STRANGERS IN THEIR OWN LAND

1
STRANGERS IN THEIR OWN LAND

• SEMINOLES AND AFRICAN-AMERICANS IN FLORIDA

2
Florida Changes Flags

• 1565 Pedro Menendez de Aviles established the
  first permanent European settlement in North
  America at St. Augustine.
• 1702-04 Led by Colonel James Moore, Carolinians
  and their Creek Indian allies attacked Spanish
  Florida in 1702 and destroyed the town of St.
  Augustine, but could not capture the fort,
  Castillo de San Marcos. Two years later, they
  destroyed the Spanish missions between
  Tallahassee and St. Augustine, killing and
  enslaving many Indians.
• 1719-22 The French captured and occupied
  Pensacola.

3
Florida Changes Flags

• 1763 The Treaty of Paris ended the French and
  Indian War. Britain gained control of Florida in
  exchange for Havana, Cuba, which the British had
  captured from Spain during the Seven Years War
  (175663). England divided Florida into two
  colonies East and West Florida
• 177683 The two Floridas remained loyal to Great
  Britain throughout the War for American
  Independence
• 1783 Spain, allied with France, captured
  Pensacola.
• 1784 The Spaniards regained control of Florida.

4
Florida Changes Flags

• 1814-18 General Andrew Jackson led military
  expeditions into Florida (see First Seminole War)
• 1821 The loss of Spain's American colonies and
  its on-going problems with the United States led
  to the transfer of Florida to the United States.
• 1821 Florida became a U.S. territory. Andrew
  Jackson was appointed first Governor of Florida.
• 1845 Florida became the twenty-seventh state of
  the United States on March 3, 184

5
Florida Changes Flags

• 1861 Florida seceded from the Union on January
  10, 1861. Within several weeks, Florida joined
  other southern states to form the Confederate
  States of America.
• 1861-65 The Union held Fort Meyers and Key West
  throughout the Civil War.
• 1865 Ultimately, the South was defeated, and
  federal troops occupied Tallahassee on May 10,
  1865.

6
Seminoles

• Seminoles were originally a part of Creek Indian
  groups in Georgia and Alabama and were
  historically a late arrival to Florida.
• The name Seminole was originally derived from
  the Spanish word cimarrone, a word used by the
  early Spaniards to refer to Indians living apart
  form the Spanish missions or any other
  Spanish-Indian settlements

7
Genesis of the Seminoles18th Century

• 1710 With the exception of a few stragglers, the
  indigenous people of Florida had been virtually
  annihilated from disease and attacks by
  Europeans.
• 1740 Muskogee-speaking sedentary farmers began
  to settle near present-day Gainesville.
• 1763 The "Eligio de la Puente" report mentions
  the invasion of Creek people, who had overrun all
  of peninsular Florida, even reaching Key West.
  Those who would later be called the Seminole and
  Mikasuki establish themselves in the
  north-central interior of Florida.
• 1765 Muskogee speaking people are referred to as
  "Seminolies" in British documents.

8
African-Americans in Florida18th Century

• 1738 The Spanish established Gracia Real de
  Santa Teresa de Mose (Fort Mose), the first free
  African community in America, to provide the
  first defense against the British.
• Approximately 100 Africans lived at Fort Mose,
  forming more than 20 households. Together they
  created a frontier community which drew on a
  range of African backgrounds blended with
  Spanish, Native American and English cultural
  traditions.

9

• As runaways came to St. Augustine some were
  re-enslaved or sold back to the English.
• 1724-28 Formerly ensalved in Carolina, Francisco
  Menendez arrived in St. Augustine around 1724. He
  became Captain of the Black Militia of St.
  Augustine and fought to ensure promises of King
  Carlos.  In 1728, helping to defend the Northern
  Florida Frontier from English and Native American
  raids, the Black Militia gained the respect and
  honor.
• 1739 The largest slave uprising in the history
  of North America took place near Charleston, SC.
  The Spanish were blamed .
• 1740 The British attacked St. Augustine under
  General George Oglethorpe. Fort Mose was
  captured.

