FLORIDA

(Source of information: "A Historical Biography of the United States, Classified" by Joseph Rippey, 7 Jan 1885; published by J. Pippey & Co., Baltimore, Md. This interesting little book is also full of advertisments from companies in business at the time.)

According to the Spanish archival maps, the existence of Florida was known for at least five centuries, as the shape of the area shows on early navigational maps.  Ponce de Leon, of Spain, reached the Florida coast as early as 1613.  He landed there on Easter Sunday and called the new land Florida, which is the Spanish name for Easter, in the area called Pascua, Florida.  Although attempts were made to plant a Spanish settlement in the area, they were routed by the Indians.

In 1528 Pamphilo de Narvaez landed with 300 men, 80 of whom were horsemen, with the intention of conquest. They wandered 800 miles and reached the Bay of Pensacola. There they made boats, embarked, and were lost. Only four known survivors reached Mexico in 1536.

Hernando de Soto, former governor of Cuba attempted an expedition to Florida 30 May 1539, reaching Tampa Bay with 9 vessels, 600 men, a herd of swine and supplies. They worked their way westward across the country, reacing the head of Appalachee Bay, where they remained for the winter. Frm their, De Soto pushed forward into the country northwest of the present limits of Florida. They were resisted by the Indians and lost 18 men and all their baggage. They wintered in Northern Mississippi.

In 1558, an expedition of 1,500 soldiers sailed from Vera Cruz, Mexico, under Tristan de Luna to explore and colonize Florida. A great storm broke up their ships after they landed. For lack of supplies the colony dwindled away and the survivors were taken home in a year or two by a vessle sent from Mexico.

The French Huguenots attempted to establish colonies on the south bank of the St. John's river in 1564, and started well, but that colony also failed in tragedy. Two vessels left Havre 18 Feb 1562 under command of Jean Ribaut with a company of emigrants. They landed at St. John's River 1 May 1562. They called it the river of May, erected a stone pillar bearing the arms of France, then sailed northward.

The French Colony, sailing in three vessels, sailed on the River of May in 1564 and began a fort which they named "Caroline." Scarcity of food led some of them to turn to piracy. Pedro Menendez de Aviles, a Spaniard, fitted out an expedition to destroy the French colony, arriving on the coast of Florida 8 September 1565. On 20 September of that same year, Menendez marched across from St. Augustine, attacked the French at Fort Caroline and murdered them. Ribaut had sailed to attack St. Augustine, but was shipwrecked on the coast. Menendez murdered most of them in cold blood.

St Augustine, Florida, the oldest city in the United States, was founded 8 September 1565 by Menendez. In an expedition against the Spaniards, under Governor Moore of South Carolina in 1702, unsuccessfully attempted to blocade St. Augustine.

In 1763, a peace treaty was signed in Paris, which ended the Seven Years' War raging in Europe.  This was pitted the British and the Prussians against France Spain and Austria.  As a result, France ceded to Britain all of her North American possessions east of the Mississippi.  In the same treaty, Spain traded the Florida territory to Britain for Havana, Cuba.  As a result, a proclamation by the King of England established two new American provinces known as East and West Florida.  These two sections were divided by the Chattahoochee and Apalachicola Rivers.  Twenty years later, the Florida sections were returned to Spain in the treaty ending the Revolutionary War in 1783.  West Florida was taken by the United States in 1810 and 1812 and the remainder finally was procured by promising to pay indemnities to all citizens who had been damaged by Spain.  The area known as West Florida was added to Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama.

By 1821 about eight thousand non-Indian people lived in Florida.  These were a mixture of Spanish and Anglo-Saxons.  As early as 1740, there were many British, Scotch and Irish settlers living in the Cumberland and Shenandoah valleys and these spread through every southern state east of the Mississippi.  The early population of the Deep South was predominantly of Irish ancestry.  They built Jacksonville in 1822, Quincy in 1825, Monticello in 1828, Marianna and Apalachicola in 1829 and St. Joseph in 1836.  Florida became a haven of the wealth even as far back as the early beginnings, but their bad treatment of the Indians, caused war to break out with the Seminole Indians during the period from 1835 to 1842.

As early as 1820, a large group of Greek settlers moved into the Florida region.  These came from Southern Greece and the Dodecanese Islands.  These primarily earned their living from the sea. Many worked as sponge divers, farming the under waters of the Florida coast.  Religiously, they were affiliated with the orthodox Greek Catholic Church.

The first railroad entered the state in 1831 and extended from Tallahassee to St. Marks.  The center section of Florida was settled in 1820 by former settlers from Virginia, North Carolina and South Carolina.  In the period between 1845 to 1860, settlers came to East Florida from Georgia, Alabama and North and South Carolina.

Florida became a territory on 30 March 1822, and has many documents and records which began during that period.  On 3 March, 1845, Florida joined the Union as our twenty-seventh state.    Florida, at one time had at least seventy-seven plantations, each made up of more than one thousand acres each.  in 1912, a large group of Lutheran Slovaks moved from the Cleveland Ohio area and purchased a large tract of land in Seminole county upon which they established a communal agricultural and poultry business.  It is interesting to note that this state continued to form new counties well into the 1920s

COUNTY FORMATIONS

FLORIDA HISTORY WEBLINKS