East Florida

Tonto, Creeks and Seminoles

2013-07-04T20:32:00.003-07:00

Actor Johnny Depp has recently gained scrutiny for basing his depiction of Tonto, in the film The Lone Ranger, on a painting not derived from any particular Native American tradition. The depiction includes a crow’s body perched on Tonto’s head.

This depiction, coincidentally, is not entirely inconsistent with the practice of Creek Indians of the Southeast and their relations among the Seminoles.

William Bartram remarked of the Creek Indians that “the junior priests or students…have a great owl skin cased and stuffed very ingeniously, so well executed, as almost to represent the living bird, having large sparkling glass beads, or buttons fixed in the head for eyes….”

Bartram remarked that priests-in-training sometimes wear “this insignia of wisdom and divination” “as a crest on the top of the head,” while “at other times the image sits on the arm, or is borne on the hand.”

Please consult William Bartram, William Bartram on the Southern Indians, ed. Gregory A. Waselkov and Kathryn L. Holland Braund (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1995), page 123.

Origins of Many Americans in the Southeast

2013-04-19T07:44:00.001-07:00

A 1785 advertisement in a Charleston, South Carolina newspaper announced that 152 Africans from the Gambia River would go on sale June 7, 1785. The advert appealed to a preference for Gambians already well established in Carolina: “The Negroes from this part of the coast of Africa are well acquainted with the cultivation of Rice, and are naturally industrious.”

In a landmark 1969 book, Philip D. Curtin estimated that almost 30% of Africans brought to South Carolina came from Senegambia (the region around the Senegal & Gambia Rivers). Please consult Philip D. Curtin, The Atlantic Slave Trade: A Census (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1972 [1969]).

Jews Arabs and Blacks Together in Jacksonville

2013-03-10T15:06:00.003-07:00

In the first few minutes of this video, US Air Force veteran and Civil Rights activist Alton Yates describes how Arab-Americans and Jewish-Americans were part of the African-American community in Jacksonville, Florida in the mid-1900s.

Georgia Workhouse

2012-10-10T15:43:00.000-07:00

The August 31, 1768 issue of the Savannah newspaper announced three runaway slaves "Brought to the Work-House," describing one as, "A TALL STOUT ABLE NEGRO FELLOW, about five feet nine inches high, about 30 years of age, has his country marks thus lll on each side of his face, is of the Coromantee country...says his name is Michael, but cannot tell his master's name, was brought from the Creek nation, where it's said he had been about two years. August 7th 1768"

In June, the Indians themselves returned runaway slave Sampson, who said "that he went to the Indian nation about seven years ago, but cannot tell his master's name." Sampson had "country marks," traditional African markings, down both sides of his face and a scar on his left shoulder. The third prisoner was a recently arrived African, who also "cannot tell him master's name" and apparently did not give his own. That prisoner "has holes in his ears and beads of different sorts round his neck...."

Senegal, Gambia & Florida

2012-10-10T15:18:00.001-07:00

From my opinion piece published by Folio Weekly (Jacksonville, Florida):

"The influence of the South Carolina slave market means many African Americans in Florida and Georgia probably have Senegambian heritage. A 1784 advertisement for 'Prime Healthy Gambia Negroes' in the South Carolina Gazette described Gambians as 'universally reckoned the best that can be imported, they being...well acquainted with the cultivation of rice, indigo and tobacco.' Rice was a major crop for coastal South Carolina and Georgia."

To read the rest of "Roots Rock: Recently discovered slave graves resurrect discussion on the origins of African Americans," Folio Weekly, 3 Jan. 2012, please visit http://bit.ly/yDDBzK.

Gambia

2012-02-10T12:00:00.000-08:00

In 1817, pirates intercepted a Spanish slave ship bound for Brazil with 95 slaves from Gambia. On October 20, 1817, pirates brought the slave ship Jesus Nazareno to Amelia Island, East Florida.

The Jesus Nazareno (Mariano Ferrar, captain) spent 47 days in the arduous Middle Passage. Of the 95 Africans placed in the ship, all 95 were alive upon reaching Amelia Island. Elizabeth M. Halcrow wrote, "Slaves from Senegambia and Angola were usually healthiest as they came by short routes on which the winds were fairly predictable."

In contrast, the American ship Aquila left Rio Pongo, Guinea with 143 slaves, of whom 126 were alive upon reaching Florida in 1810. In 1806, Zephaniah Kingsley's ship Peje acquired 19 slaves in Zanzibar, East Africa, of whom 16 were still alive upon reaching East Florida.

