A Greenwood slave seeks freedom in death

Suicide at the bottom of a well.

by Dale Cox

 

Aerial photograph of Greenwood taken before
Hurricane Michael struck the area.

The census of 1860 shows that half of the more than 10,000 people living in Jackson County were held in slavery by a relatively small percentage of the other half. Most were of African descent, although some Native Americans were among their number.  

A true story of the plight of one of these individuals appeared in the pages of the Florida Whig newspaper in 1853. The man lived on the farm of Dr. Franklin Hart and committed suicide by jumping into a well:

Singular Suicide.- The Florida Whig of the 29th ult. records a remarkable case of suicide by a negro belonging to Dr. Franklin Hart, of Marianna, who precipitated himself, head-foremost, into the well, and was drowned. The circumstances were these: - A few days, probably a week preceding, the negro, pampered by too good treatment, attacked his master, and inflicted considerable injury, and, of course, ran away. On the following Sunday evening, the negro came to the house of a servant belonging to a gentleman of the place, who immediately and faithfully reported his appearance to Dr. Hart, who had him secured. On Monday morning, when asked to step out, which he doubtless concluded was for the purpose of receiving a well-merited chastisement, he threw himself into the well, and, probably stunned by the descent, his own efforts to save himself, though violent, were unavailing, and those from above fruitless, though speedily rendered. [1]

This 1845 drawing depicts the whipping or "paddling" of a
slave in Pensacola, Florida. Library of Congress.

The name of the man who so desperately sought to avoid enslavement and the last is not known. The newspaper writer's statements that the man's attack on Dr. Hart, who held him in bondage, was due to "too good treatment" and that a planned beating was "well-merited" is a reflection of the attitudes held by some in the press in that day.

The man's story reached far beyond his home county or state. The Florida Whig's article about the suicide was picked up by The Liberator, an Abolitionist newspaper published in Boston by William Lloyd Garrison. The publisher was a leader in the religious movement against slavery, and his modest readership included Frederick Douglas. 

In addition to abolitionist sermons and editorials, The Liberator republished news accounts of incidents such as the one involving Dr. Hart to reinforce its crusade against American slavery.

Dr. Hart's home, according to an advertisement he placed five years later, was in Greenwood:

The subscriber offers for sale his Residence in Greenwood, Florida, to which is attached 80 acres of Land, 50 of which are cleared and in a good state of cultivation.

Greenwood is situated in one of the most pleasant, healthy, and populous neighborhoods in the State, 9 miles north of Marianna and 10 miles west of Niel’s landing on the Chattahoochee River, and is a fine location for a Physician or Merchant.

The Dwelling is a good two-story house with 6 rooms and there are on the premises a Storehouse, Physician’s office, a good barn and stables, and all necessary outhouses.

Any person buying and not wishing the land for cultivation could divide it into Lots and sell it at a profit. Apply to

FRANKLIN HART.

Greenwood, Jackson county, Fla.

February 2, 1858 [2]

The burial location of the unfortunate man is not known. Perhaps someday, a marker will tell his story and remind us all that he once lived and died in our community.

-

References:

[1]The Liberator, December 2, 1853, page 192.

[2] Columbus Enquirer, February 4, 1858.

African slaves in Florida before St. Augustine?

"Africans of unrecorded countries."

by Dale Cox

Fort Caroline National Memorial commemorates the ill-fated
French attempt to settle on Florida's St. Johns River.

Did France bring African slaves to Florida more than fifty years before the "first" slaves reached Virginia in 1619?

An enigmatic passage in the deposition of a settler who arrived in 1564 - one year before the founding of St. Augustine - suggests that slaves helped build a short-lived French settlement on the St. Johns River. The colony was called Fort Caroline, and it stood in present-day Jacksonville.

Slavery was not particularly new in North America when the French arrived on the Atlantic seaboard of today's United States. Hernando de Soto infamously enslaved hundreds of Native Americans during his brutal march through the Southeast, even using the weak as food for his dogs. Other Native Americans from the region were carried away as slaves by Spanish vessels that stopped along the coast to fish or trade. 

The first recorded European settlement in North America, in fact, was neither Pensacola nor St. Augustine and certainly not Jamestown or Plymouth. It was San Miguel de Guadalupe, a colony founded somewhere on the Georgia or South Carolina coast in 1526. Meager Spanish records verify that some African slaves accompanied the expedition and that its commander, Lucas Vasquez de Ayllon, intended to kidnap hundreds of Native Americans to send into slavery.