10
African-Americans in Florida18th Century

• 1752 Spaniards rebuilt Fort Mose. Africans
  established in St. Augustine, returned to their
  military/agrarian lifestyle. Many of the men
  married Indian women and still others hunted and
  traded with Indian allies.
• 1784 When the British evacuated Florida,
  Spanish colonists and settlers from the newly
  formed United States came pouring in. Others who
  came were escaped slaves, trying to reach a place
  where their U.S. masters had no authority and
  effectively could not reach them.
• 1787 More than half of the plantations in
  Florida had fewer than four African slaves.

11
African-Americans in Florida19th Century

• 1821-45 Territorial status. By 1840 white
  Floridians were concentrating on developing the
  territory and gaining statehood. The population
  had reached 54,477 people, with African American
  slaves making up almost one-half of the
  population.
• 1821 Andrew Jackson Allen, one of the earliest
  performers in America, does a song-and-dance in
  blackface. He sings a "Negro dialect" song on the
  Pensacola stage.
• 1831 Stephen Foster, composer of appealing love
  songs for the parlor and upbeat songs for
  minstrel shows, wrote "Old Folks at Home." aka
  Way Down Upon the Suwannee River

12
African-Americans in Florida19th Century

• 1845 Florida entered the Union as a slave state,
  balancing the free state status of Iowa
• 1851 Steven Foster's song, "Old Folks at Home,"
  was adopted as the official state song by the
  Florida state legislature.

13
 THE SEMINOLE WARS

• The First, Second and Third Seminole Wars were
  never declared wars on the part of the American
  government. They were
• A continuation of American policy to contain
  Native American populations east of the
  Mississippi and remove them to reservations west
  of the Mississippi, a policy that culminated in
  the Indian Removal Act of 1830.
• Early battles fought over the jurisdiction of
  runaway slaves that would eventually escalate
  into the Civil War.
• The Seminole Wars resulted in the removal of
  nearly four thousand Seminoles to Oklahoma with a
  remnant of approximately three hundred
  disappearing into the Everglades

14
Important Figures Seminoles

• Neamathla (fl. early 19th c.), leader of the
  Mikasukis, chosen spokesman at 1823 Moultrie
  Creek conference
• Micanopy (c.1795-1848), chief after 1833, ally
  of Osceola, removed to Oklahoma in 1838.
• Ote-emathla "Jumper," (fl. 19th c.), a Red Stick
  Creek, Micanopy's brother-in-law and sensebearer
  (advocate).
• King Philip (17? -1840), leader of Mikasuki band
  and brother-in-law to Micanopy
• Coacoochee "Wildcat" (1810?- 18?), King Philip's
  son and Micanopy's nephew, war-leader, removed to
  Oklahoma in 1841, whence he led followers,
  especially the Black Seminoles to Coahuila, Mexico

15
Important Figures Seminoles

• Abraham, Black Indian (fl. 19th c.), interpreter
  and advisor to Micanopy
• Halpatter Tustenuggee "Alligator" (fl. 19th c.),
  Alachua warchief with King Philip's band
• Osceola or Asi-yaholo "Billy Powell"
  (1804?-1838), Red Stick Creek, war-leader of
  Seminole band
• Holata Micco "Billy Bowlegs" (c. 1810-1864),
  Seminole warchief most prominent in Third
  Seminole War, resisted emigration to Oklahoma
  until 1858
• Arpeika or Abiaka "Sam Jones" (1750's?- 1860),
  Mikasuki shaman, highly resistant to relocation,
  he led his followers into the Everglades

16
Important Figures Americans

• Andrew Jackson (1767-1845), General, first
  U.S.governor of Florida, seventh President of the
  U.S. (1829-37)
• Francis L. Dade, Army Major who led ill-fated
  expedition resulting in Dade Massacre, 1835
• Wiley Thompson, Indian agent in charge of
  Seminole removal 1833-35, killed by Osceola
• Thomas Sidney Jesup (1788-18 ), commander of the
  army in Florida (1836-38)
• Zachary Taylor (1784-1850), "Old Rough and
  Ready," commander of the Army in Florida
  (1838-40)
• William Jenkins Worth (1794-1849), commander of
  the Army in Florida at end of Second Seminole War
  (1841-42), twelfth President of the U.S.
  (1849-50)

17
The First Seminole War 1817-1818

• Preceded by years of border disputes along the
  Florida-Georgia border
• Fort Negro, on the Apalachicola River, built by
  the British in 1815 and turned over to a band of
  runaway slaves on the British departure, was an
  obstacle for the US in the supply route to
  Georgia.
• General Edmund Gaines (1777-1849) was ordered to
  destroy the fort. A hot cannon ball landed in a
  powder magazine blowing up the fort and killing
  270 of its 344 occupants.

