Treasures of Nassau: Antebellum Florida Part II

Amelia Island and Nassau County were not considered part of the Florida Plantation Belt. That distinction would go to the Panhandle area, where British colonists fleeing the American Revolutionary War developed large estates with slave labor. Nonetheless, northeastern Florida had its share of plantations, large and small, in the years preceding annexation as a U.S territory.

One of the larger plantations on Amelia Island in the late 18th century belonged to John Perceval, the 2nd Earl of Egmont, who was among a group of British aristocrats/adventurers/speculators who set out to acquire land in Florida.

Egmont’s first attempt to establish a plantation on the St. Johns River failed to flourish. In September 1770, he abandoned the St. Johns River project and relocated his laborers to Amelia Island, where he had been awarded land by the British governor. The land had been set aside in a failed attempt to entice settlers from Bermuda. Three months later, Egmont died. Although it is unlikely Egmont ever lived on his island estate, his widow, Catherine Percival, the Countess of Egmont, was documented as residing here for a time. During the Egmont era, the island was known as “Egmont Isle.”

After Egmont’s death, Stephen Egan from one of his other estates in Ireland was recruited to become the resident superintendent on Egmont Isle. Specializing in the cultivation of indigo, Egan proved to be competent at running the estate and turning a profit. The plantation flourished until it was destroyed during the American Revolution, when Patriots burned every house on the island to the ground. Still under the direction of the Egmont heirs, Egan and 22 slaves moved to another plantation farther south near Jacksonville, where they continued to produce naval stores and established a timber enterprise. By the time British East Florida had been ceded back to Spain and British lands confiscated in 1785, Egan and his slaves had long before set sail for what is now the Dominican Republic. All Egmont properties in Florida were thereafter abandoned.

References to the Egmont family and Stephen Egan still exist on the island in street names such as Countess of Egmont Street and places, including Egans Creek.

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While the second Spanish occupation of East Florida drove some plantation owners away, it opened the door for others to migrate here. Henry and Margaret O’Neill, their three children and their slaves migrated to the area based on a Spanish edict of 1786 promising free land to outsiders. Spain relented on an earlier mandate that outsiders convert to Catholicism as a condition of owning land in Florida; however, they still forbade any other form of public worship.

The O’Neills chose an idyllic spot on the mainland overlooking Lanceford Creek in what is now Nassau County as the site to build their plantation. They named their plantation Nueva Esperanza, or New Hope.

In 1791, Henry O’Neill died at the hands of marauding Georgians invading from across the St. Marys River. The King of Spain waived the 10-year occupation requirement to receive title to new claims for his widow and provided her a pension for her husband’s bravery. Later dubbed “The Moccasin Boys,” outlaw bands of ruffians from Georgia continued to be a problem for many years later, raiding Florida settlements to steal slaves, horses and cattle and burning everything in sight.

Margaret O’Neill later remarried but continued to live at New Hope. Upon her death, the plantation was bequeathed to a son, Eber O-Neill, who once again, in the 1812 Patriot Rebellion, had to defend his family against marauders from across the river in a night-time raid, hiding his wife and children in the skeleton of a giant oak while he and the slaves scattered livestock. After the invaders left, he found his family safe in the tree but his fields and house ravaged by fire. He immediately set about rebuilding.

The New Hope plantation would continue in operation until the Civil War, and members of the O’Neill family and their descendants continued to play roles in local history.

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It was not the Spanish reoccupation of East Florida that drove another plantation owner from the area but the transition to an American territory.

Zephaniah Kingsley, slave trader and slave owner, was born in Bristol, England, and later settled in South Carolina. In 1803, he was granted 3,300 acres in East Florida by the Spanish Crown. He established four plantations along the St. Johns River until, like O’Neill’s New Hope, all were destroyed in the 1812 Patriot Rebellion.

Kingsley subsequently purchased another plantation from its previous owner on Fort George Island in 1814. When he arrived in East Florida, Kingsley was already married to Anna Madgigine Jai, an African princess from Senegal whom he purchased as a slave. In 1811, he freed her from slavery. Not only was she the mother of nine of his children, she also became active in plantation management and evolved into a successful business woman and property owner in her own right. She once stayed in Old Town Fernandina for a time while the Kingsley estate was being refurbished. According to the book “Slavery and Plantation Growth in Antebellum Florida,” Kingsley was also known to have mistresses with whom he fathered children. He reportedly acknowledged paternity of all his biracial children and freed them.

Kingsley’s plantation more closely followed the Spanish model in that it operated under a task system. Once slaves had completed their assigned task for the day, they were allowed to tend their own gardens and work on crafts. They were entitled to keep proceeds from the sale of their produce or crafts. Further, Kingsley directed that his slave families not be separated. Under Spanish rule, slaves could purchase their own freedom, thus, contributing to a growing class of free Blacks. Ultimately, Kingsley envisioned a three-tiered societal structure of slaves, free Blacks and whites.

Under Spanish law, even the enslaved had the right to marry, to own property and to buy their own freedom. Free Blacks were not subject to legal discrimination as long as they accepted Catholicism. No one was born into slavery.

American planters viewed freed blacks as a threat to the social order. Once Florida became a U.S. territory, laws were passed that discriminated against free Blacks and placed harsh restrictions on African slaves. No free Blacks were permitted to enter Florida. Those who were already in the territory could no longer bear arms, serve on juries, testify in court or vote. They were soon not even allowed to assemble in public. A stiff fine was instated for slave owners who set a slave free and, once freed, the former slave had to leave the territory within 30 days. Slaves nor mulattos could now marry or own property.

Zephaniah and Anna Jai Kingsley fled with their children to what is now the Dominican Republic, where their descendants still live today. The remnants of Kingsley Plantation, consisting of a plantation house, a kitchen house, a barn and the ruins of 25 slave cabins remain on Fort George Island under the administration of the National Park Service.

Free Blacks, Indian slaves and “Black Seminoles” living near St. Augustine fled to Havana. Some Seminole Indians abandoned their settlements and moved further south. Fugitive slaves escaped from Cape Florida to the Bahamas and half the free Black population of Pensacola left the country.

As early as 1817, the U.S. Army, under the command of Andrew Jackson, had made forays into Spanish territory during a period that later became known as the First Seminole War. The Spanish requested British intervention to turn the Americans back, but none came. Although some in President James Monroe’s cabinet demanded Jackson’s dismissal because of his invasion into a foreign territory, Secretary of State John Quincy Adams called the action necessary because Florida had become “a derelict open to the occupancy of every enemy, civilized or savage of the United States, and serving of no other earthly purpose than as a post of annoyance to them.” The United States effectively controlled East Florida after 1817. American troops never left the city of Fernandina after driving out French privateer Luis Aury, who had especially alarmed American planters up north by arming Black men. Plantation owners worried about slave revolts. Their fears were justified as slaves were doing just that in the Caribbean and South America.

Once East Florida was officially annexed as a U.S. territory in 1821, Andrew Jackson was appointed military governor. He would be ruthless and unrelenting in his effort to drive native peoples from the rest of the peninsula.

The next article will explore what daily life was like in antebellum Florida based on personal accounts captured in print and audio.

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pbushnell@fbnewsleader.com