, of which she and her children
were the beneficiaries. In an Indian raid her
husband had been killed, and she and her chil-
dren carried into captivity. Her benefactor
hearing of their melancholy fate redeemed them,
and gave them a home in his own house, until

186 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

an opportunity^ was afforded of sending them
to their friends. He was received with dis-
tinguished consideration at Richmond and
Fredericksburg. Philadelphia honored him
and his company with a three da^'s' entertain-
ment. Colonel Willet, ^vho accompanied them,
tells us that upon their landing in New York,
the Tammany Societ}^ in full regalia, received
them, attended them to Congress Hall, and
thence to the residence of General Washington.
And then and there, w^ere brought face to face,
the most remarkable ^vhite man, and the
most remarkable red man the western hemis-
phere had then produced.

Whilst the chiefs of the two confederacies are
settling their relations, an interesting event
calls our thoughts from New York to Alabama.
The impressive influence of the Great Chiefs
presence was no sooner v^^thdrawn, than a
large number of the restless Creeks conceived
the purpose of destroying the white settlements
on the Tensas, which had been increasing rap-
idly under his protection. The plan, and the
time for its execution were at last fixed. But,

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 187

fortunately, they were revealed to Mrs. Sophia
Durant, the sister of McGillivray.

She possessed remarkable command of the
Muscogee language, coupled with the gift of
oratory. She often addressed councils at the
instance of her brother, who, owing to his long
absence from his people in his youth, as well as
the study of other tongues, had lost the full
command of his own.

At the time she was informed of the bloody
scheme, she was at her farm on Little river.
Although far under the shadow of maternity
she determines, at every risk to herself, by
prompt action, to save an unsuspecting popula-
tion from the terrible fate hanging over them.
She orders two horses to be saddled on the
instant. She mounts one and her trusty negress
the other. More than twice two score human
lives depend upon her reaching Hickory- Ground
in time, and that required a ride of sixt}- miles.
Night and day those two women ride on that
errand of mercy. The only pause was when an
opportunity offered to summon a chief to the
Hickory Ground Council House. The notice
flies from chief to chief, that the sister of the

188 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Grand Chief has called a council, to tell them,
doubtless, what he had said to her on ** talking
paper." From all quarters, prompted by in-
terest and curiosity, there is a rush for the Hick-
ory Ground. By that device, worth^^ the gen-
ius of her brother, the council is promptly
assembled. She addresses them with a tone of
mingled authority and persuasion. She tells
them of the scheme that had been disclosed to
her; upbraids them for ingratitude to her
brother, then with the Great White Chief,
who might exact from him and his thirty com-
panions the lives of the murdered whites ; warns
them, too, of the vengeance which he would be
compelled, with the assistance of the whites, to
visit upon the murderers; adding all those
appeals which in such an exigency would come
swelling up from the heart of a noble woman.
From all sides of the assembly come pledges
that the ringleaders shall be seized, and the en-
terprise crushed; and promptly and efficiently
it w^as done. History, story and art have
commemorated the saving of a single life by
Pocahontas; but how insignificant was that
act compared with the one just described ! The

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 189

action is further glorified by the fact, that
within two weeks after the noble woman had
saved so many human beings, she added an-
other life to the long roll of the living.*

A treaty was speedily negotiated between
the Creeks and the United States, by which the
Oconee lands referred to in the foregoing letter
were ceded for an annual payment of fifteen
hundred dollars, and a distribution of merchan-
dise. Questions of boundary were settled; the
Indian territory was guaranteed against farth-
er encroachment ; a permanent peace was pro-
vided for; the Creeks and Seminoles placed
themselves under the jurisdiction of the United
States, and renounced their rights to make
treaties with any other nation. All the Indian
Chiefs besides McGillivray participated in the
negotiation and execution of the treaty.

But besides that open one, there was a secret
treaty to which the Grand Chief and the United
States only, were parties. It contained a stipu-
lation, that after two years the Indian trade
should be turned to points in the United States.

'Pickett's History of Alabama, Vol. II. p. 127.

190 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

It provided for annual stipends to be paid to
designated chiefs. McGillivray himself was ap-
pointed Indian agent of the United States, with
the rank of a Brigadier-General, and the yearly
pay of twelve hundred dollars.*

These treaties were the grounds of severe
criticism upon McGillivray. B\^ the open treaty,
it w^as said, he made a surrender of the Oconee
country for an inadequate consideration. But
the obvious answer to that objection w^as, that
he had exhausted every expedient that his clear
and fertile mind could command, to stay the
encroachments of the Georgians without a war,
an alternative which would have eventually
ended in crushing his people. Besides, the
plighted faith of the United States, that no
farther encroachments should be made upon
them, was to them a consideration far exceed-
ing every other ; for history had not then declar-
ed, as it has since, how frail a barrier against
encroachments upon Indian territory is the
plighted faith of the nation.

Whatever personal advantages he derived

2 Pickett's History of Alabama, Vol. II. pp. 110-11.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 191

from the secret treaty, whether pecuniar}'^ or in
dignity, inured to the benefit of his people. To
honor him was to give consideration to them;
and they regarded the tributes which his abili-
ties drew from the British, the Spaniards, and
the Americans, as so man\' offerings made to
the power of the nation. That each of those
tributaries complained that he was not their
dupe, is alike a proof of his ability, and his
fidelity to his people.

For a short time after the New York Treaty
he seemed to be losing the confidence of his
people, through the machinations of the self-
styled General Bowles, w^ho, it will be remem-
bered, assisted with a body of Choctaws,
Chickasaws and Creeks, in the defense of Pensa-
cola against Galvez. He w^as a bold, unprinci-
pled mischief-maker, who would stop at noth-
ing that could be turned to his own advantage ;
one of those characters who breed suspicion and
create confusion for their own profit and consid-
eration. To sap the confidence of the Creeks
in their Grand Chief, was to bring about an un-
settled condition of things in which he would
find himself in his element ; and for that pur-

192 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

pose he availed himself of the New York Treaty.
It would have been an easy matter for McGilli-
vray to have him driven out of the nation, or
b}' the judgment of a council to have taken his
life; but neither of these courses suiting his pol-
icy, he resolved upon one more subtle and yd
as effectual. He visited New Orleans, where it
w^as conjectured he held a consultation with
Governor Carondolet, on the subject of ridding
the nation of the mischief-maker. Shortly after-
w^ards, Bowles was seized by the Spaniards and
sent to Spain. Of the end of his exile we are
informed b^^ a letter of General Washington's
dated at Mount Vernon, fifth of August, 1793.*
''On m}" way to this place I saw Captain Bar-
ney at Baltimore, who had just arrived from
Havana. He says, the day before he left that
place, advice had been received, and generally
believed, that Bowles, who was sent to Spain,
had been hanged." Thus ended a chequered
life, full of adventures, strange phavSes, and bad
deeds, which it would be interesting to follow
were this the proper place.

* The same letter speaks of the death of "onr friend
McGillivray," Sparks, Vol. 10, p, 335.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 193

The New York Treaty was an object of sus-
picion both to Pant on and the Spaniards,
although they knew nothing of its secret feature ;
but they naturally inferred that some other con-
siderations, besides those made public, must
have induced the United States to honor Mc-
Gillivray with the commission and pay of
Brigadier-General.

The suspicion, however, resulted profitably to
McGillivray. Before he went to New York he
complained to Panton of the parsimonious con-
duct of the Spanish government to him, from
whom it expected, and obtained, so much care
and labor. Believing this supposed slight on
their part was the cause of the favor he mani-
fested for the Americans, that government at
once took steps to remove it. He was appoint-
ed the Spanish Superintendent-General of the
Creek nation, with a salary of two thousand
dollars, to which fifteen hundred more were
shortly afterwards added.

Soon after McGillivray received that appoint-
ment, the Spanish government sent to the Hick-
ory Ground, as its resident agent, Captain Pedro
Olivier, accompanied by an interpreter. This

194 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

man soon became engaged in intrigues to pre-
vent the running of the boundary lines provid-
ed for by the New York Treat}' ; and in this
matter he was assisted by WiUiam Panton, who
visited the Creek nation for that purpose.

This state of things naturally excited the sus-
picion of the United States, that McGillivray
was co-operatmg with Panton and Olivier.
Of any active co-operation by him, however,
there is no evidence, as there is none of his
active opposition to their machinations. He
was too sagacious a man, and had the good
of his people too much at heart to engage
in the latter. The boundar\' line fixed b}' the
treaty, had from the first, been exceedingly ob-
jectionable to the Creeks, so much so, that even
the influence of their Grand Chief had failed to
reconcile them to it. Indeed, he himself feared
that such a reconciliation w^as beyond his abili-
ty. In self-vindication, in the midst of Olivier's
intrigues, he writes to General Knox, Secretary
of War: ^'You recollect, sir, that I had great
objection to making the south fork of the
Oconee the limit; and when you insisted so
much, I candidly told you that it might be

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 195

made an article, but I would not pledge myself
to get it confirmed." It was against the run-
ning of that boundary line, that the intrigues
of Olivier and Panton were ostensibly directed ;
but their real object was to keep the Creeks in a
ferment in order to exclude their trade from the
Atlantic cities, and confine it to Pensacola ; the
question of boundary being seized upon as a
means of accomplishing that end. AlcGillivray's
position w^as one of great delicacy and responsi-
bility. For him to resist by active opposition
those who opposed the running of the boundary
line, was not only to do something he had
never undertaken to do, but to take a stand
that might divide his people into two hostile
camps, the most calamitous condition that
could befall them.

In the midst of these trials, death came to his
relief on the seventeenth of February, 1793, at
Pensacola, whilst on a visit to William Panton.
He was buried with masonic honors, and, it is
said, in Panton's garden. Unfortunately the
identity of the spot has defied diligent investiga-
tion, and generations have unconsciousK' dese-
crated his dust, as they have that of another dis-

196 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

tinguished man already mentioned . But the sus-
picion arises that to a different cause must be
attributed the oblivion that has befallen the
last resting place of the Great Chief, from that
which has been assigned in the case of General
Bouquet's. Had Panton erected a respectable
brick monument even, over the remains of one
for whom he professed so much friendship, and
who had done so much to increase his fortune,
reverently protecting it up to the time he left
Florida, this generation might be able to direct
the footsteps of the stranger to the tomb of the
most remarkable man to whom Alabama ever
gave birth, and the most extraordinary man
to whom Florida has furnished a grave.

He has been accused of deceit and duplicity in
his dealings with the British, the Spaniards and
Americans. But truth and candor, if not exot-
ics, are not virile growths in the domain of
state craft, while necessity is the ever read}^ plea
on which adepts in the art, or their apologists,
rest their vindication. When, therefore, the
Great Indian stands condemned at the Bar of
Eternal Truth, well may other statesmen and

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 197

diplomatists whose achievements history de-
lights to record, shrink from the Judgment Seat.

The Grand Chief watched without interference
the struggle of the Spanish and British for su-
premacy in West-Florida, because the true
interests of his people pointed to neutrality.
Cavour, the ablest and purest statesman of
recent times, from a like patriotic motive stood
ready, in case of failure, to disavow, the inva-
sion of Naples b^^ Garibaldi, which he had,
nevertheless, secretly promoted. If the New
York treat}^ was a gross violation of the Pensa-
cola treaty of 1784, Washington and his cabi-
net invited, and encouraged, whatever of bad
faith there was in the transaction.

The defense of such characters must rest at
last upon the final judgment oftheir own nation
upon their life work. So judged, McGillivray
is entitled to no low place on the roll of patri-
otic statesmen.