For information on the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database, visit the web site http://www.slavevoyages.org/tast/database/search.faces. For more on Zephaniah Kingsley's "Zinguibara" slaves, please consult, Daniel L. Schafer, Anna Madgigine Jai Kingsley: African Princess, Florida Slave, Plantation Slaveowner (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2003),139 note 3. Elizabeth M. Halcrow, Canes and Chains: A Study of Sugar and Slavery (Kingston, Jamaica: Heinemann, 1982), 30.

Slave Ship Mentor

2011-12-16T09:27:00.000-08:00

Advertising the arrival of 152 "prime healthy young negroes" from the Gambia River on the ship Mentor, merchants Robert Hazlehurst & Co. appealed to a well-established preference in the South Carolina slave market: "The negroes from this part of the coast of Africa, are well acquianted with the cultivation of rice, and are naturally industrious." The Columbia Herald (Charleston), 30 May 1785.

What sugar was to the Caribbean, rice was to coastal South Carolina and Georgia.

For more on the preferences and sources of the South Carolina slave market, consult Daniel C. Littlefield, Rice and Slaves: Ethnicity and the Slave Trade in Colonial South Carolina (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1991 [1981]) and Philip D. Curtin, The Atlantic Slave Trade: A Census (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1969).

Pearl Harbor Day

2011-12-07T07:15:00.000-08:00

To honor the 70th anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor (Dec. 7, 1941) Ancestry.com is making available their records of World War II, free through the remainder of the day: http://www.ancestry.com/pearlharbor.

Greg O'Brien and Scholarship on the Choctaw

2011-07-07T14:42:00.000-07:00

In the book Choctaws in a Revolutionary Age, 1750-1830, historian Greg O'Brien describes the importance of traditional religion for the Choctaw Nation, speakers of a Muskhogean language related to Chickasaw and Creek.

In the book Empire and Others, check for O'Brien's assessment of Choctaw effort to maintain trade with the British.

Please consult Greg O'Brien, "Protecting Trade Through War: Choctaw Elites and British Occupation of the Floridas," in Martin Daunton and Rick Halpern, eds., Empire and Others: British Encounters with Indigenous Peoples, 1600-1850 (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999), pages 149-166.

First Black Mayor of Jacksonville, Florida

2011-06-11T11:07:00.000-07:00

On May 14, 2011, the voters of Duval County, Florida elected Alvin Brown Mayor of Jacksonville.

Mayor Elect Brown will be the first African-American to serve as mayor of Jacksonville.

In the 1880s, Jacksonville had a Jewish-American mayor, Morris A. Dzialynski, pronounced "Dah-linsky."

In the 1980s, Jacksonville voters elected an Arab-American mayor, Tommy Hazouri.

Better Business Bureau: BBB Wise Giving Alliance

2011-03-25T19:42:00.000-07:00

On March 14, 2011, the Wilson County News (Floresville, Texas) published a news release for the Better Business Bureau on choosing a relief-based charity helping Japan.

Those considering donation to charities organization can find a BBB rating for the charity.

Writing for MSNBC in 2006, Elizabeth Schwinn offered ten recommendations for charitable giving.

St. Augustine's Plaza de la Constitucion

2010-06-20T08:18:00.000-07:00

The St. Augustine Record (St. Augustine, Florida) explained that the city's Plaza de la Constitucion received its name in 1813, when Spain adopted a Constitution and ordered monuments constructed in Spanish cities around the world.

The restored monarchy, later the same year, ordered the destruction of the monuments. According to the Record, "St. Augustine never took down their monument."

Latchway

2010-04-14T22:14:00.000-07:00

On Sept. 20, 1775, East Florida Governor Patrick Tonyn wrote to General Thomas Gage, the commander of British military forces in North America. Tonyn, the Irish-born governor of the heavily-Loyalist colony, wrote about efforts to thwart the land schemes of investor Jonathan Bryan. Please note the creative rendering of the Creek (Seminole) town of "Alachua:"

"In consequence of those transactions, so notoriously base and wicked, I issued at that time a proclamation against Bryan. In a few hours will set out a Constable, with two soldiers, who will also be appointed Constables, to Latchway, with a talk to the Cowkeeper and headmen, and a Judge's warrant, to apprehend Thomas Gray, wherever they can find him."