18
The First Seminole War 1817-1818

• Neamathla, village chief of Fowltown, reacted by
  warning General Gaines that if the Americans
  tried to cross the border into Florida, they
  would be annihilated.
• A gunfight between American soldiers and
  Neamathla's Seminoles on November 21, 1817, is
  considered the opening salvo of the First
  Seminole War.
• The War Department ordered General Andrew Jackson
  to bring the Seminoles under control.
• On March 9, 1818, Jackson swiftly marched into
  Florida, despite opposition in Washington.
• Meeting little resistance, he moved against the
  Seminole villages around Lake Miccosukee and
  captured St. Marks on April 6.

19
Adams-Onis Treaty 1821

• The First Seminole War, ended with General Andrew
  Jackson's (1767-1845) occupation of the city of
  Pensacola and the Spanish surrender of Fort
  Barrancas to the American army in May, 1818.
• His victory led to the Adams-Onis Treaty of 1821
  in which Spain ceded the territory of Florida to
  the United States.
• The hostilities among the white Americans and
  the Seminole and black inhabitants of Florida
  continued.

20
Suggested Solutions to the Indian Problem

• 1) Total removal of the Seminoles from the
  peninsula and relocation to Georgia or to
  Oklahoma,
• 2) Concentration of the Seminoles on a
  reservation in Florida
• 3) Full citizenship granted to the Seminoles with
  each family receiving a plot of land to break the
  tribal bond and promote private enterprise --this
  suggestion was totally ignored, and the Seminoles
  were strongly resistant to removal.

21
Moultrie Creek Treaty 1823

• Restricted Seminole settlements to a reservation
  of four million acres north of Charlotte Harbor
  and south of Ocala with no land within twenty
  miles of any coast, a stipulation that would
  hinder foreign contacts.
• The Seminoles agreed not to make the reservation
  a haven for escaped slaves.
• Six small reservations were granted to six north
  Florida chiefs, including Neamathla, the elected
  spokesman for the tribes at the conference.
• However, almost before the treaty took effect,
  President James Monroe was moving towards a
  policy of general Indian removal.

22
Indian Removal Act 1830

• One of the first bills proposed by the newly
  elected President Jackson in 1830
• Mandated that that Eastern Indians be encouraged
  to trade their eastern land for western land or
  lose Federal protection
• After the act was made law on May 28, 1830,
  pressure was applied to the Seminoles to conform
  to the new law.

23
Paynes Landing Treaty 1832

• James Gadsden was named special agent to the
  Seminoles with the purpose of persuading them to
  move West.
• In May, 1832, he convened a meeting with the
  chiefs at Payne's Landing. The meeting has been
  the subject of much political and scholarly
  controversy as no minutes of the meeting were
  kept.
• All that is certain is that a treaty was signed
  by seven chiefs and eight subchiefs on May 9,
  1832, who agreed to travel to inspect the lands
  in Oklahoma, and if they found them satisfactory,
  they would agree to move west as a part of the
  Creek allocation.
• Nearly all of the chiefs whose names were on the
  treaty later repudiated it.

24
Fort Gibson Treaty 1833

• An exploratory party of seven chiefs left Florida
  for Oklahoma in October, 1832, and returned to
  Fort Gibson, Arkansas, in March, 1833.
• Again there are allegations of coercion and
  forged marks on the Fort Gibson Treaty in which
  the chiefs agreed that the Seminoles would move
  west within three years -- one third of the
  population each year.

25
Opposition to Removal

• Replacing Phagan as Indian agent in December,
  1833, Wiley Thompson was put in charge of
  Seminole removal.
• The Indians were encouraged in their reluctance
  to move both by white traders and by their
  Indian-Negro allies and slaves who had everything
  to lose if the Seminoles went to Oklahoma.
• Strong opposition to migration emerged,
  especially from the war-chief Osceola, who
  advised condemning any Indian who favored
  removal.
• Relations deteriorated and skirmishes increased
  between the government and Seminoles throughout
  1835 culminating in the outbreak of war in
  December.