For seventeen years, dating from the Creek
troubles in 1776, up to his death, he had been
the guide and shield of his people. For them
those were years of comparative peace, growth,
and preparation for the white man's civiliza-

198 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

tion, by the example afforded in his own person
of its benefits and attractions. With war rag-
ing around them, under his guidance, thc}^
reached a condition which caused him to be
honored, and their alliance sought by two mon-
archs and a Great Republic. He moved
amongst them enjoying the reverence and honor
of a patriarchal sheik. Intrigue and detraction
brought him under a transient cloud. But when
they learned his life was closed in death, their
hearts were smitten as those of a family when
it loses its head. There went up from the
Creek land an universal wail ; and again, like a
sinister prophecy of evil, there came over it the
shadow it was under before the council of
Cow^eta.

Bitter, too, to his people, was the thought,
that he slept in the ''sands of the Seminoles,'^
and not on the banks of the beautiful Coosa,
which he loved so well; where he was born,
w^here he had presided over councils, and made
"paper talk " for their good, and where his hos-
pitality was ever ready, alike for the distin-
guished stranger and the humble wa^'farer.

The fate of Milfort may interest the reader. After

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 199

the death of McGillivray he returned to France, where
in 1802 he published the"Memoire De Mon Sejour Dans
La Nation Creek, " to which we owe the preservation of
the traditions of that people. But sad to relate, forgetting
his Indian wife, he married a French woman. He was
made General of Brigade b^- the Emperor Napoleon. He
died in 1814. His French wife was burned to death at
an advanced asre at Rheims.

200 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

CHAPTER XVIII.

Governor Folch — Barrancas — Changes in the Plan of the
Town — Ship Pensacola — Disputed Boundaries — Square
Ferdinand VII. — English Names of Streets Changed for
Spanish Names — Palafox — Saragossa — Reding — Baj^len
Romana — Alcaniz — Tarragona.

Galvez remained but a short time in Pensa-
cola after the surrender of the British. On their
departure, he returned to New Orleans, the cap-
ital of his province of Louisiana.

In May, 1781, Don Arturo O'Niell was ap-
pointed Governor of Spanish West-Florida, and
continued to hold the office until 1792. His
successor was Enrique White, who was suc-
ceeded by Francisco de Paula Gelabert, whose
jad interim tenure expired in 1796, by the ap-
pointment of Vicente Folch y. Juan.

The events of any interest which occurred
before that year, have been already mentioned
in previous chapters. Folch signalized the early
part of his administration by causing a town

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 201

to be laid out, "between a quarter and half a
mile" from San Carlos, that fort having been
reconstructed between 1781 and 1796.* This
town was officially known as San Carlos de
Barrancas, that being the original application
to the locality of the Spanish word barranca,
signifying broken, in the sense in which the
term is applied to a landscape.

Folch's purpose in laying out the town was,
to substitute it for Pensacola, as the chief town
and capital of the province. Of the real motives
w^hich prompted the design no information can
be obtained. His scheme was defeated, how-
ever, by his inability to procure for it the royal
approval ; the probable result of an appeal to
the King by the inha^bitants of Pensacola.

He afterwards attempted an important
change in the English plan, by la3dng off into
blocks and lots, so much of the park, or public
place as is now embraced in the area between
Intendencia and Government streets. He also
sold many of the lots, which the purchasers pro-
ceeded to improve. But, when Intendant Mor-

American State Papers, Public Lands, Vol. IV., p. 136.

202 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

ales visited the town in 1806, he utterly disap-
proved of Folch's proceedings, and refused to
confirm the titles of the vendees. Morales' sub-
sequent conduct in the matter, how^ever, shows
that in refusing his confirmation he was in-
fluenced more by inimical feeling against the
governor, than any just sense of public dut}-,
for he himself afterwards granted the lots. This
was the beginning of the mutilation of the great
public place according to the English plan ; a
mutilation which was continued from time to
time, until there was nothing left but the two
small plats of ground known as Seville Square,
and that of Ferdinand VII.

Ilis administration in one of its earlier years
was marked by one event for which his genera-
tion is entitled to credit. A ship of 800 tons was
built at CaranarOy as the cove in which the
Marine Railway is now situated was then
known. Her name was Pensacola, and during
the decade from 1870, she was still in existence,
making voyages to and from Spanish ports.
This was the first, and thus far, the last private
enterprise of the kind by Pensacolians.

In 1804, the firm of William Panton & Co.,

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 203

was dissolved by the death of William Panton,
who had been, as we have seen, so prominent a
figure in the history of Pensacola, both under
the British and Spanish rule. The business of
the firm was thenceforward carried on under
the style of John Forbes & Co.

In October, 1800, Bonaparte compelled Spain
bvthe treatv of San Ildefonso to cede Louisiana
to France ; and France, in 1803, sold and ceded
it to the United States. The United States,
from the time of the purchase, claimed that it
extended eastward to the Perdido, which was
the eastern boundary of Louisiana in the days
of d'Arriolaand Iberville, and so remained until
the cession, in 1763, to Great Britain of Florida
by Spain, and of that portion of Louisiana
south of the 31 parallel of N. latitude, east of
the Mississippi, by France. The British, after
that cession, in creating the province of West-
Florida, extended it from the Chattahoochee to
the Mississippi. Spain, on the other hand, after
the treat}' of Versailles, restricted W^est-Florida
to the Perdido, she being at that time the owner
of the whole of Louisiana. When, therefore, she
ceded Louisiana to France, it was, as claimed

204 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

by the United States, Louisiana beginning west-
ward of the Perdido; for by contracting the
West-Florida of the British, she, to that extent,
extended Louisiana to its original limit, and
left Pensacola within the boundary line tacitly
established by the expeditions of Arriola and
Iberville. Spain did not, however, consent to
that construction. She claimed that British
West-Florida was not embraced in Louisiana ;
and the question was not finally settled until
1819, when Florida was ceded to the United
States. It was, from 1803, up to that cession,
a cause of ill feeling and secret hostility on the
part of Spanish officials at Pensacola, towards
the American settlers in the disputed district.

Folch's official term extended to 1809, and
in the number of sovereign masters to whom
he was subject during one year of his adminis-
tration, his official life was remarkable. He was
commissioned bv Charles IV., who abdicated the
throne of Spain in March, 1808. Upon his ab-
dication, his eldest son, the Prince of Asturias,
was proclaimed King, under the title of Ferdi-
nand VII. On May 10, Bonaparte, having in-
sidiously enticed Ferdinand to Bayonne, com-

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 205

pelled him, b\' threats against his life, to resign
his crown. On June sixth, of the same year,
Joseph Bonaparte was proclaimed King of
Spain, by no other real authority than the will
of his imperial brother.

Never did any event arouse the patriotic
resentment of a people, as Spain's was
aroused, by the ignominy of witnessing her law-
ful King deposed, to enable an adventurer to
assume his crown. The French Emperor march-
ed army after army into the country, to estab-
lish the new dynast}^ by overawing the people
into submission. But army corps led by mar-
shals, whose names had theretofore been the syn-
onyms of victory, only intensified the spirit of
resistance. As one man, from the shore of the
Mediterranean to the Bay of Biscay, the popula-
tion flew to arms. Alountain and plain, hill
and valley, rang with their battle cry as they
hastened to their cities, towns, and villages, to
be or"[anized into militarv commands. The
patriotic passion that fired every heart in the
Kingdom, was shared b3' Spaniards in every
quarter of the globe. Of the sympathy of Pensa-
cola with the great patriotic movement in the

206 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

mother country, there exists memorials m the
names of some of its streets, and its chief public
square.

It was in the fervorof that s^'mpathy that the
square received the name of the exiled monarch ;
a token of loyalty, of which, however, he
proved himself unworthy by his conduct after
his restoration to the throne. Never had a
monarch a better opportunity^ of making his
reign happ}^ and illustrious, and never did one
under such conditions make it a source of
greater shame to himself, and misery to his
people. He was not by nature a cruel, or a bad
man ; but he was neither firm nor truthful ;
two weaknesses in a ruler which may prove as
fruitful a source of political crimes as a natural
inclination to evil actions. In his first procla-
mation after re-ascending the throne, amid the
enthusiastic joy of his people, he said, *' I detest,
I abhor despotism;" yet he, afterwards, lent
himself to schemes which deprived Spain of
constitutional government, restored the inqui-
sition, and led to proscriptions involving the
lives of some of the patriots who had contrib-
uted so largely to the restoration of his crown.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 207

The cruel and despotic policy of his advisers, at
len^h, drove the liberal party into a wide-
spread revolt, which would have resulted in his
permanent dethronement, but for the interven-
tion of the French, who, in 1823, enabled him
by their arms to keep on his head the crown
they had snatched from it in 1808.

But, if in the chief square of the town there
be a reminder of a perfidious monarch, there
are in some of its streets memorials of Spanish
glory.

The English names of those streets were
changed to the names they bear, at the time
when the events with which the latter are
associated occurred, and were designed to be
commemorative monuments of the glor\^ shed
upon old Spain by the illustrious deeds of her
sons. Upon their being monumental, must rest
the apology- for a slight retracing of their
legends, which would otherwise be out of place
in this book.

Palafox and Saragossa, or Zaragoza, are the
first to arrest attention, as they are likewise
suggestive one of the other.

Jose de Palafox y Melzi, whose ancestral scat

208 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

was near the city of Zaragoza, was in 1808, a
young officer of the King's guards. He accom-
panied Ferdinand on his visit to Bayonne,
which ended in the King's abdication. It was
by him the captive King sent the instructions
to the Junta which w^as to exercise the sover-
eignty^ of the Spanish people during the exile of
their monarch. Having performed that duty,
Palafox went to Zaragoza, to join in the
uprising of Aragon, of which it was the capital.
Despite his lack of years and experience, his
commanding presence led the Aragonese, full of
patriotic ardor and warlike impulse, to choose
him as their leader, and proclaim him Captain
General of Aragon. In a short time he found
himself at the head of ten thousand infantry,
two hundred horse, and eight pieces of artillery.
Zaragoza, situated on the right bank of the
Ebro, was, in 1808, a city of fifty thousand
inhabitants. It stood in the midst of an allu-
vial plain, rich in its olive trees, its vineyards,
and agricultural products. Its fortifications
consisted of a brick wall not above ten feet
high and three in thickness, pierced for guns,
but few were in the embrasures. At intervals,

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 209

however, there were convents, castles, and
Other solid stone structures. The universal
uprising of the Aragonese, and the proximity of
the city to the French frontiers, suggested it a-s
one of the most important points for the French
to occupy, in the execution of their designs to
subjugate Spain. It was, accordingly, one of
the first places against which a military force
was sent.

In June 1808, Napoleon ordered Lefebvre to
advance against it from the Pyrenian frontier.
His advance was interrupted b\' three battles,
in w^hich the raw and undisciplined Aragonese
peasants did not hesitate to attack the French
column, but were in each instance driven back.
Lefebvre at last presented himself before
Zaragoza, with a demand for its submission.
To that demand Palafox made the memorable
reply, "War to the knife;" a reply that fore-
shadowed the terrific struggle by which those
old brick walls w^ere to be won by the enemy.
In every attack the French made upon the gates
and walls, between the twelfth of June and
August fifteenth, they were repulsed with
fearful loss. Lefebvre, discouraged by his

210 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

successive failures to carry the place by storm,
drew off his army to await the arrival of heavy
artiller}', to enable him to undertake a regular
siege.

The second attempt on Zaragoza began in
December, 1808. In the interval between this
and the first attack the defences had been
greatl}' strengthened, and a large supply of arms
procured. As the French columns advanced
towards the cit}^ there was presented a specta-
cle not often witnessed by one doomed to a
siege. The entire population, men, Avomenand
children, were engaged in the work of preparing
for resistance. None left the walls, but on the
contrary the peasantry of the surrounding
country rushed within them to share in the
perilous defence. By the time the French took
their position around the city, it had within
it fifty thousand defenders, the most of them
undisciplined and uninured to arms, j^et animat-
ed with the spirit of their leader's reply to
Lefebvre's demand of surrender.