The St. Johns River, which the French called the River May.

San Miguel, like the first effort to settle Pensacola in 1559, failed, and the survivors sailed away.

The French came next, building Charlesfort at today's Marine Corps Training Base at Parris Island, South Carolina, in 1562. The colony lasted less than one year, but the French came back with a greater determination just two years later.

The site they selected this time was a low triangular island on what they called the River May. This early designation for the St. Johns River survives in today's community of Mayport and Naval Station Mayport, both located near the river's mouth. Led by Rene de Goulaine de Laudonniere, the settlers formed an alliance with local Timucua Indians and started building Fort Caroline.

Among the early French settlers was a man named Robert Melenche. He later gave a deposition about the founding of the colony:

A modern ship passes beneath the guns of Fort Caroline. A
recreation of the fort stands near the original site.

…In this armada they brought three ships; the General's ship was a galleon of over 200 tons, although it was not a vessel for mercantile traffic because it had been built for war. Another was a 120-ton ship, and still another, an 80-ton ship. Three hundred men went out in this armada, 110 sailors, 120 experienced soldiers, and the rest of them, officers of various rank. Besides these, there were many Africans of unrecorded countries. [1]

The last line of this excerpt is of particular note. Who were the "many Africans of unrecorded countries" put ashore in Florida by France in 1564? Not even one of their names is known, and Melenche says nothing more about them. France was engaged in the African slave trade by the time, and Melenche's failure to include the "many Africans" in his enumeration of the 300 men sent to America suggests they were slaves.

A gruesome fate awaited the colonists of Fort Caroline - and undoubtedly many of the Africans as well.

Many of the settlers died of sickness and malnutrition during the winter of 1564-1565. Others mutinied and sailed away. The survivors were about to give up when a relief expedition arrived in August 1565.

The earth and timber walls of the fort proved no match for
the Spanish soldiers that attacked on September 20, 1565.

At roughly the same time, however, the Spanish arrived just down the coast and founded St. Augustine. Determined to wipe out the French, who he regarded not only as interlopers but as heretics because they were Protestants, Spain's commander Pedro Menedez de Aviles led 500 men overland to Fort Caroline.

The Spanish soldiers advanced through rough terrain and torrents of rain, reaching a pond near the fort on September 19, 1565. They stormed Fort Caroline on the next morning, slaughtering virtually every man they found. Some forty or fifty of the French escaped over the walls and into the surrounding wilderness. Laudonniere was among them.

The only other survivors were in a group of 60 women and children spared by Menendez. Everyone else died, and Fort Caroline was no more.

The fate of the slaves of Fort Caroline is unknown. Most probably died in the massacre or in two subsequent slaughters carried out by Menendez against French shipwreck victims. A handful may have been among the survivors.

The site of the ill-fated French settlement has never been found, and many believe that it has been washed away by erosion. The story, however, is commemorated at Fort Caroline National Memorial in Jacksonville. It is a unit of the Timucuan Ecological & Historic Preserve and is open to the public daily.

For more information, please visit the park's website:   https://www.nps.gov/timu/learn/historyculture/foca.htm.

Ghost of Jericho Pond: Old U.S. Road legend a memory of Reconstruction

The Old U.S. Road where it passes over Jericho Pond
north of Marianna in Jackson County, Florida.

Jericho Pond is more swamp than pond. Crossed by the Old U.S. Road north of Marianna, the pond is thick with trees, snakes and mosquitoes.

It is also the center of a bizarre ghost story that has its roots in the turbulent days of the Reconstruction era.

I was reminded of the story a few years ago by a retired Jackson County resident who said that it was one of three ghost tales that he vividly remembered from his childhood. The other two were the Ghost of Bellamy Bridge and the haunting of Holyneck Road.

The legend holds that Jericho Pond is haunted by the ghost of a freedman (i.e. freed slave) who was murdered there during the years following the War Between the States (or Civil War).

Jericho Pond

The section of the Old U.S. Road that crosses the pond was once narrow and closed in by closed in by cypress and other swamp trees. It was dark even during the day but at night the darkness became almost impenetrable.