26
Second Seminole War1835-1842

• The two most notable incidents occurred on
  December 28th, 1835, when the Seminoles presented
  a two-pronged attack.
• Jumper and Alligator with 180 warriors ambushed a
  relief column marching from Fort Brooke to Fort
  King under the command of Major Francis Dade.
  Only three of the 108 soldiers escaped slaughter
  in the fierce battle that followed.
• Meanwhile Osceola led sixty warriors in an attack
  on Fort King with the express purpose of killing
  Wiley Thompson who had imprisoned Osceola in
  chains earlier during the year.
• Unfortunately for the Seminoles, the Dade
  Massacre pressured Northerners in Congress to
  accept Southern proposals for more troops and
  equipment.

27
Second Seminole War

• General Jesup had convinced a large number of
  chiefs and their tribes to emigrate on the
  condition that they would be accompanied by their
  Negro allies and slaves.
• Opposition from landowners and the press led to
  a compromise that only those who had lived with
  the Seminoles before the outbreak of the war
  would be permitted to go.
• Over seven hundred Seminoles had gathered at Fort
  Brooke north of Tampa by the end of May 1837,
  including Micanopy, Jumper, Cloud and Alligator.
• On the night of June 2, Osceola and Arpeika
  surrounded the camp with two hundred warriors and
  spirited away nearly the entire population.

28
Second Seminole War

• Jesup no longer felt any compunction about using
  trickery to gain his ends.
• In September 1837 King Philip, Yuchi Billy,
  Coacoochee and Blue Snake with their followers
  were captured and imprisoned them at Fort Marion.
  
• Osceola and Coa Hadjo sent word that they were
  willing to negotiate. At the conference near Fort
  Peyton, Jesup ordered the truce violated and the
  Indians were imprisoned.

29
Osceola

• News of Osceola's capture spread through the
  nation.
• When he was transferred to Fort Moultrie in
  Georgia , George Catlin visited him and painted
  his portrait.
• His death on January 30, 1838, enshrined him as
  a martyr to the Indian cause.

30
Battle of Lake Okochobee 1837

• Coacoochee and John Cowaya (or Cavalo), an
  Indian Negro leader, escaped from Fort Marion on
  November 29, 1837, with sixteen other warriors
  and two women,
• They headed south to join bands led by Jumper,
  Arpeika, and Alligator.
• The largest and last pitched battle of the war
  was fought on the banks of Lake Okeechobee on
  December 25, 1837
• Colonel Zachary Taylor commanded eleven hundred
  men against approximately four hundred Indians.
• The Indians finally retreated from the
  two-and-a-half-hour battle leaving twenty-six
  killed and one hundred twelve wounded and having
  sustained eleven killed and fourteen wounded.

31
Second Seminole War

• In February 1838, further treachery at Fort
  Jupiter netted over five hundred Seminoles
• Persuasion and mopping-up operations sent many
  of the remaining Seminole leaders, including
  Micanopy, on the westward migration.
• Jesup's tenure in Florida, which had resulted in
  the capture, migration or death of over 2400
  Indians, ended in May 1838, when General Zachary
  Taylor took over command of the Florida forces.
• Taylor carried out operations against scattered
  bands of Apalachicola, Tallahassee and Alachua in
  northern Florida and Seminole bands in central
  and southern Florida.

32
Seminole Removal

• General Alexander MacComb, commanding general of
  the army, came to Florida in April 1839, and
  declared the war over when he concluded an
  agreement with the Seminoles who agreed to
  withdraw south of the Peace River by July 15,
  1839, and remain there "until further
  arrangements were made."
• Although a trading post was set up on the
  Caloosahatchee River, the Indians learned that
  they were not to be allowed to stay in Florida.
• Chekika, chief of the Spanish Indians
  (descendants of Calusas), led an attack and
  destroyed the post in July.
• Col. Harney surprised Chekika in the Everglades
  and executed him.