The French force consisted of two army corps
of fifty thousand men, commanded by Marshals
Moncey and Montier, with all the necessary

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 211

artillery and appliances for a siege. For fifty
days after the French artillery began to play
upon the city the conflict between the besieged
and the besiegers was incessant. In that time,
thirty-three thousand cannon shot, and sixteen
thousand bombs had been hurled against the
place. When a breach was made in the wall,
immediately and under the terrific fire of the
enemy it was closed up with sand bags. If at
any point an entry was made within them by
the besiegers, the stone houses became citadels
for the besieged. If the defenders were driven
from a room, a stand was made in the next one.
Women and children shared in the labors and
the perils of the fight. As a gunner fell at the
feet of his wife, stricken down by a cannon shot,
she promptly took his place at the gun.
Napoleon, dissatisfied with the slow progress
made b^^ Moncey and Montier towards a
reduction of the place, sent Junot to take the
command. Becoming dissatisfied with him, he
sent Lannes to bring the operations to a close.
Pestilence, too, came to his aid as well as addi-
tional forces sent by the Emperor. At last Pala-
fox was confined to his bed with the prevailing

212 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

epidemic. The French soldiers were at the same
time depressed by the fierce and uninterrupted
conflict. ''Scarce a fourth of the town is won, "
said one of them, ''and we are already exhaust-
ed. We shall all perish amongst these ruins,
which will become our own tombs, before we
can force the last of these fanatics from the last
of their dens.'* With the assailants thus de-
pressed, and the besieged deprived of the pres-
ence and encouragement of their leader, besides
the havoc of pestilence, a favorable capitulation
was accepted by Marshal Lannes. The regular
troops marched out of the walls with the
honors of war, and were sent as prisoners into
France, each soldier retaining his knapsack, the
officers their horses and side arms. The peas-
ants ^were dismissed, and private property was
respected. Fifty thousand human beings per-
ished during the siege, all, except six thousand,
from pestilence. Palafox remained a prisoner
in France until 1814, when he returned to
Spain. He was afterwards created Duke of
Zaragoza, and died in 1847.

Of this siege a British historian has said :
*' Modern Europe has not such a memorable

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 213

siege to recount ; and to the end of the world,
even after Spain and France have sunk before
the waves of time, and all the glories of modern
Europe have passed away, it will stand forth
in undecaying lustre; a monument of heroic
devotion, which will thrill the hearts of the
brave and generous throughout every succeed-
ing age. "*

Baylen, a parallel street with Palafox, next
invites notice. Bavlen is a small town at the
foot of the Sierra Morena, on the road leading
from Cadiz to Cordova and Seville. There, on
July nineteenth, 1808, the French General
Dupont, after his recent plunder of Cordova,
with excesses more in keeping with the days of
Alaric, than the nineteenth century, was, with
20,000 men, and all their plunder, compelled to
surrender, after a series of battles to a Spanish
army, largely made up of irregular Spanish
troops.

To Reding, a Swiss in the service of Spain,
was due the glory of the event, which excited
profound attention throughout Europe, and

* Allison's Modern Europe, Vol. III., p. 301.

214- HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

made a deep and sinister impression on the
French.

Of the "catastrophe" Napoleon, who was at
Bordeaux when he heard of it, said : ** That an
army should be beaten, is nothing; it is the
daily fate of war and is easily repaired; but
that an army should submit to a dishonorable
capitulation is a stain upon the glory of our
arms which can never be effaced. Wounds in-
flicted on honor are incurable. The moral effect
of this catastrophe will be terrible. " Baylen
was doubtless the first link in the chain of
events which drew from him the reflection in
which he indulged at St. Helena : "It was that
unhappy war in Spain which ruined me. '*

Romana street bears the name of the most
illustrious General Spain produced during her
great Peninsula war — the Marquis de Romana.
He was one of those great and generous charac-
ters who are too great and generous to be
moved by selfishness or envy, and was in con-
sequence the bond of union between the English
and Spanish armies. He was marching to the
relief of Badajoz, when he was seized with heart
disease at Cartaxo, where he died suddenly Jan-

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 215

uary 22, 1811. It is enough for his fame for
him to have been the subject of the following
dispatch by the Duke of Wellington : '*In the
Marquis de Romana, the Spanish army has lost
its brightest ornament, his country its most
upright patriot, and the world the most stren-
uous and zealous defender in the cause in which
we are engaged ; and I shall always acknowl-
edge with gratitude the assistance w^hich I
received from him, as well by his operation, as
by his counsel, since he has been joined w^ith the

army."

Alcaniz is a reminder of another field of
Spanish glory. It is the name of a town in Ar-
ason, on the right bank of the Guadalupe, sixty
miles south-east of Zaragoza. It was, on May
twenty-third, 1809, the scene of the defeat of a
French army under Suchet by the Spanish forces
under General Blake.

Tarragona street commemorates one of those
sieges like that of Saragossa, which signalize
the Spanish race above all others, for the tenac-
ity and devotion with which in all ages it has
defended its homes. The city of that name,
situated on the Mediterranean shore of Spain,

216 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Avas besieged bj^ Suchet, and defended by Gen-
eral Cortinas, from Ma\' 4, to June 29,
1811. The defense was conducted with
the same fierce obstinacy and courage which
marked that of Saragossa, and with even
greater mortalitj^, if allowance is made for the
ravages of pestilence in the latter. But there
was a vast difference in the finalitv of the two
sieges. Tarragona was taken by assault; and
never did American savages exercise more
demon-like fury upon unresisting and powerless
humanity than the French troops visited upon
the Tarragonese. Above six thousand human
beings comprising all ages, and both sexes,
were massacred w^hilst appealing for mercy.
"The blood of the Spaniards inundated the
streets and the houses. Armed and unarmed,
men and women, gra^' hairs and infant inno-
cence, attractive youth and wrinkled age, were
alike butchered by the infuriated troops. "*

* Allison's Historj' of Modern Europe, Vol. III., p. 4-22.

ff

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 217

CHAPTER XIX.

Folch Leaves West Florida — His Successors — War of 1812
— Tecumseh's Visit to the Seminoles and Creeks —
Consequences — Fort Mims — Percj- and Nicholls' Expe-
dition.

In October, 1809, Folch left Pensacola to fill
the appointment of Governor of the country
west of the Perdido, the capital of which was
Mobile. The uneventful period, for Pensacola
at least, between that j^ear and 1813, was
marked only by the incoming and outgoing of
governors. Folch's successor was his son-in-
law, Don Francisco Maximiliano de Saint
Alaxent, under an ad interim appointment. In
July 1812, he was succeeded by Mauricio
Zuniga, who in May, 1813, gave place to Alateo
Gurzalez Maurique, whose administration
covered the period of the war between the
United States and Great Britain, which was
declared by the former, on June 18, 1812.

218 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

That Pensacola should have been involved in
that struggle would seem to be out of the
natural order of events, when it is remembered
that Spain and the United States were at peace.
But, as before intimated, there existed a covert
hostility on the part of the Spanish officials at
Pensacola against the Americans, growing out
of the dispute as to the limits of West Florida;
and now intensified by the capture of Mobile
on April 13, 1813, by an expedition from New
Orleans, under the command of General Wilkin-
son. Spain herself was too much absorbed by
her struggle for existence to take any active
interest in a question of boundar^^ in the new
world. But the British, who were her allies in
her war with the French, availed themselves of
that official hostility to induce the Spaniards at
Pensacola to permit them to make that place a
base from which the Indians could be furnished
with supplies to wage war on the United
States.

After the capture of Detroit, in August, 1812,
the British formed the scheme of combining the
Indians on the western frontier of the United
States in a line of warfare extending from the

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 219

Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico. As their chief era-
issary to accomplish that end, they employed
Tecumseh, the great Shawnee Chief, who in the
fall of that 3^ear made his appearance amongst
the Seminoles and Creeks. He at once began
the work of exciting their hostility against the
Americans, by every argument, art, and device
which his own savage shrewdness could sug-
gest, or the deliberate calculations of his British
allies prompt. He addressed the Creek assem-
blies with the burning words of an impassioned
oratory, to which his stately form and command-
ing presence gave additional force. He upbraided
their disposition to adopt the speech, the dress,
and habits of the white man, instead of cleav-
ing to those of their forefathers. He persuaded
them that it was degrading to an Indian war-
rior to follow the plow, or to rely upon cattle
and the fruits of the field for sustenance ; that it
was decreed by the Great Spirit that the coun-
try should go back to the forest, and that the
Indian should depend upon the chase for his
food, as his forefathers had done. An invidious
contrast was drawn between the disinterested
friendship of the British, who had no occasion

220 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

or use for their lands, and the cupidity of the
Americans who were annually restricting their
hunting grounds by their ever extending settle-
ments. Superstition, and necromancy, too, were
successfulh^ emplo^^ed to enforce his teachings.
Some of the wavering, like Francis, afterwards
known as the prophet, were induced to submit
to days of seclusion and fasting, in houses from
which the light was excluded, until darkness,
spells, and incantations, acting upon bodies
enfeebled by hunger, inspired faith in the mis-
sion of the great Shawnee. A comet, which ap-
peared in the last days of September of that
3^ear, was pointed to as a sign placed in the
heavens by the Great Spirit, as a presage of
wrath and destruction to the white man, and a
promise of redemption to the Indian.

He had the temerity, even, to foretell a great
natural phenomenon of which he was to be the
proximate cause, as an evidence his mission
was inspired. ''When I reach Detroit I shall
stamp my foot, and the earth will tremble and
rock." And strange to relate, at about the
lapse of time the journey would consume, an
earthquake was felt throughout the Creek

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 221

country, when from all sides came the cry of
the awe-stricken Indians : "Tecumseh has reach-
ed Detroit and stamped his foot. "*

His mission divided the Creeks into two par-
ties, of w^hich by far the most numerous and
warlike, was that which yielded to his seduc-
tions. To each of his converts he gave a red
stick as an emblem of war, and hence the hostile
Creeks became known as ''Red Sticks. "

He had hardly returned to Detroit, when
there came to Pensacola British agents, bring-
ing with them military supplies for distribution
amongst the Red Sticks, to whose bloody in-
stincts was applied the stimulus of a bounty
of five dollars for every American scalp.

That Pensacola should be the Creek base of
supply, was in accordance with the plan of
warfare designed b}^ the British at Detroit, and
a fulfillment of Tecumseh's promised assistance
to their savage allies. After the arrival there of
the British agents and their stores, the Red
Sticks lost no time in procuring from them the
needed supplies for the war to which they had

Pickett's History of Alabama, Vol. II., p. 246.

222 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

pledged themselves. From all parts of the
Creek country the hostiles were seen hurrying
to Pensacola, and returning with arms and am-
munition, without hindrance from the Spanish
officials.

The first startling result of the alliance
between the British and Indians, was the mas-
sacre of Fort Mims, which occurred in August,
1813, an event that sent a thrill of horror
through ever}^ American heart.