Travelers would avoid following that section of the road at night, especially in the days before automobiles, because of the ghost. Residents of the area claimed that the spirit would waylay wagons or buggies at Jericho Pond, unhitch the horses or mules pulling them and then try to make its escape by riding them away. Drivers would be left stuck in the swamp with their vehicles.

The road passed by an old church not far away, however, and the ghost could not set foot on holy ground. People who walked out of the swamp after having their horses or mules taken would find them grazing peacefully in the moonlight of the churchyard, left there by the ghost as it returned to pond.

Each escape attempt ended in the same way with the ghost left trapped in its perpetual haunt.

The tale of the Ghost of Jericho Pond began to fade with the arrival of automobiles and the eventual widening and paving of the road. I remember from my own childhood, however, stories of a ghost that would try to stop cars on Old U.S. Road.

The dark swamp of Jericho Pond.

The story grew from a true event that happened in 1867. The war had ended two years before and Jackson County was occupied by U.S. troops and under the control of agents of the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands. Generally called the Freedmen's Bureau, this federal agency had been established to ease the transition of the South from a time when most African-Americans were slaves to a new era in which both white and black men were free and could vote.

The new reality did not extend the right to vote to women and Native Americans and more decades would need to pass before they too gained suffrage.

Florida in 1867 was a place of simmering emotions. Rumblings in the U.S. Congress made it clear that Abraham Lincoln's dream of a peace "with malice toward none, with charity for all" was not the goal of many political leaders. Calls for the punishment of the South were rising in Washington, D.C., as politicians - many of whom had stayed as far away from battle as possible - demanded that Constitutional protections be suspended in the former Confederate states.

Another view of Jericho Pond, where Gilbert Walker was
killed by Hugh Parker in 1867. Walker's ghost supposedly
haunts the swampy pond.

The tidal wave of blood that had engulfed North and South alike during the dreadful war were not enough for the demagogues of that day.

In this time of growing tension, an incident took place at Jericho Pond that characterized life in 1867.

Two wagons approached the pond from opposite directions on the Old U.S. Road. One was driven by Gilbert Walker, a freedman, and the other by a white farmer named Bell. The passage of the road through the swamp was narrow and it was impossible for two wagons to pass by each other.

Each man pulled his wagon as far to the side as possible but there was still not enough room for them to pass. Seeing this, Walker got down from his wagon and pulled back the limbs that extended from roadside bushes to help Bell get past. It was at this point that a third man, named Hugh Parker, arrived on the scene.

Parker lived in Texas and was making his way home through the Deep South. He ran up to Walker and demanded to know why he had not gotten his wagon out of the road so the other man could pass. The freedman explained hat he had done so as well as he could and was holding back the brush so that Bell could get by.

This did not placate Parker, who warned that he would kill Walker if he ever again failed to give way for a white man to pass. Before either Walker or Bell could attempt to explain further, Parker suddenly pulled a pistol and said, "I might as well do it now."

T. Thomas Fortune, who recalled the search
for Walker's killer, was born into slavery in
Jackson County but later became a prominent
writer and newspaper publisher.

He then shot Walker in the chest and left him for dead on the ground. Bell tried to help the unfortunate man but there was nothing that he could do. Gilbert Walker died within fifteen minutes. Bell summoned authorities and attempts were made to locate Parker but he escaped detection and - it was believed - made his way on home to Texas.

The murder shocked Jackson County and alarmed black and white residents alike. T. Thomas Fortune, a prominent African-American newspaper publisher of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, in 1867 was the young son of Jackson County freedman Emanuel Fortune. He published his memories of the search for Parker more than 60 years later:

...The news of the tragedy swept through the county like a prairie fire. Negro men and women from every direction swarmed into the village [i.e. Marianna], fighting mad and determined to be avenged. The village and nearby swamps and forest were thorough searched for the bloody miscreant, all of the afternoon and night, but he eluded capture. It was good for him that he did, as the Negroes were outraged and thoroughly aroused and would have torn him limb from limb if they captured him. - (Philadelphia Tribune, July 28, 1927).

The passage of so much time caused Fortune to mistake the murderer, Hugh Parker, for Sgt. Thomas Barnes, but the alarm caused by the killing was every bit as vivid as he described.

Parker was never apprehended for his role in the crime, which may be why Walker's ghost became associated with Jericho Pond. Perhaps he continues each night an attempt to escape the injustice that befell him there 150 years ago.