33
Seminole Removal

• The commands of General Walker K. Armistead and
  General William J. Worth saw the final years of
  the Second Seminole War.
• Following the successful policy of deceiving
  chiefs who came to negotiate, most notably
  Coacoochee, and through continuing guerilla
  warfare, the army managed to remove all but about
  six hundred of Florida's Indians who were
  restricted to a temporary reservation south of
  the Peace River when Congress refused to continue
  to fund any further campaigns in 1842.

34
Government Losses in the Second Seminole War

• The six and half years of the Second Seminole War
  were more costly than all of the Indian wars
  combined.
• The armed forces sustained 1466 service deaths
  and an indeterminate number of losses from wounds
  and diseases
• The conflict cost somewhere in the neighborhood
  of forty million dollars to the United States
  Treasury, and property losses across the state
  were huge.

35
Government gains from the Second Seminole War

• The Armed Occupation Act brought new settlers to
  the interior of Florida which had been made
  accessible by the mapping, exploration and
  road-building that had attended the fighting.
• The military had gained skill in guerilla warfare
  and an understanding of the need for
  inter-service cooperation
• The federal government learned to exercise its
  power to convert economic power into military
  strength.

36
More Seminole Removal

• Between 1842 and the outbreak of the Third
  Seminole War in 1855, the Seminoles kept to the
  reservation
• The federal government, determined to remove the
  remaining Seminoles
• offered large financial inducements to leave
• installed a strong military presence in the
  territory
• brought chiefs, most notably Billy Bowlegs, to
  Washington, D.C. to impress them with the power
  of the government.
• The Seminoles remained adamant in their
  opposition to removal until Secretary of War
  Jefferson Davis declared that if they did not
  leave voluntarily, the military would remove them
  by force.

37
Third Seminole War 1855-1856 Billy Bowlegs
War

• On December 1855, a band of forty Seminoles led
  by Billy Bowlegs and Oscen Tustenuggee, attacked
  a patrol investigating Seminole settlements in
  the Big Cypress Swamp, marking the first skirmish
  of the war that was dubbed "Billy Bowlegs War."
• It was a war of skirmishes, raids and harrassment
  against small settlements, both white and
  Seminole.
• A treaty signed on August 7, 1856, that granted
  the Seminoles over two million acres in Indian
  Territory along with a generous financial
  settlement, was the catalyst to the end of the
  conflict in Florida.
• Bowlegs and his band left Florida in May and two
  other bands left the following February.

38
The Remnant

• Only the Muskogee band led by Chipco, hidden
  north of Lake Okeechobee, and Arpeika's
  Mickasuki band, buried deep in the Everglades,
  a remnant of 100-300 souls, remained in
  relative peace in Florida.
• The Seminoles of Florida call themselves the
  "Unconquered People," descendants of just 300
  Indians who managed to elude capture by the U.S.
  army in the 19th century.
• Today, more than 2,000 live on six reservations
  in the state located in Hollywood, Big Cypress,
  Brighton, Immokalee, Ft. Pierce, and Tampa.
• In addition to the Seminole people, Florida also
  has a separate Miccosukee tribe.

39
 The Civil War 1861-65

• 1861 The independent "nation of Florida"
  withdrew from the American Union.
• 1861 In Pensacola the Army of the Confederate
  States of America took Ft. Pickens.
• Florida provided an estimated 15,000 troops and
  significant amounts of supplies including salt,
  beef, pork, and cottonto the Confederacy, but
  more than 2,000 Floridians, both African American
  and white, joined the Union army.

40
The Abolition of Slavery

• 1803 Denmark abolishes the slave trade.
• 1807 Britain abolishes the slave trade.
• 1817 France abolishes the slave trade.
• 1818 Holland abolishes the slave trade.
• 1820 Spain abolishes the slave trade
• 1824 Sweden abolishes the slave trade.
• 1833 Slavery itself is finally abolished in the
  British colonies.
• 1833 Slavery is abolished in the West Indies.
• 1834 Slavery ends in the Bahaman Islands.
• 1835 On June 25, Queen Maria Cristina abolished
  the slave trade to Spanish colonies.
• 1848 Slavery is abolished in the French
  colonies.
• 1863 African-Americans in Union-occupied areas
  became free citizens on New Year's Day with the
  Emancipation Proclamation.
• 1863 Slavery is abolished in the Dutch colonies.
  