The fort was situated on Lake Tensas, a mile
east of the Alabama river. It consisted of a
stockade enclosing about an acre, with a block-
house in one of its angles. In the center of it
stood the residence of Samuel Mims, for whom
it was named. It had been hastily constructed,
as a refuge for the people of the neighborhood,
in anticipation of an extended war, rendered
imminent by encounters that had taken place
between small parties of Indians and whites.
In July, there entered the stockade five hundred
and fifty-three souls, composed of soldiers, other
men, women and children. Owing to the ill
chosen site, situated as it was in a hammock,
and the negligence of those in command, the

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 223

place was surprised at midday on August 30,
by one thousand Creek Indians under William
Weatherford and Francis, who rushed in at
the open gate, which had been heedlessly left un-
closed. But few of those in the Fort escaped.
All the dead were scalped, except those who
were saved from that outrage, by undergoing
the process of cremation in the buildings in
which they had taken refuge, and which were
fired by the enemy to overcome their defenders.
Their bloody work finished, the Indians rested
and feasted, at the scene of the massacre, smok-
ing their pipes, and trimming and drying the
scalps they had taken. Afterwards, these hor-
rid trophies of victory, strung on sticks, were
taken to the British agents at Pensacola, who
paid for them the promised bounty.

It is due to WiUiam Weatherford, who was a
son of a half-sister of Alexander McGillivray,
that, it should be mentioned, at the peril of
his own life, he interfered to save the women
and children. Failing in his merciful efforts, he
refused to witness their massacre, and left the
bloody scene.

Not content with making Pensacola a base

224 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

for inciting the Indians to hostitilies against
the United States, in 1814, there came into the
harbor a British fleet, with a body of marines,
the former under the command of Captain
William Henry Percy, and the later under that
of Lieutenant-Colonel Edward Nicholls, for the
purpose of taking possession of its fortifications.
This the imbecile Maurique permitted them to
do. Fort George, which had been named St.
Michael by the Spaniards, resumed its English
name, and received a British garrison, w^hilst
the flag of St. George once again floated from
its ramparts. Fort San Carlos and the battery
on Santa Rosa Island were also turned over to
the British. And at the same time, the
Governor's house was made the headquarters
of Percy and Nicholls.

The fleet consisted of two ships, each of
twenty-four guns, and two brigs, each of
eighteen guns, with three tenders. The marines
numbered two to three hundred men.

Nicholls at once began to increase his force by
enlisting Indians, whom he supplied with
British uniforms, and drilled in the streets of
Pensacola.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 225

Thus reads his order of the day, twenty-sixth
of August 1814. ''The noble Spanish nation
has grieved to see her territories insulted,
having been robbed and despoiled of a portion
of them w^hile she was overwhelmed with
distress, and held down by the chains which a
tyrant had imposed on her gloriously struggling
for the greatest of all blessings (true liberty).
The treacherous Americans, who call themselves
free, have attacked her like assassins while she
was fallen. But the day of retribution is fast
approaching. . . As to the Indians, you are
to exhibit to them the most exact discipline,
being patterns to these children of nature. You
will teach and instruct them, in doing which
you will manifest the utmost patience, and you
will correct them when they deserve it."

Percy in a communication to Lafitte, the
commander of the Banataria pirates, sa^^s : "As
France and England are now^ friends, I call on
you with your brave followers to enter into the
service of Great Britain, in which you shall have
the rank of Captain."

Nicholls likewise issued a proclamation to the
people of Louisiana and Kentucky, inviting

226 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

them to join the British. To the latter he
addressed himself specially as follows: "Inhabi-
tants of Kentucky, you have too long borne
with grievous impositions. The whole brunt of
the war has fallen on your brave sons. Be
imposed upon no more. Either range yourselves
under the standard of your forefathers, or
observe a strict neutrality." ^

And as an additional stimulus to the activity
and zeal of the Indians, the bounty on American
scalps was raised from five to ten dollars, f

* Niks' Weekl.v Register, Vol. VII., pp. 134-135.
t Pickett's History of Alabama, Vol. II., p. 357.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 227

CHAPTER XX.

Attack on Fort Boyer by Percy and Nicholls— Jackson's
March on Pensacola in 1814— The Town Captured—
Percy and Nicholls Driven Out — Consequences of the
War to the Creeks — Don Manuel Gonzalez.

The first aggressive operation of Percy and
Nicholls against the Americans after they had
established themselves at Pensacola was an
attack on Fort Boyer on Mobile Point, pre-
paratory to an ad vance on Mobile. But General
Jackson's great victory of the Horse Shoe over
the Creeks on the twenty-seventh of March
had eifectually crushed them, and the treaty
with them which followed enabled him to direct
his attention exclusively to the movements of
the British at Pensacola.

His first step was to put Fort Boyer in con-
dition to resist an attack, by repairing it,
mounting additional guns and placing an ample
garrison in it. This preparation had hardly
been accomplished, when, early in September,

228 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

1814-, tlie British commanders made a com-
bined attack upon it b}^ land and water. The
former was repulsed, and the latter resulted in
the destruction of the Hermes, Percy's flag ship,
and the drawing off of the other vessels in a
crippled condition. After the inglorious ex-
pedition, the British fleet and land forces
retired to Pensacola— a result hardly in keep-
ing with the vaunts of Percy and Nicholls
in their several proclamations issued in August.
Pensacola having lost all claim to neutrality,
as well b^ being under the British flag, as by
becoming a refuge for the hostile Indians who
declined to bring themselves within the terms
of the treaty which General Jackson had made
with the Creeks after the victory at the Horse
Shoe, he resolved to advance upon it. He had
previously written Maurique a letter reminding
him of the peaceful relations between Spain and
the United States, expostulating with him upon
his permitting the British to make Pensacola
the base of their operations, and allowing it to
be an asylum for the hostile Creeks, naming
two of them especially, McQueen and Francis,
whose strange adventures will be mentioned in

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 229

a future page. To this mild expostulation the
governor made an ambiguous and insulting
repl}', ending with the threat ''that Jackson
should hear from him shortly."* The corre-
spondence occurred just before the Percy and
Nicholls' attack on Fort Boyer, and doubtless
it was their bombastic prediction of success
which prompted old Maurique to send Jackson
so defiant reply.

General Jackson, however, did not wait
longer than the last days of October, 1814, for
the execution of the Spanish governor's threat.
Having collected his forces at Fort Mont-
gomer3^, on the twenty-seventh he took up his
line of march for Pensacola, the Indian trail re-
ferred to in an early chapter being its guiding
thread. The troops consisted of the Third,
Thirty- nineth and Forty -fourth infantry,
Coffee's brigade, a company of Mississippi
dragoons and part of a West Tennessee regi-
ment, numbering three thousand effective men,
besides a band of friendly Choctaws.

He reached the vicinitv of the town on the

Niks' Weekly Register, Vol. VIL, p. 11.

230 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

evening of the sixth of November. He first ap-
peared on its western side, and there, having
halted, he says, in the dispatch containing an
account of the expedition, *'0n my approach I
sent Major Pierre with a flag to communicate
the object of my visit. He approached the Fort
St. George with his flag displayed, and was
fired on by the cannon from the fort."* Im-
mediately afterwards, with the adjutant and a
small party, he himself made a reconnoissance.
He found the fort manned by Spanish as well as
English troops. He likewise observed that
there were in the harbor seven English war
vessels, which it was necessary for him to con-
sider in his future movements. His plans were
at once formed. A force under Captain Denkins,
with several pieces of artillery, occupied the site
of Fort St. Barnardo, which was once again to
be pitted against its old antagonist, Fort
George. t Inferring that the enemy v^ould ex-
pect his attack from the west, General Jackson,
on the night of the sixth, caused the main body
of his army to make a circuitous march, so that

* Niles' Weekly Register, Vol. VII., p. 281.
t Niles' Weekly Register, Vol. VII., p. 281.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 231

the morning would find it on the eastern ex-
tremity of the town.* This movement shielded
him from the guns of St. George or St. Michael,
whilst by entering the town at the eastern end
of Government street he would, in a measure,
be protected from the guns of the English ves-
sels. But he encountered a battery of two guns
as he entered the street, which fired upon the
centre column with ball and grape, whilst there
opened upon the troops a shower of musketry
from houses, fences and gardens.! The battery
was soon silenced, however, b}^ a storming
party led by Captain Laval, who lost a leg at
the last fire of the guns. All the Spanish forces
at the battery fled as Laval's command rushed
upon it except a gallant Spanish oflBcer, who,
refusing to fly, was taken prisoner. But tra-
dition says, instead of laurels, he won from his
own people the imputation of "fool" for his
rashness — a rashness, however, which, had it
been crowned with success, would probably
have secured him the praise of a hero.

♦ Niles' Weekly Register, Vol. VII., p. 281.
t Niles' Weekly Register, Vol. VII., p. 281.

232 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

When the command had well advanced into
the town it was met by the governor in person,
with a white flag, and an offer of surrender at
discretion. The offer was accepted, but solely
for the purpose of enabling General Jackson to
accomplish the declared object of the expedition
— which was not conquest— but to expel the
British, whose presence was due to the im-
becility of Maurique, as well as the small
Spanish force at his command, consisting, as it
did, of two or three companies of the regiment
of Tarragona. In order to attain that object,
possession of Forts Barrancas and St. Michael
by the Americans was indispensable, and, to
the extent of his ability, the governor made the
surrender. But when Captain Denkins and his
command were about to proceed to take pos-
session of St. Michael, Captain Soto, the
Spanish officer in command, refused to obey the
governor's instructions to make the surrender.
Preparations that were immediately made to
take it by storm, however, induced Soto to re-
consider his refusal and to admit the American
command. The demand was made at six o'clock
on the evening of the seventh, and the surrender

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 233

occurred at midnight. The purpose of Soto's
delay cannot be divined, for Nicholls having on
the night of the sixth withdrawn his men to
the shipping, there remained in the fort but a
small band of Spaniards.

As General Jackson withdrew his forces from
the town, which he did on the evening of the
same day of its capture, they were fired upon
by the British vessels, but without inflicting
any injury.

Whilst, on the morning of the eighth, a
detachment was preparing to march on Bar-
rancas, with the purpose of cutting off the
retreat of the British fleet, there was heard a
great explosion, which it was at once concluded
was occasioned by the blowing up of San Car-
los. General Jackson nevertheless sent the
detachment there to verify the fact. On its
return in the night it reported the fort blown
up, everything combustible burned, and cannon
spiked by the British, who had taken to their
ships, and sailed out of the harbor.

The onh' casualties which occurred doing these
operations on the part of the Americans were
seven killed and eleven wounded, including

234- HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Captain Laval ; and on the part of the Span-
iards four killed and six wounded.

Captain William Laval was a South Carolin-
ian, the son of a French officer of the Legion of
Lauzun, belonging to the French forces in the
Revolutionary war. In 1808 he received the
commission of ensign in the American army. In
1812, he became a first lieutenant. The break-
ing out of the Creek war found him a captain.
He was with the third regiment, to which his
company belonged, at the battle of Holy Ground.
For the service of charging the Spanish battery
at Pensacola he was specially selected by
General Jackson. The loss of his leg prevented
his sharing with his regiment in the glorious
victory of N^w Orleans, and ended his military
career as well. His aptitude for civil as well as
military life was manifested by his filling the
offices of Secretary of State, Comptroller Gen-
eral, and Treasurer of South Carolina, as well as
Assistant Treasurer of the United States under
Polk's administration.

That the presence of the British was enforced,
and by no means agreeable to the Spaniards,
was promptly manifested by the good feeling

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 235

exhibited by the latter towards the Americans,
as soon as Percy and Nicholls had taken their
departure. The inhabitants were much im-
pressed by the kind and generous conduct of
General Jackson; who seems fully, to have
appreciated the peculiar position in which the
town was placed, by the pretentious audacity
of Percy and Nicholls, the feebleness of its
garrison, and above all the imbecility of Mau-
rique. In the dispatch before referred to he says:
"The good order and conduct of my troops,
whilst in Pensacola, have convinced the Span-
iards of our friendship and our prowess ; and
have drawn from the citizens an expression,
that 'The Choctaws are more civilized than the
British.' '* In letters written from Pensacola to
Havana, in relation to the capture of the plac%,
the comparison is thus expressed: "the Ameri-
can Choctaws were more civilized than the
religious English." These letters teem with the
praises of the considerate conduct of General
Jackson and his army.

