Retrieved from Google Images
Retrieved from Google Images
"West Florida was a colony of the Kingdom of Great Britain from 1763 until 1783 when it was ceded to Spain as part of the Peace of Paris (1783).
Effective British control had ended in 1781 when Spain had captured Pensacola. The territory subsequently became a colony of Spain, though parts of the territory were gradually annexed by the United States. The area is now part of the modern U.S. states of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida.
In 1762 during the Seven Years War a British expedition attacked and occupied Havana, the capital of Cuba. In order to secure the return of the valuable city, Spain agreed to cede its territory of La Florida in the terms of the Treaty of Paris (1763). France also ceded a large segment of New France to Britain including everything on the east bank of the Mississippi River.
The British divided these new territories into two separate colonies: East Florida, with its capital in St Augustine, and West Florida, which had the former Spanish settlement of Pensacola as its capital. By the same treaty, Spain was given the Western side of the Mississippi, which formed Spanish Louisiana with its capital at New Orleans at the mouth of the river. Many of the existing Spanish inhabitants were evacuated to Cuba, and new British and American settlers arrived to take over the land."
Waymarking.com
"The Spanish Land Grants were land claims filed by settlers in Florida after the transfer of the territory from Spain to the United States in 1821 in order to prove land ownership. Starting in 1790, Spain offered land grants to encourage settlement to the sparsely populated and vulnerable Florida colony. When the United States assumed control of Florida, it agreed to honor any valid land grants. Yet residents had to prove that validity through documentation and testimonials. Therefore, these records were the dossiers filed by grantees to the U.S. government. They were either confirmed (found to be valid) or unconfirmed (found invalid) by the US government through land commissions, federal courts, or by the U.S. Congress."
(Florida Memory)
Retrieved from "Florida Memory Project"
The Other War of 1812 by
Resurrecting a forgotten chapter in transatlantic history, James G. Cusick tells how, just before the United States went to war against Great Britain in 1812, an ill-advised invasion of a Spanish colony became a stage on which the young republic clumsily acted out its imperial ambitions and racial fears. With the halfhearted backing of President James Madison and Secretary of State James Monroe, a party of Georgians invaded East Florida, confident that partisans there would help them swiftly wrest the colony away from Spain. The raid was a strategic and political disaster. Few sympathizers materialized, official U.S. support dissolved, and an extended guerrilla war ensued. This was the "other war of 1812," or the Patriot War. Cusick, a lively storyteller as well as a meticulous scholar, conveys the savagery of the borderlands conflict that pitted American adventurers and anti-Spanish partisans against Spanish loyalists and their allies, who included Seminole Indians and escaped slaves. At the same time, Cusick looks at the American motivations behind the invasion, including apprehensions about Florida's growing population of unregulated blacks and geopolitical intrigues involving Spain, Britain, and France.
The Acquisition of Florida by
When he landed on a peninsula on the North American coast in 1513, Juan Ponce de Len claimed the territory for Spain. He named the area La Florida ("the flowery land") for its immense beauty and lush vegetation. Ponce de Len's North American discovery sparked a centuries-long struggle for control of the region. As treaties and wars pushed Florida into the hands of the French, British, and Spanish empires, settlers in the area frequently found themselves in conflict with the American Indian tribes who claimed the land as their own. Finally, after an unauthorized invasion of Spanish territory and the First and Second Seminole Wars, Florida entered the Union in 1845. The Acquisition of Florida is a richly detailed account that remembers such American heroes as Andrew Jackson and Seminole chief Osceola for their roles in the complicated history of the Sunshine State.
Florida by
As if Ponce de Leon, who happened on the peninsula in 1513, returned today to demand a quick reckoning ("Tell me what happened after I was there, but leave out the boring parts!"), Michael Gannon recounts the longest recorded history of any state in the nation in twenty-seven brisk, fully illustrated chapters. From indigenous tribes who lived along spring-fed streams to environmentalists who labor to "Save Our Rivers," from the first conquistadors whose broad black ships astonished the natives to the 123,000 refugees whose unexpected immigration stunned South Floridians in 1980, the story of the state is as rich and distinctive as the story of America. And it's older than most people think. As Gannon writes, "By the time the Pilgrims came ashore at Plymouth, St. Augustine was up for urban renewal. It was a town with fort, church, seminary, six-bed hospital, fish market, and about 120 shops and houses. Because La Florida stretched north from the Keys to Newfoundland and west to Texas, St. Augustine could claim to be the capital of much of what is now the United States." Gannon tells his fast-marching saga in chronological fashion. Starting with the wilderness of the ancient earth, he fills the landscape with Indians, colonists, pioneers, entrepreneurs, politicians, and the panorama of Florida today--"the broad superhighways that wind past horse farms, retirement communities, international airports, launch pads, futuristic attractions, and come to rest, finally, amidst the gleaming towers of Oz 'like cities."