• 1873 Slavery is abolished in the Spanish
  colonies of Puerto Rico.
• 1880 Slavery is abolished in Cuba.

41
Reconstruction 1868-77

• The end of the Civil War marked the decline of
  Floridas plantation economy.
• 1870 Josiah T. Walls served as a state
  representative and senator and was Florida's
  first African-American in the U.S. House of
  Representatives. Jonathan Gibbs filled the office
  of secretary of state while fellow
  African-Americans throughout the state served as
  members of city councils.
• 1876 A School for African Americans was built in
  Tallahassee.
• 1877 Reconstruction ended and removal of federal
  troops began the curtailment of the rights and
  freedoms exercised by African-Americans.  

42
19th C. Development

• 1882 The cigar industry in Tampa, Florida
  created a unique, multicultural, multiracial
  urban area. Afro-Cubans, Cuban-born whites and
  white political exiles from Spain immigrated to
  work in the cigar factories.
• 1887 Eatonville was the first black incorporated
  municipality in Florida.
• African American laborers built Floridas
  railroads and roads, tapped the turpentine and
  farmed the sugar-cane fields in the rapidly
  growing state.

43
20th Century

• Both agriculture and tourism, before
  air-conditioning was commonplace, needed workers
  during the winter. Around 1890 blacks from the
  Bahamas began arriving in Floridas lower east
  coast for seasonal agricultural work.
• Between 1900 and 1920, 10,000 to 12,000about
  one-fifth of the Bahamian populationcame to
  Florida. By 1920 the foreign-born made up a
  quarter of Miamis population Bahamian blacks
  comprised 16 of the citys entire population.

44
Racial Tensions 1920s and 1930s

• Following World War I, Florida, like the rest of
  the nation, experienced heightened racial
  tensions and anti-immigrant sentiments that led
  to lynchings and racial persecution.
• An election in 1920 in Ocoee in Orange County
  ended in a race riot and deaths.
• in 1923, the entire African-American town of
  Rosewood was set fire and residents killed by a
  white mob.
• During the Great Depression, the low economic and
  social status of blacks meant being in the worst
  position.

45
World War II

• World War II was the last conflict to countenance
  segregated military units.
• Florida in World War II became almost one big
  military post with 172 installations spread
  throughout the state.
• African-Americans from less segregated regions of
  the U.S. faced typical Jim Crow rules while on
  duty in Florida.
• German prisoners of war could use facilities from
  which American blacks were banned. POWs rode in
  railroad coach cars designated "whites-only,"
  while black GIs were sent to baggage cars.
• Famous athletes, such as baseballs Jackie
  Robinson and Hank Aaron, encountered the same
  racial restrictions during spring training
  sessions in Florida.

46
Civil Rights

• After WW II, Florida attracted soldiers who had
  been stationed here to return as residents.
• African-Americans began a fervent voter
  registration campaign believing that change would
  come in the voting booth. But change was resisted
  violently.
• On Christmas Eve 1950, Harry T. Moore, state
  leader of the National Association for the
  Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), was killed
  by a bomb beneath his bed because of his
  voter-registration activities.
• By the early 1960s blacks in Florida cities
  joined others throughout the south in marching to
  protest segregation and staging sit-ins at
  segregated facilities. In 1963 and 1964 Martin
  Luther King organized demonstrations in St.
  Augustine,celebrating its 400th anniversary of
  founding.

47
Civil Rights

• 1964 Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of
  1964.
• 1965 The Voting Rights Act and the Supreme
  Courts "one-man-one vote" ruling and related
  decisions brought externally imposed change to
  Floridas political and racial life.
• Although Brown vs, Board of Education negated the
  separate but equal doctrine in 1954, Florida
  schools did not desegregate until the late 1960s
  when school districts were drawn by the courts to
  ensure racial balance.
• Following the civil-rights legislation and court
  actions of the 1960s African-Americans once again
  returned to elected positions. In 1968 the first
  black was elected to the Florida legislature
  since Reconstruction.
• In 1992 the first African-Americans since
  Reconstruction were elected to represent Florida
  in the U.S. Congress.