When the first account of the invasion
reached Havana, American vessels were seized
as a retaliatory measure; but when all the

236 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

particulars of the expedition were learned they
were promptly released.

Having blown up St. Michael, General
Jackson left Pensacola, on November 9, to go
to the defence of New Orleans, which from all
indications was threatened with an attack by
the British. There he arrived with his army,
on December 2, to begin those preparations
which were to end on January 8, in the grand
and glorious land victory of the War of 1812.

When Percy and NichoUs left Pensacola, they
took with them, not only their Indian allies,
but also about one hundred negro slaves be-
longing to the inhabitants of the town. Sailing
to Appalachicola, they there landed the Indians
and negroes. Still bent on instigating a savage
w^arfare against the American settlements, a
fort under their directions was built on the Ap-
palachicola river, which they supplied with guns
and ammunition. It was designed to serve as a
refuge for fugitive slaves, and a resort for hos-
tile Indians, as well as a salient point from
which to carry on an exterminating w^arfare
against the white settlements in southern Geor-
gia and Alabama.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 237

Such were the inglorious results of the Percy-
Nicholls expedition to Florida, beginning, as we
have seen, with stilted proclamations to the
people of Louisiana and Kentucky, coupled
with an invitation to a nest of pirates to
become their allies; and ending with the rob-
bing and destruction of the property of a com-
munity to which they had come under the guise
of friendship, and as its shield from wrongs
which existed in their own imaginations only.

Aside from the barbarity which marked the
warfare instigated by Britain against the
Americans in Florida and Alabama during the
years 1812-1814, history has cause to lament
its fatal consequences to the people who were
the cruel instruments by which it was waged.

At the time of Tecumseh's mission to the
Creeks, about twenty years had elapsed since
the death of their Great Chief, McGillivray. In
that interval, under the impulse of his teachings
and example, continued and increased by the
fostering care of the United States, they had
made considerable advance in civilization.
Large numbers of them had learned to rely
more upon tillage and their herds for a livelihood,

238 HISTORICAL SKETCHES FO

than on the chase. It was no uncommon thing
to see in the nation, well-built houses standing
in the midst of considerable farms. They owned
slaves and lar^e herds of cattle. The hum of
the spinning wheel, and the noise of the shuttle,
moved b}^ the deft hands of Indian matrons,
were common sounds throughout the Creek
country; whilst an Indian maiden with her
milk pail, or at her churn, Avas no unusual sight.
The schools established amongst them were
gradually shedding upon them the light and
mellowing influence of knowledge. *

The large infusion of white blood into the
tribe, owing to the attractions of the Creek
women, which have already been noticed, like-
wise, added the hope of a civilization resting
upon the strongest instincts of human nature.
Of the possibility of this civilizing and ennob-
ling influence, gradually permeating and elevat-
ing the Creeks as a people, we have the evidence
in some of their descendants, who at this day,
are amongst the most respectable citizens in
several communities in Alabama and Florida.

Niks' Weekly Register, Vol. 6, p. 370.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 239

Such was the state of the Creek nation, when
the British at Detroit sent Tecumseh, like
another Prince of Evil, into that fair garden of
a nascent civilization, to convert its peaceful
scenes into fields of slaughter, with all the woes
that follow in the footsteps of war.

The first fruit of that cruel scheme, as we
have seen, was the tragedy of Fort Mims.
Then follow^ed in rapid succession the avenging
battles of Tallasehatchee, Talladega, Auttose,
and Holy Ground. To those succeeded the last
great heroic struggle at the Horse Shoe, in
which, of one thousand Red Sticks engaged,
two hundred only survived. Afterwards came
the surrender of Weatherford with that speech *

* Weatherford having boldh' ridden up to General Jack-
son's tent, was met by the threatening question: "How-
dare 3'ou, sir, ride up to mv tent after having murdered the
women and children at Fort Mims?" Weatherford replied:
" General Jackson, I am not afraid of you. I fear no man,
for I am a Creek warrior. I have nothing to request in
behalf of myself; you can kill me if you wish. I come to beg
3'Ou to send for the women and children of the war party
who are now starving in the woods. Their fields and cribs
have been destroyed b3- your people, who have driven them
to the woods without one ear of corn. I hope you will send

240 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

which conies to us as the dirge-like epilogue of
the woeful drama; and a memorial of that pro-
phetic shadow which fell on his people when
they learned their Grand Chief was lying in the
"sands of the Seminoles. "

The Spaniards criticised General Jackson's
Florida campaign, because he did not, instead
of advancing on Pensacola, proceed at once
to Barrancas, to capture San Carlos, and there-
by prevent the escape of the British vessels.
But the answer to the criticism is, that he was
not aware, perhaps, of all the conditions known
to the Spaniards, which in their judgment,
would have facilitated a surprise, or contributed
to a successful assault. Besides, such a move-
ment would have been inconsistent with the
purpose of his invasion, w^hich was to procure
the exclusion of the British from Florida, by the

out parties to safely bring them here in order that they
may be fed. I exerted myself in vain to prevent the massa-
cre of the women and children at Fort Mims. I am now done
fighting. The Red Sticks are nearly all killed. If I could
fight you any longer I would most heartily do so. Send
for the women and children ; they never did you any harm.
But kill me if the white people want it done. " — Pickett's
History of Alabama, Vol. II., p. 349.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 241

action of the Spaniards themselves ; a consider-
ation which was due to the amicable relations
existing between Spain and the United States.
Entertaining these views, General Jackson did
not deem it proper to seize the Spanish forts in
the first instance without communicating with
the Governor. This he attempted to do, and it
was only after the outrage of firing on his flag,
he resolved, without further parle\' or remon-
strance, by his own arms to drive out the
British.

That, however, he had considered a move-
ment on Barrancas, before or at the time of his
advance on Pensacola, is evidenced by an inter-
view which he had with Don Manuel Gon-
zalez, who was an officer in the Spanish commis-
sary department, and who had a cattle ranch
at a place then known as Vacaria Baja, now as
Oakfield, one mile from the trail the American
army was following. Don Manuel, with his
family, was at the ranch, when the General rode
up to the house, and accosted him. There was
with the Don at the time, his son, Celestino,
then a young man. Through an interpreter,
the General made known, that the purpose of

242 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

his visit was to require the Don, or his son, to
guide the army to Barrancas. The Don boldly
refusing, the General became insistent, to the
degree of threatening the use of force to secure
compliance. Roused by the threat, wnth a mien
as dauntless as Jackson's, Don Manuel replied :
"General, my life and my property are in your
power ; j^ou can take both ; but my honor is in
ni}^ own keeping. As to m}^ son, I w^ould rather
plunge a sword into his bosom than see him a
traitor to his king." The General replied b}^
extending his hand with the exclamation, *'I
honor a brave man," and thenceforth became
his friend.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 243

CHAPTER XXI.

Seminole War, ISlS^ackson Invades East Florida —
Defeats the Seminoles — Captures St. Marks — Arbuthnot
and Ambrister — Prophet Francis — His Daughter.

At the close of the war between the United
States and Great Britain, the British troops
were withdrawn from the fort onthe Appalach-
icola river built under the auspices of Nicholls
and Percy.

The Seminoles were, as their name signifies,
outlaws and runaways from the Creek confed-
eracy^, or their descendants. Hence it was, that
those of the Red Sticks who refused to submit
to the terms of the treaty between the United
States and the Creeks, either fled to the British
at Pensacola, or to the Seminole nation. It was
in a district inhabited by Seminoles, that the
fort built by Nicholls on the Appalachicola river
was situated. The spirit and objects which
prompted its construction continued to animate
its motley garrison long after Nicholls' depar-

24'4? HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

ture. At length it proved such an interruption
to navigation, besides being an asylum for
runaway negroes, as to bring against it, in
1816, an expedition by land and water under
Colonel Duncan L. Clinch. A shot from a gun-
boat exploded the magazines and destroyed the
larger part of the garrison. The destruction of
this nest of rapine, however, did not for long
give peace and security to the district.

In the fall of 1817, a feeling of unrest and suspi-
cion mutually seized upon the white settlers and
Indians, induced by causes for which both were
responsible. The first act of war, however, was
the capture on November21ofFowlton, a Semi-
nole village above the Georgia line, by an Ameri-
can force, under Colonel Twiggs . This proved the
signal for Indian massacres, the most shocking
of which was that of Lieutenant Scott and his
<:ommand. Whilst going up the Appalachicola
river in a barge they were attacked from a
dense swamp on the bank. There were in the
barge forty men besides Scott, seven soldiers'
-wives, and five children. All were killed except
one w^oman spared by the Indians, and four
men who swam to the opposite bank.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 24-5

In March 1818, General Jackson was ordered
to the seat of war. He invaded East Florida,
and in a campaign of six weeks crushed the
Indians. In one of their towns, were found
three hundred scalps of men, women and
children, fifty still fresh hanging from a red war
pole. He also captured the Spanish Post of
Saint Marks.

For the last act, investigation can find no
adequate reason. It was not, however, an
irremediable wrong, for restitution furnished
a remedy. Two irreparable wrongs, however,
marked that short campaign.

Alexander Arbuthnot, being found at St.
Marks, was brought before a court-martial.
He was a man of seventy years of age, a Scotch-
man, an Indian trader, and a friend of the
Indians, but a counsellor of peace between them
and the whites ; a man of education, who used
his pen to represent Indian wrongs to both
Spanish and American officials; and who, when
Jackson was about to invade their country',
advised the Seminoles to fly and not to fight.
On his trial, the plainest rules of evidence were
disregarded, and without proof he was found

246 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

guilty of the charges of inciting the Creeks to
war on the United States and, hkewise, of
*' aiding and abetting the enemy, and supplying
them with the means of war.*' Under that
baseless judgment the old man was hanged ;
his Avaving white locks protesting his inno-
cence. '"

Robert C. Ambrister, who had formerly be-
longed to Nicholls' command, being found in
the Indian nation, was also seized and tried by
a court-martial. He confessed that he had coun-
selled and aided the Indians. The court at first
sentenced him to be shot, but before closing the
trial, upon a reconsideration it set aside that
judgment, and substituted for death the
punishment of fifty stripes, and confinement
"with a ball and chain at hard labor for
twelvemonths." Nevertheless, General Jackson
disregarding the last, executed the first judg-
ment.!

Jackson having early in May closed his
campaign against the East Florida Seminoles,
and obtained evidence satisfactory to himself,

*Niles' Weekly Register, Vol. 15, pp. 270—282.
tNiles' Weekly Register, Vol. 15, p. 281.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 247

that the Spanish officials at Pensacola were in
sympathy with them, resolved to march upon
that town, and repeat the lesson which he had
taught it in 1814. Before following him in
that expedition, however, mention will be made
of the adventures, fate and daughter of Francis,
the Indian prophet, \vho left Pensacola, it will
be remembered, with Nicholls on the approach
of the Americans in 1814.

Francis had been one of Tecumseh's most
notable and zealous disciples, as well as one of
the most sedulous in making Red Stick converts.
A leader in the massacre of Fort Mims, he had
revelled in deeds of blood in that human
slaughter pen. When Nicholls left Florida with
his troops, Francis accompanied him, and
finally made his way to London. There in a
gorgeous dress he was presented to the Prince
Regent, who in recognition of his military serv-
ices to the crown, bestowed upon him a gilded
tomahawk, with a dazzling belt, a gold snuff-
box, and a commission of brigadier-general in
the British service. Well would it have been
for the prophet had he remained in aland where
his deeds were so highly appreciated. But the

248 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

instinct of the savage brought him back to
Florida, where he was captured by the decoy of
an American vessel lying in the St. Marks river,
fl^^ing a British flag. He went ofl" to her in a
canoe, to meet allies, but found enemies, Avho
seized and delivered him to Jackson. He was
summarily hanged, with his brigadier's commis-
sion on his person.