Peter Force, editor, American Archives... 9 vols. (Washington, DC: M. St. Clair and Peter Force, 1837-1853), Series Four, Volume 3: 745

Oral History Training, Kenyon College (Gambier, Ohio)

2010-02-11T05:43:00.000-08:00

Kenyon College hosts

Frank Dunkle, of the Ohio Humanities Council, announced on H-Net (Humanities and Social Services Online), "If you are doing an oral history project or are thinking about doing one, you should apply to attend this year's Oral History Institute, June 8-10 on the beautiful campus of Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio. The program trains participants in planning and conducting successful oral history projects. Emphasizing hands-on experience, topics covered in the two-and-a-half-day schedule include interviewing techniques, transcribing and archiving, and devising public programs based on oral history. To develop these skills, participants will work on a practice project that encompasses all stages of oral history and will also have time to consult with experts about planned projects. Sessions will also be available on using technology in oral history and on fundraising."

Kenyon College alumnae include President Rutherford B. Hayes, Defense News writer and former CNN anchor Kris Osborn, and Swedish Prime Minister (1969-1986) Olof Palme.

Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database

2010-01-24T12:50:00.000-08:00

Once available on CD ROM from the University of Cambridge, this database of over 30,000 Trans-Atlantic slave voyages is available online from Emery University, the National Endowment for the Humanities and the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute (Harvard University). Partners include The University of Hull (UK), Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) and Victoria University of Wllington (New Zealand).

Search by voyage outcome (for instance, slave embarked in the Americas), captain name (for instance, Kingsley) and main point of embarkation (say, Caribbean or mainland North America).

Once you open a listing detailing the regions of Africa from whence the slaves arrived, and the mortality figures for slaves and crew (data not available for every voyage), please remember to click "search" again. Otherwise, the same entry opens even if you click another.

Make a note of which entry, on which page, and return to your search results. Good luck with good research.

http://slavevoyages.org/tast/index.faces

Florida Historical Quarterly

2010-01-19T10:01:00.000-08:00

The Florida Historical Quarterly is online.

You can browse issues, starting with Volume 1, Issue 1 (April 1908), or you can search the volumes for keywords.

The service is provided by Publication of Archival, Library & Museum Materials (PALMM), a cooperative effort by the public universities of Florida.

East Florida

2009-11-15T14:51:00.000-08:00

For twenty years, Britain claimed claimed Florida (1763-1783). The British divided Florida into two provinces. Pensacola was the capital of West Florida (basically, Panhandle). St. Augustine, the capital of Spanish Florida, remained the capital of East Florida (essentially, Peninsular Florida). The British designated the Apalachicola River as the boundary between East Florida and West Florida.

Britain obtained Florida from Spain according to the Treaty of Paris (1763), which ended the Seven Years War, or French and Indian War. The formal transfer occurred in 1764. Britain returned Florida to Spain according to the Treaty of Paris (1783), by which Britain also recognized the independence of the United States of America. The formal transfer of Florida from Britain to Spain occurred in 1784.

The following titles remain informative works on British East Florida.

Kenneth H. Beeson, Jr., Fromajadas and Indigo: The Minorcan Colony in Florida (Charleston, SC: History Press, 2006). This book was Beeson's Master of Arts thesis at the University of Florida (1960).

James W. Covington, The British Meet the Seminoles: Negotiations Between British Authorities in East Florida and the Indians, 1763-68 (Gainesville: University of Florida, 1961)

Patricia C. Griffin, Mullet on the Beach: The Minorcans of Florida, 1768-1788 (Gainesville: University of North Florida Press, 1991)

Joseph Byrne Lockey, East Florida, 1783-1785: A File of Documents Assembled and Many of Them Translated by Joseph Byrne Lackey (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1949)

Charles Loch Mowat, East Florida as a British Province, 1763-1784 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1943)

Daniel L. Schafer, "'...Not So Gay a Town in America as This...:' St. Augustine, 1763-1784," in Jean Parker Waterbury, ed., The Oldest City: St. Augustine, Saga of Survival (St. Augustine: St. Augustine Historical Society, 1983), 91-123

Daniel L. Schafer, "'Yellow Silk Ferret Tied Round Their Wrists:' African Americans in British East Florida, 1763-1784," in David R. Colburn and Jane L. Landers, eds., The African American Heritage of Florida (Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1995), 79-85

James Leitch Wright, Florida in the American Revolution (Gainesville: University Presses of Florida, 1975)