While we know our northern friends may not feel it, in the South, Spring is
here. So we thought we'd share a few of our gardening sites appropriate
for this time of the year. Along with gardening, there's grilling, and getting
ready to diet so that you can fit back into that bathing suit this summer!
From The Conquest By De Soto To The Year 1818. Missionary
Operations By The Spaniards.
Moore S Invasion Of Florida. Bowles. Wars Of 1812. Defeat Of The Seminoles By
General Jackson.
We can but briefly touch upon the
incidents of Florida history for nearly two
centuries after De Soto s invasion. The
French Huguenot refugees, who settled upon
St. John's River in 1562, found the natives
placable and generous. Although their
kindness was but ill reciprocated by the
colony, no very serious difficulties
occurred between the two races. The power
and self-confidence of the Indians had been
broken, and their numbers greatly reduced,
by the desolating ravages committed by the
Spaniards.
In the brutal and murderous wars between the
French and Spanish colonies, which succeeded
the new attempts at settlement, the Indians,
although they took no conspicuous part, were
occasionally involved in hostilities. The
most important era in the native history of
this period is that of the establishment of
a regular missionary system of instruction.
The central point of these operations was
the convent of St. Helena, situated at St.
Augustine. Don Pedro Menendez de Avilla, the
Spanish governor who founded this town, and
who had been commissioned by the king of
Spain to spread the Catholic religion among
the Indians, was indefatigable in carrying
out his sovereign s intentions. The success
met with by the ecclesiastics sent forth
among the various tribes, is astonishing. In
the wilder ness of central Florida may still
be seen the ruins of buildings erected by
their means for religious exercises. Their
efforts were not confined to the vicinity of
the colonies: emissaries penetrated the
western forests, even to the Mississippi;
and amid the rough mountain districts of the
north, they were to be found living with the
Indians, and assiduously instructing them,
not only in their religious creed, but in
language and useful arts.
The Spanish influence might perhaps have
been maintained over the Indians during the
existence of the colony, but for the jealous
suspicions of Cabrana, who was made governor
in 1680. He put to death the principal chief
of the Yemasees, or inhabitants of East
Florida, upon an accusation of having given
aid and comfort to the English settlers on
the St. John's, then called May River. The
consequence of this act was a long and
troublesome war.
The unfortunate Indians were for many years
after this event made the tools of the
hostile European colonies: first in the
French and Spanish wars, and afterwards, in
1702 and 1704, when Governor Moore, of South
Carolina, invaded Florida.
In the northwestern districts of the
peninsula dwelt the Appalachees; the rest of
the country was inhabited by the Yemasees.
These two nations had formerly been upon
terms of the bitterest enmity, but had been
reconciled by the mediation of the
Spaniards. Moore, followed by a considerable
body of English, and a large force of Creek
Indians, ravaged nearly the whole country,
beginning at Appalachee, and proceeding
southeasterly to the Atlantic seaboard. He
carried away many Indians of the, conquered
tribes to the English plantations as slaves.
After a long period of hopeless and
profitless warfare, in which they had
nothing to gain by success, and by means of
which they were disabled from agriculture
and deprived of a settled abode, the
scattered remnants of the Indian tribes
gradually took up their quarters in the
heart of the country, and farther towards
the south. In the latter part of the
eighteenth century they acquired the name of
Seminoles, said to signify " wanderers."
In the year 1792, an unprincipled adventurer
from England, named Bowles, made strenuous
attempts to excite the hostility of the
Indians against the Spanish settlers.
Failing in a direct attempt to plunder an
Indian trading-house on the St. John's, and
finding himself abandoned by his associates,
he betook himself to the Creeks, married a
woman of that tribe, and persuaded the
Indians that the store of goods which he had
attacked belonged rightfully to them. He met
with considerable success in deceiving the
simple-minded natives, and, assisted by
several chiefs of the Creek nation, he got
possession of the fortress of St. Marks.
Delivering himself up to riot and
drunkenness, with his followers, it proved
no difficult task for the Spanish troops to
retake the fort. Bowles was allowed to
escape, but was afterwards delivered up by
his Indian allies, and taken to Cuba a
prisoner. The Seminoles were partially
involved in the wars of 1812 and the two
succeeding years, when the Americans invaded
Florida. Their chief leaders were King Payne
and his brother, the noted Boleck or
Bowlegs. Having done no little damage by
burning buildings and plundering the
plantations in their vicinity, they purposed
to march northward, but were engaged and
routed nearer home, by General Newman, with
a body of troops from Georgia. This force
having crossed the St. John's, marched into
Alachua, and encountered Payne within a few
miles of his head-quarters. The Indians
fought bravely, but could not resist the
superior skill of the whites. Payne was
killed, and his men were driven off in the
first engagement; but they rallied, and
returned to the attack with redoubled
energy. They possessed them selves of the
body of their chief; and afterwards,
surrounding the American forces, kept them
in a state of siege for a number of days,
imperfectly protected by a structure of
logs.
After this period, and previous to the
cession of the Floridas to the United
States, the affairs of the Seminoles and
their American neighbors were unsettled, and
some bloody scenes were enacted. Fugitive
slaves from the adjoining states found a
secure asylum among the immense wilds of the
marshy and uninhabited territory of the
Floridas, and conflicting claims of Indians
and whites respecting negroes long after
formed a fertile source of quarrel and
complaint. Some of the Seminoles became
possessed of large numbers of slaves,
holding them by undisputed title.
In the month of March 1818, General Jackson,
with more than three thousand men, over one
half of whom were Creek warriors, marched
into West Florida to punish and check the
ravages of the Seminoles. With little
opposition from the inhabitants, the towns
surrounding the lake of Miccosukie were
destroyed, and much booty, in corn and
cattle, was secured. The Indian villages
upon the Oscilla and St. Mark's Rivers,
known as the Fowel towns, met with a similar
fate. St. Mark s was soon after occupied by
the invaders, and, in the ensuing month, the
great body of the Seminoles, aided by large
numbers of negroes, was defeated on the
borders of the Suwanee, and several hundred
were taken prisoners. The rest fled into
East Florida.
This site
includes some historical materials that may imply negative stereotypes
reflecting the culture or language of a particular period or place. These
items are presented as part of the historical record and should not be
interpreted to mean that the WebMasters in any way endorse the stereotypes
implied .
Indian Races of North and South America, By Charles De Wolf Brownell, 1865