It is a pleasing change to turn from deeds of
blood to instances of humanity, especially when
they come to us in the form of attractive youth.
A young Georgian, named Duncan McRim-
mon, captured by the Indians whilst he was
fishing, was doomed to death. The stake was
fixed, the victim bound, the faggots and torch
were read}^ when a deliverer came in the person
of Milly or Malee, a girl of sixteen years, the
daughter of Francis. Her intercessions induced
her father to spare McRimmon and send him to
St. Marks to insure his safety. Not thinking
himself secure there, McRimmon went aboard
the decoy vessel, and by a singular fatality was
there w^hen Francis also came.

Malee, bewitching in face, slender and grace-
ful in form, a Red Stick in blood and courage, an

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 249

expert with the rifle, a feadess rider who
required no other help than one of her small
hands to mount, was the ideal of an Indian
heroine. She was likewise sprightly in mind,
and spoke English and Spanish as well as
Indian.

An adventure will illustrate her heroic nature.
After her father's capture, but in ignorance of
it, she and several attendants barely escaped
the snare into which he had fallen. As they ap-
proached the decoy, however, something occur-
ring to excite suspicion, their canoe was turned
for the land. To arrest it, a blank shot was
firedby the vessel. That being unheeded, a charge
of grape shot was sent after the fugitives. The
missiles fell around them, but the canoe neither
pausing nor changing its course, was paddled
the faster for the shore. A boat was sent in pur-
suit, but the chase was too late. As the heroine
leaped from the canoe to the beach, she snatch-
ed a rifle from an attendant and fired at the
pursuers. The ball having grazed several of
them, and struck the rudder-post, put an end to
the chase.

After the close of the war,McRimmon sought

250 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

Malee in marriage. His suit, after repeated re-
fusals, was crowned with success. A marriage,
and a happy plantation home on the Suwanee,
\vere the fruits of her humanity, and his per-
sistent wooing. After eighteen years of mar-
ried life, Malee found herself a widow with eight
children.

Among the Red Sticks, who after the disas-
trous battle of the Horse Shoe fled to the Semi-
nole nation, ^vere a Creek mother and her
orphan boy, whose age might be twelve. The
3^oung Red Stick was destined in after years to
fill the continent with his name. Osceola was
old enough at the time of Tecumseh's mission,
and the stirring events in which it resulted, to
receive from them a deep and lasting impres-
sion. To those impressions, doubtless, and the
blood he derived from one of those Spartan war-
riors, whose heroism excited the admiration of
their conquerors, * was due his primacy in the

*So impressed was General Jackson's chivalric nature
with the lion-like courage of the Red Sticks at the battle of
the Horse Shoe, that he made an earnest, but ineffectual
effort to end the conflict, and thereby save a remnant of
that band of heroes.

<:OLONIAL FLORIDA. 251

Seminole war ; for an alien he was without the
influence of a sept to achieve it. In the career
of the Seminole chief may be discerned the far-
reaching influence of the Great Shawnee, and
the abiding force of youthful impressions.

252 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

CHAPTER XXII.

Jackson's Invasion of West Florida in 1818 — Masot's Pro-
test — Capture of Pensacola — Capitulation of San
Carlos — Provisional Government Established by Jack-
son— Pensacola Restored to Spain — Governor Callava —
Treaty of Cession — Congressional Criticism of Jack-
son's Conduct.

Hitherto Jackson's operations had been con-
fined to the province of East Florida. On the
tenth of May, 1818, he began his invasion of
West Florida by crossing the Appalachicola
river at the Indian village of Ochesee. Thence
he followed a trail which led him over the
natural bridge of the Chipola river — a bridge
which it would be difficult for the v^ayfarer to
observe, as it is formed by the stream quieth"
sinking into a lime-stone cavern, through which
it again emerges within adistanceof half amile.

Within a few hundred yards of the trail, and
near the north side of the bridge, there is a cave
one-fourth of a mile in length, with many

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 253

lateral grottoes, itvS roof pendant with glittering
stalactites and its floor covered with lime-stones
moulded in varied and eccentric forms. Panic-
stricken by Jackson's campaign in East Florida,
the Indians on the west of the Appalachicola
river, when he began his westward march,
made this cave a place of refuge, and were there
quietly concealed when his troops unconsciously
marched over their subterranean retreat.

The army marched in two divisions. The one
commanded by Jackson in person followed the
bridge trail, the other moved by a trail which
led to the river, northward of the place where
it made its cavernous descent. The water
being high, the construction of a bridge or rafts
became necessary to enable the wagons and
artillerv to cross. Whilst the northern division
was thus obstructed, General Jackson, unim-
peded in his march, reached the appointed place
of junction. Here he waited, in hourly expecta-
tion of the appearance of the other column,
until worked up to a frenzy of impatience which
was changed to indignation when, after the junc-
tion, the interposition of a river — contradicted,
as he supposed, by his own immediate experi-

254 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

ence — was assigned as the cause of the delay.
At length, however, the guides, by disclosing the
existence of the bridge, solved the riddle and re-
stored the general to good humor.

His march westward, and south of the north-
ern boundar\^ of the province of West Florida,
brought him to the Escambia river, which,
having crossed, he reached the road that he
had opened over the old trail in 1814, when he
marched to Pensacola on a similar mission to
that in which he v^as now engaged.

Don Jose Masot, who was governor of West
Florida, having received intelligence of Jackson's
westward march and his designs on Pensacola,
sent him a written protest against his invasion,
as an offence against the Spanish king, '^ ex-
horting and requiring him to retire from the
Province,'' threatening if he did not, to use force
for his expulsion. This protest was delivered
by a Spanish officer, on May 23, after Jackson
had crossed the Escambia river and was within
a few hours' march of Pensacola. Notwith-
standing Masot's threat, instead of advancing
to meet the invader, he hastily retired with
most of his troops to Fort San Carlos, leaving

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 255

a fe\v only at Pensacola, under the command of
Lieutenant-colonel Don Lui Piemas, for the pur-
pose of making a show of resistance.

Masot's protest, instead of retarding, seems
to have accelerated Jackson's advance. In the
afternoon of the same da^^ on which it was re-
ceived, the American army was in possession of
Fort St. Michael and encamped around it.
Thence, immediately upon its occupation, Jack-
son sent Masot a dispatch in reply to his pro-
test, in which he demanded an immediate
surrender of Pensacola and Barrancas. In his
answer, on May 24, to that demand, Masot,
as to Pensacola, referred Jackson to Don Lui
Piemas; as to San Carlos he replied: "This
fortress I am resolved to defend to the last ex-
tremity. I shall repel force by force, and he
who resists aggression can never be considered
an aggressor. God preserve your excellency
many years." Upon the receipt of this com-
munication, Jackson, by arrangement with
Colonel Piemas, took possession of Pensacola.

On the twenty-fifth, Jackson replied to
Masot's dispatch of the twenty-fourth, in which
he tells him he is aware of the Spanish force,

256 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

and hints at the foil}' of resistance to an over-
\vhelming enemy. In conclusion he says: '*I
applaud your feelings as a soldier in wishing to
defend your post, but when resistance is ineffec-
tual and the opposing force overwhelming, the
sacrifice of a few brave men is an act of wanton-
ness, for which the commanding officer is ac-
countable to his God."

In the evening of the day on which Jackson's
communication was w^ritten, and within a few
hours after it was received by Masot, Fort
San Carlos was invested by the American army.
On the night of the twenty-fifth, batteries were
established in favorable positions within three
hundred and eighty-five yards of the fort,
though the work was interrupted by the Span-
ish guns. Before the American batteries replied,
Jackson, in his anxiety to spare the effusion of
blood, sent Masot, under a flag of truce, another
demand to surrender, accompanied by a rep-
resentation of the futility, if not the folly, of
further resistance. The refusal of the demand
was followed by the batteries and the fort
opening upon each other. The firing continued
until evening, when a flag from the fort invited

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 257

a parley, which resulted in a truce until the fol-
lowing day, the twenty-seventh, when, at eight
o'clock in the morning, articles of capitulation
were signed. Such was Masot's defense to "the
last extremity," and such the fruit of Jackson's
expostulation with his fiery but feeble antag-
onist.

The military features of the capitulation were
that the Spanish surrender should be made
with the honors of war, drums beating; and
flags fl3^ing, during the march from the gate
of the fort to the foot of the glacis, where
the arms were to be stacked; the garrison
to be transported to Havana ; and their rights
of property, to the last article, stricth-
respected.

But, as in the case of General Campbell's and
Governor Chester's surrender, in 1781, to Gal-
vez, there was a political aspect to the capitu-
lation of Masot.

In Jackson's despatch to Calhoun, Secretary
of war, he says of the capitulation: '*The
articles, with but one condition, amount to a
complete cession to the United States, of that
portion of the Floridas hitherto under the gov-

258 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

eniment of Don Jose Masot. " The condition
alluded to was, that the province should be
held by the United States until Spain could fur-
nish a sufficient militar^^ force to execute the
obligations of existing treaties.

Having accepted the cession of West-Florida
to the United States, Jackson further assumed
the authority of constituting a provisional
government for the conquered province. He
appointed one of his officers. Colonel King, civil
and military governor ; he extended the revenue
laws of the United States over the country ; ap-
pointed another of his officers. Captain Gads-
den, collector of the port of Pensacola, with
authority to enforce those laws ; declared what
civil laws should be enforced, and provided for
the preservation of the archives, as well as for
the care and protection of what had been the
-^property of the Spanish crown, but now, in the
v'General's conception, become the property of
^he United States.

Shortly after these occurrences. General Jack-
son, with his constitution sorely tried by the
fatigue and privations of the campaign, left
Pensacola for his home in Tennessee, to find

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 259

quietude and repose, made- sweet by public ap-
plause on the one side, and interrupted by bitter
censure and criticism on the other.

The views with which Jackson began the
Seminole campaign in March, and those which
he entertained at its close in May, by the capit-
ulation of Masot, present a strange and strik-
ing contrast. He invaded East-Florida to
crush the Seminoles, as he had crushed the
Creeks of Alabama. This he accomplished by
invading the territory of a power at peace with
the United States. As an imperious necessit\%
the invasion was justified by his government.
During his operations, however, he acquired in-
formation from which he concluded that there
existed a sympathy between the Spanish
officials at Pensacola and the Indians. Osten-
sibly, to correct that abuse he marched to Pen-
sacola, where he ended his campaign by procur-
ing the cession of the province of West-Florida,
followed by the establishment of an American
government, without the authority of the
United States.

The United States, without formally disavow-
ing Jackson's conduct, signified its readiness to

260 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

restore Pensacola and St. Marks whenever a
Spanish force presented itself to receive the sur-
render. In September, 1819, such a force ap-
pearing at Pensacola, the town and Barrancas
were immediately evacuated by the American
troops. And thus ended the government estab-
lished by Jackson, after it had existed fourteen
months, during which it was administered
to the satisfaction of the inhabitants of the
Province.

With the troops there came as governor Don
Jose Maria Callava, knight of the military order
ofHermenegildo,\vho, in 1811, had won the cross
of distinction for gallant conduct in the battle
of Almonacid, one of the many fiercely fought
battles of the Peninsula war.

The advent of the Spaniards seemed to be in-
consistent with the fact that, on the twenty-
second of the previous February, a treaty had
been entered into between Secretary Adams and
Don Louis de Onis, the Spanish minister for the
cession of the Floridas. But it was subject to
the ratification of both governments, and,
though ratified by the United States, it had not
been acted upon by Spain. At first the re-occu-

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 261

pation might have been considered a matter of
form, in which a sensitive government consulted
its dignity by placing itself in a condition to
make a voluntary surrender of territory for a
consideration, instead of appearing to submit to
a conquest. But, as time rolled on without a
ratification of the treaty by Spain, the re-occu-
pation of Pensacola seemed to point to her
determination to permanently retain the
Floridas.

It was believed, at the time the treaty was
negotiated, that Jackson's bold action had done
more to bring it about than Mr. Adams' diplo-
matic skill, a belief for which there was an
apparent foundation in the delay of Spain to
ratify it after the pressure of his conquest was
removed.

No instance in the life of that great man more
strikingly illustrates than these transactions
the beneficent working of that imperious will,
to which he made everything bend that stood
in the way to the attainment of what he con-
ceived a patriotic end.

The necessity for the campaign of 1814, as
well as that which he had just closed, convinced

262 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

him that Florida, as a Spanish colony, would
be a constant menace to the peace and security
of the border settlements of Alabama and
Georgia, not so much from the hostilit}^ of the
Spanish as their inability to control the restless
and war-like Seminoles. He saw, too, the
necessity of making Spain sensible of her obli-
gation to exercise the necessary restraint upon
her savage subjects, and at the same time to
make her fully realize the large and onerous
military establishment it would be necessary' to
maintain in Florida to accomplish that object.
The articles of capitulation brought the United
States and Spain face to face upon this question.
It impressed upon the former the imperative
necessity of securing a permanent cession, and
it compelled the latter to count the cost in-
volved in fulfilling the condition by which only
the provisional cession could be nullified.

A stud}^ of the correspondence between Masot
and Jackson, w^hilst the latter was still east of
the Appalachicola river, creates the impression
that the reason assigned by Jackson for his ex-
pedition to Pensacola was but a pretext, and
that the real motive was made manifest by the

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 263

articles of capitulation — a provisional cession,
as the first step to a permanent cession. He
was unsustained by his government openly, at
least, he was censured by a congressional com-
mittee and denounced by the press, but he soon
found his vindication in public opinion, en-
lightened by subsequent events.

Masot, the other chief actor in these transac-
tions, had been appointed governor of West
Florida in November, 1816, and, as we have
seen, his official term ended with the capitula-
tion of the twenty-seventh of May, 1818.
Shortly afterwards he left Pensacola for Havana
in the cartel Peggy, one of the vessels provided
by Jackson to carry the Spanish governor to
the latter place. The Peggy was overhauled by
an armed vessel under the "Independent Flag,"
as the ensign of Spain's revolted South Ameri-
can colonies was called. No lives were taken,
nor was the Peggy made a prize, for she was an
American, but the Spaniards were robbed.
Masot had with him eight thousand dollars in
coin, which he had concealed. A slight suspen-
sion by the neck, however, as a hint of a higher
and more fatal one, wrung from him the hiding-

264 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

place of his treasure, which he lost, but saved
his life.* The Peggy was overhauled bj the
''Independent Flag," during a vo^-age to
Havana from Campeachy, whither she had
taken refuge from what w^as supposed to be a
piratical vessel.

During Masot's administration there occurred
a transaction which occupied a place in the in-
vestigations of the special committee of the
senate of the United States, appointed, in 1818,
to inquire into and report upon the occurrences
of the Seminole war of that 3^ear, prominent
amongst them the capture of St. Marks and
Pensacola. The committee condemned all Jack-
son's proceedings and seem to have even
harbored the suspicion that a land speculation
prompted him to exact a cession of the latter
place. The circumstances w^hich induced the
suspicion are detailed in an affidavit of General
John B. Eaton, afterwards secretary of war
under Jackson and governor of Florida, which
appears amongst the documents accompanying
the report of the committee. t

* Niles' Weekly Register, Vol. XV., p. 261.
t Niles' Weekh' Register, Vol. XV., p. 88.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 265

It seems that, in 1817, Eaton and James
Jackson of Nashville— nowise related to General
Jackson— foreseeing that Florida was to be ac-
quired b}' the United States, resolved to make a
purchase of lots in Pensacola and lands in its
vicinity. To them w^ere afterwards added six
associates, John McCrae, James Jackson, Jr.,
John C. McElmore, John Jackson, Thomas
Childress and John Donelson, who was anephew
of Mrs. Jackson. Donelson and a Mr. Gordon
were appointed to proceed to Pensacola to
make the purchases. As a measure of security
to Donelson and Gordon, Eaton applied to
General Jackson and obtained for them a letter
of introduction to Masot. Provided with this
letter, w^hich facilitated their operations, Donel-
son and Gordon went to Pensacola and fulfilled
their mission by buying a large number of un-
improved town lots, sixty acres of land adjoin-
ing the town and a tract on the bay two or
three miles to the westward.

Eaton says : General Jackson had no interest
in the speculation, nor was he consulted respect-
ino- it, his onl}^ connection with it being the
letter to Masot. As there is no allusion to the

266 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

transaction in the report of the committee, they^
must have concluded that the suspicion which
prompted the search for evidence respecting it
was unfounded. Such at least must be the just
conclusion from the silence in respect to the
matter observed by a document so full of
pointed condemnation of Jackson's acts, of the
manner in which his army was raised and the
officers commissioned by himself, the executions
of Arbuthnot and Ambrister, the capture of St.
Marks and Pensacola, the establishment of a
provisional government, the extension of the
revenue laws of the United States over the
conquered province, and the appointments for it
of a governor and a collector of the customs.

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 267

CHAPTER XXIII.

Treaty Ratified— Jackson Appointed Provisional Governor
— Goes to Pensacola — Mrs. Jackson in Pensacola —
Change of Flags — Callava Imprisoned — Territorial Gov-
ernment— Governor Duval — First Legislature Meets at
Pensacola.

Although the United States was unremit-
ting in its efforts to induce Spain to ratify the
treaty of cession, her ratification was post-
poned from time to time under various pretexts.
Prominent English journals having declared,
that if Florida was ceded to the United
States, Great Britian, in order to maintain her
influence in the Gulf of Mexico, should insist
upon a surrender to her of the Island of Cuba,
public opinion in the United States i^ettled
down to the conclusion that the 'delay of the
ratification was due to British intrigue. But,
that this opinion was ill founded, is evident
from President Monroe's message of the seventh
of December, 1819, in which he sa^-s : "In the

268 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

course which the Spanish government has on
this occasion thought proper to pursue, it is
satisfactory^ to know that the\' have not been
countenanced by any European power. On the
contrary, the opinion and wishes of both France
and Great Britain have not been withheld
either from the United States or Spain, and
have been unequivocal in favor of ratification. "

The procrastination of Spain was the occa-
sion of intense public feeling in the United
States; which at lens^th formallv manifested
itself on March 8, 1820, in a resolution reported
b\' the committee of Foreign Relations of the
House of Representatives, to authorize the Pres-
ident to take possession of West Florida.
Patience, however, prevailed, and on February
19, 1821, the ratification took place.

General Jackson was shortly afterwards ap-
pointed Provisional Governor of Florida, and
instructed to proceed to Pensacola with a
small military force, to receive from the Spanish
authorities a formal surrender of West Florida.
On April 18, he left the Hermi^:.^e, w^ith Mrs.
Jackson and his adopt^^'^. son, Andrew Jackson

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 269

Donelson, to enter upon the long, tedious jour-
ney to Pensacola, via New Orleans. .

A stage of the journey in Southern Alabama,
brought him to a military post, in the neighbor-
hood of which, William Weatherford, the Creek
hero, resided. At the suggestion of General
Jackson, Colonel Brooke, the commandant of
the Post, and his host, invited Weatherford to
dine with his conqueror. The invitation was
accepted. When the Great Chief appeared,
Jackson cordially met him, and taking him by
the hand, presented him to Mrs. Jackson as
"the bravest man in his tribe. "

Coming into Florida earW in Juh', on reach-
inor what was then known as the Fifteen Mile
House, now as Gonzalia, where Mr. Manuel
Gonzalez then had his cattle ranch, the General
spent several days with him. Whilst there,
hearing of the approach of his troops, accom-
panied by Mr. Gonzalez, he went up the road
to meet them. Comin^^ to a creek, thev saw
the wagons of several up-country traders stuck
in the mud, which the latter, for lack of suffi-
cient force, were making ineffectual attempts
to move. On the other side of the branch were

270 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

several men lying on the ground, and horses
grazing near them. Accosting the men who
were tugging at the wheels of a wagon, Jackson
said, ** Why don't you get those men across the
branch to help you ? " "Oh ! they say they are
General Jackson's staff. " ''Well, " said he, " I
am General Jackson himself, and by the eternal,
I will help you I " And with those w^ords, dis-
mounting from his horse, and throwing off his
coat, he lustily put his shoulder to the wheel.

Upon the arrival of the troops at the Fifteen
Mile House, headquarters were established, and
remained there until all the arrangements were
made for a formal change of government.

Mrs. Jackson, however, took up her residence
at Pensacola two or three weeks before Jul^^ 17,
when the change of flags was to take place.
During the Sundays which preceded the change,
Mrs. Jackson, who was an eminently pious
woman, cherishing great reverence for the Sab-
bath, was greatly scandalized by the manner
in which it was dishonored. Shops did more
business on that day than any other. It was a
day of public gambling, fiddling, dancing, and
boisterous conduct. When the last Sunday of

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 271

Spanish rule came, seemingly because the last,
the fiddling, dancing, noise and confusion, ex-
ceeded that of any preceding one. Unable to
restrain her pious indignation, Mrs. Jackson
vented it in a protest against the Sabattic Sat-
urnalia, made through Major Staunton, with the
emphatic announcement that the next Sunday
should be differently spent.

In anticipation of the change of government,
there was a large influx of people from the
States, induced by the great expectations enter-
tained of the future of Pensacola ; a future in
which it was confidently predicted, it was to be
the rival of New Orleans. Many persons also
came expecting official appointments from the
new Governor, but who, greatly to his chagrin,
aswelearnfrom Mrs. Jackson's letters, were dis-
appointed, in consequence of the President him-
self making the appointments.

At length the sun arose upon the day when
its beams were for the last time to bathe in
light the ancient banner of Castile and Aragon,
as the emblem of the sovereignty of these
shores. In the early morning appeared in the
Public Square the Spanish Governor's guards,

272 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

haiidsomeW dressed and equipped, consisting
of a full company of dismounted dragoons of
the regiment of Tarragona. After a parade,
they fell into line south of the flag stafl", extend-
ing from east to west in front of the Govern-
ment House, which stood on the north-east cor-
ner of Jefferson and Sargossa streets. At eight
o'clock there marched down Palafox street a
battalion of the Fourth Infantry, and a com-
pany of the Fourth United States Artiller^^,
coming from their camp at Gal vez Springs, which
filing into the Square, formed a line opposite the
Spanish guards, and north of the flag staff-
Precisely^ at ten o'clock. General Jackson and
his stafl", entering the Square, passed amid
salutes from the Spanish and American troops,
between their lines to the Government House,
where Governor Callava awaited him for the
purpose of executing the documentary^ formali-
ties of the cession. As the first sign that this
act was performed, the Spanish sergeant guard
at the gate was relieved b}' an American sen-
tinel. General Jackson and Governor Callava
then left the house, and passed between the
double line of troops. As they reached the flag

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 273

staff the Spanish flag came down, and the stars
and stripes went up, saluted by the Fourth Artil-
lery and the sloop-of-war Hornet, whilst her
band, assisting at the ceremon}', played the
Star Spangled Banner.

At Barrancas the ceremony w^as slightly
different. The flags of both nations appeared
at the same time at half-mast. In that posi-
tion they were saluted by the Spaniards. As
the flags were separated, one ascending and the
other descending, both were honored with a
salute by the .Americans.

The da\' was naturally one of rejoicing to the
Americans, but as naturally one of sadness
and in some instances of heart aches to the
Spanish population. The advantages of being
under the United States government were too
great not to be appreciated by owners of real
estate and business men generally. But there
w^as a sentimental side to the change. Some of
the Spanish garrison had married in Pensacola,
and with others the inhabitants had formed
social ties, induced by a common language,
habits and tastes. To them it can well be im-
agined that the change of flags was but the

274 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

presage of bitter separations. In 1763 all
the Spanish left the country, and in a common
exile mutual consolation was found; but, in
1821, the sorrow was that a part went and a
part remained to mingle with a strange people.
Mrs. Jackson, in a letter, thus expresses the
emotions of the occasion: "Oh! how they
burst into tears to see the last ray of hope de-
part from their devoted city and country — de-
livering up the keys of the archives — the vessels
lying in the harbor in full view to waft them to
their distant port. . . . How did the city sit
solitary and mourn. Never did my heart feel
more for a people. Being present, I entered
immediately into their feelings."

The Sunday following the change was, ac-
cording to Mrs. Jackson's prediction, one of
quietude and freedom from the license of
-previous ones, which had so shocked her
:religious sensibilities. She thus expresses the
ichange: ''Yesterday I had the happiness of
-witnessing the truth of what I had said. Great
order was observed, the doors kept shut, the
gambling houses demolished, fiddling and danc-
ing not heard any more on the Lord's day,

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 275

cursing not to be heard." For the change the
lovers of Sunday quietude were doubtless
indebted to Mrs. Jackson, for her prediction is
not to be taken as that of a prophetess who
merel}' foresees and foretells, but that of a
woman with a will of her own, and conscious
of her ability to direct the stern governor in
the exercise of his authority, at least outside of
politics.

The next morning after the change of flags,
the Spanish officers and garrison sailed for
Havana in the transports Anne Maria and
Tom Shields, under convoy of the United States
sloop-of-war Hornet.

Governor Callava and staff, however, re-
mained in Pensacola, where his handsome
person, polished manners, soldierly bearing and
high character made him a general favorite with
the American officers and their families, who
extended to him every social courtesy. General
and Mrs. Jackson, however, were distant and
reserved in their bearing towards him, resulting
in some measure from a prejudice against Span-
ish officials induced b}' the general's experience
with Maurique and Masot. Perhaps, too, there

276 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

mingled with that prejudice a slight feeling of
jealousy of Callava's social success, a weakness
from which strong characters, under the insinu-
ation of others, are not exempt.

There soon occurred, however, a painful inter-
ruption of the gallant Spaniard's social enjoy-
ment— so graceful an attendant of the change
of government — by an occurrence which must
be regarded as a lasting reproach to its authors.

The treaty required the Spanish government
to surrender all documents relating to private
rights in the archives of the province. This
duty had been performed by Callava, who had
caused a separation to be made between the
documents falling within the definition of the
treaty and others which did not, and had de-
livered the former to Alcalde H. M. Brackenridge,
an appointee of the American gove^rnor. The
latter papers, packed in boxes for transporta-
tion to Havana, were placed in the custod}^ of
Doningo Sousa, one of Callava's subordinates.
In the separation of the papers, one relating to
the estate of Nicholas Maria Vidal, involving a
trifling sum, was by accident placed with the

COLONIAL FLORIDA 277

documents in one of the boxes in Sousa's pos-
session.

A woman claiming to be an heir of Vidal com-
plained to Brackenridge that the paper had not
been delivered to him and was about to be
removed to Havana by Sousa. Brackenridge,
instead of politely calling Callava's attention
to the woman's complaint and asking for a sur-
render of the document, at once made a pre-
emptory demand for it upon Sousa. Sousa
properly declined compliance, alleging his want
of authority to do so without instructions
from Callava, and at the same time, to relieve
himself from responsibility in the matter, sent
the boxes to Callava's house. Brackenridsfe at
once reported the matter to Jackson, who
ordered Sousa to be imprisoned, and at the same
time Callava to be arrested and brought before
him immediately, although it was night and
Callava was at the time at a dinner party at Col-
onel Brooke's. When the knightly Castilian was
brought before Jackson, he naturally proposed
to enter a protest against such astonishing
proceedings. This Jackson would not permit,
but insisted that Callava should at once answer

278 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

interrogatories to be propounded to him. Cal-
lava's persistent attempts to protest were as
persistently interrupted b\' Jackson, until at
last the latter, in a rage of passion, ordered him
to be imprisoned, an order which was promptly
executed by commiting him to the calaboose,
where Sousa had preceded him. This outrage
committed. Alcalde Brackenridge, as if deter-
mined to leave no bounds of decency un violated,
had the boxes at Callava's house opened that
night and took from one of them the worthless
paper — worthless at least to the claimant — that
had occasioned the trouble.

For this disgraceful transaction Brackenridge
is primarily responsible. He was an intelligent
law3^er, afterwards a judge, and later a member
of Congress from Pennsylvania; and therefore,
presumably acquainted with the decencies, to
say nothing of the amenities of official inter-
course. He w^as likewise well acquainted with
Jackson's prejudices and irascible temper, as
well as what a fire-brand to his nature w^ere the
w^rongs, whether real or simulated, of a woman.
In the light of these considerations, Bracken-
ridge must stand condemned, as either a wilful

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 279

mischief-maker, or a wily sycophant, playing
from selfish motives, upon the weaknesses of a
great man.

But neither Jackson's greatness, nor his being
the dupe of Brackenridge, can remove from him
the reproach of having in this transaction vio-
lated official courtes}^ the chivalrous con-
sideration due by one distinguished soldier to
another, as well as the laws of international
comity and hospitalit3\

A writ of Habeas Corpus was issued b}^ Hon.
Elijias Fromentin, U. S. Judge for West Florida,
to bring before him Callava and Sousa, on the
night they were committed. Obedience to the
writ was refused by the guard, who sent it to
the Governor. Thereupon, His Excellenc\' issued
a notice to the Judge to appear before him, "to
show cause why he has attempted to interfere
with my authority as Governor of the Floridas,
exercising the powers of the Captain-General
and Intendant of the Island of Cuba. " The
Judge prudently delayed his appearance until
the next daj', in order to allow the Governor
time to cool ; but in the meantime remained in
momentary expectation of a guard to take

280 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

him to jail. The affair, however, ended in a
storm\' interview, in which to the Governor's
question, whether the Judge "would dare to
issue a writ to be served on the Captain-Gen-
eral," the latter replied, ''No, but if the case
should require it, I would issue one to be served
on the President of the United States. "

After the troublesome paper was procured by
Brackenridge, an order was made for the release
of Callava. A few days after his release he left
Pensacola for Washington to make his com-
plaints to the United States government.

Some of the Spanish officers whom he had left
in Pensacola, published after his departure, a
paper expressing their sense of the outrage to
which he had been subjected. This being regard-
ed by Jackson as an attempt *'to disturb the
harmony, peace and good order of the existing
government of the Floridas," the protesting
Spaniards were by proclamation ordered to
leave the country by the third of October, allow-
ing them four da3^s for preparation, *'on pain of
being dealt with according to law, for contempt
and disobedience of this, my proclamation. "

A tragedy occurred during Jackson's rule,

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 281

which illustrates his lack of tenderness of
human life. With full knowledge of the affair,
he permitted a duel to be fought in a ])ublic
place by two young officers, Hull and Randall.
When he was informed that the former had
fallen, shot through the heart, pistol in hand,
with the trigger at half-cock, he angrily ex-
claimed : '' Damn the pistol ; by G — d, to think
that a brave man should risk his life on a hair-
trigger ! "

Jackson's bearing generally, and especially
liis summary dealings with Callava and Sousa,
had inspired the population with great fear of
his despotic temper. Of that feeling there oc-
curred a ludicrous illustration. An alarm of
fire brought a crowd to the Public Square,
which was near the fire. General Jackson also
hurried to the scene. To stir the lookers-on to
exertion, he made a yelling appeal. The crowd
not understanding English, and thinking it
had heard a notice to disperse, took to its heels,
and left the General the sole occupant of the
Square.

Mrs. Jackson was a domestic woman, and
better satisfied to have her husband at home,

282 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF

than to see him in exalted stations requiring"
his absence from the Hermitage. Whilst in
Pensacola, she pined for that dear spot ; and it
is, evidently, \Yith joy, that she announced in a
letter to a friend, that the General calls his
coming to Florida, ''a wild goose chase," and
that he proposed an early return. In October
they returned to Tennessee.

That a man of his estate and political pros-
pects, should have accepted, to fill for a few
months, the office of Governor of a wilderness,
with a salary of $5,000, admits of only one ex-
planation. His recent campaign had been so
severely condemned, that he regarded the ten-
der of the appointment by Mr. Monroe, as hav-
ing the semblance, at least, of a national apol-
ogy for the injustice which he had suffered, and
accordingly he accepted it in the spirit in which
it was tendered. In a word, he filled the office,,
because filling it would be a vindication of his
conduct in the campaign of 1818.

On the third of March, 1822, congress
established a territorial government for both
the Floridas as one territory. The first gov-
ernor under the territorial organization was

COLONIAL FLORIDA. 283

W. P. Duval of Kentuck}^, who had rbpresented
a district of that state in congress, and who
was the original of Washington Irving^s Ralph
Ring wood. He resided, temporarih^ in Pensa-
cola, where the legislative council of thirteen,
appointed by the President, held its first session.
It had hardly begun its work, however, when
the yellow fever breaking out compelled an ad-
journment to the Fifteen-mile house, before
mentioned, where the Florida statutes of 1822
were enacted. One of them illustrates the vice
or virtue there may be in a name. The title of
"An Act for the Benefit of Insolvent Debtors,"
w^as misprinted in the laws of the session so as
to read: *'An Act for the Relief of Insolent
Debtors." The error destroyed its utility, and
no man, it is said, as long as it remained on the
statute book, ever invoked the relief of its pro-
visions.

The limit assigned to these historical sketches
has now been reached. The space that inter-
venes between the visit of the luckless Navaez
to Pensacola bay and the establishment of the
territorial government of Florida embraces a
period of nearly three hundred 3'ears. The

284 SKETCHES OF COLONIAL FLORIDA.

changes and shifting scenes which, during that
period, marked the history of the settlements on
its shores, stand in contrast with the persistency
of the arbitrary boundary line of the Perdido,
established by the mutual consent of the Spanish
and French in the earl^^ ^^ears of the eighteenth
century. Disturbed by the English dominion
for twenty 3^ears, it was restored by the Span-
ish, and finally confirmed in 1822 by the act of
congress establishing a territorial government
for the Floridas.

In 1820 the constitutional convention of
Alabama, in anticipation of the ratification of
the Spanish treaty, memorialized congress to
embrace West Florida within the boundaries of
that state. The memorial enforced the measure
with all those obvious arguments which come
to the mind w^hen it turns to the subject. But
they were silenced, as if by the imperious decree
of fate that the Perdido boundary should be,
and forever remain, a monument of d' Arriola's
diligence in reaching the Gulf coast three years
before d' Iberville.

14 DAY USE

RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED

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Renewed books are subject to immediate recalL ^,

J NTER ;. . . , Aint) DISC CIRC DEC 1 4 'Q?

COSH

A?R 3 0 1965

TKTt?

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OCT 19 19^8

NOV - 3 1981

RECEIVED

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FEB 16 1993

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