Dale Cox
May 12, 2017

Jackson County may not own Courthouse Square

The beautiful oaks on Courthouse Square were planted by
Aesop Bellamy, one of Marianna's first African-American
business owners in ca. 1873.

Is the Jackson County Board of County Commissioners on the verge of cutting down trees that the county doesn't even own?

That question has unexpectedly come to the surface as citizens await a final decision from their county commissioners on the fate of the historic live oaks that surround the Jackson County Courthouse in downtown Marianna. The last vote from the board took place nearly three weeks ago when the commissioners agreed to seek cost estimates on the removal of all of the trees.

The question now rising, however, is whether the county actually owns the historic oak trees - or the ground in which they grow?

Part of the Battle of Marianna was fought on Courthouse
Square on September 27, 1864. This scene is from the
150th anniversary commemoration of the battle.

A thorough search of both public and private archives of deeds and other records has produced no deed or other document proving county ownership of the courthouse square. In fact, it appears that the City of Marianna may actually own the trees, the square and even the ground on which the county courthouse stands.

This unexpected discovery results from political maneuvering that took place in the earliest days of Jackson County's history.

The county was created by the Florida Territorial Legislature on August 12, 1822. The territory had been part of Spain just one year before and it would take another twenty-three years for Florida to secure admission into the union as a state. Jackson County was named for Andrew Jackson, the former major general who served as Florida's U.S. first governor. It included all of the land between the Choctawhatchee and Suwannee Rivers.

The "Widow Hull's Place" was near today's Waddell's Mill
Pond in rural Jackson County, Florida.

The first meetings of the county's government took place at the Widow Hull's place, a home that stood on the south side of today's Waddell's Mill Pond not far from Springfield A.M.E. Church. Mrs. Sarah Hull provided lodging and food for the County Court, a predecessor of today's Board of County Commissioners. The court then included three members.

A controversy soon developed over where to place the permanent county seat. The legislative council first designated the Widow Hull's as an interim location but later changed the interim meeting place to Webbville, a community about half way between Campbellton and what is now Marianna.

Richard Keith Call was a protege of
Andrew Jackson and the
Territorial Governor of Florida.

The controversy intensified when Robert Beveridge, a Scottish merchant from Baltimore, secured title to 160-acres of prime Chipola River land on November 1, 1827. The patent included the site on which the Jackson County Courthouse stands today.

Beveridge pushed forward the development of a new town that he called Marianna. His business partners included Richard Keith Call, an ally of Andrew Jackson and future governor of Florida. With such powerful influence on his side, Beveridge soon lobbied the legislative council to designate Marianna as the permanent county seat for Jackson County.

The developer offered to deed to Jackson County the public (courthouse) square and two downtown lots if the legislature would give Marianna the county seat designation. The town's citizens also offered to donate $1,500 to be used in building a courthouse and jail.

The offer met with a friendly reception in Tallahassee and a bill designating Marianna as the county seat of Jackson County was passed on October 20, 1828. A second act approved the incorporation of the town of Marianna eight days later on October 28, 1828.

Webbville as it appears today. The "ghost town" is still the
actual county seat of Jackson County, Florida.

The news was met with outrage in nearby Webbville, which was then the county's largest town. Unable to sway the members of the legislative council, Webbville residents took their case to the U.S. Congress.

Marianna's developers, meanwhile, went forward with their first sale of lots on January 25, 1829. Bids were opened for the new courthouse and jail on the same day.

Robert Beveridge maintained possession of the courthouse square during that sale, along with the now lost Masonic and School Squares, the future site of Marianna's Riverside Cemetery and the triangular park then called "the Plaza" (today's Confederate Park).

As the incorporation of the community took effect and Marianna's citizens elected their first leaders, these holdings became the property of the town. Beveridge continued to pay taxes on the lands until the organization of Marianna's government could be completed.

The Jackson County Courthouse in the late 1800s, about
20 years after Aesop Bellamy planted the Courthouse Oaks.
He was one of the county's first black business owners.

Robert Beveridge still owned the future site of the Jackson County Courthouse when the U.S. Congress intervened and annulled the legislative council's action designating Marianna as the county seat. Since Florida was still a U.S. territory, Congress and the President held ultimate power over local governmental decisions. In a rare display of this power, Congress overturned Marianna's designation as county seat on January 21, 1829.

Officials in Washington, D.C., followed on March 2, 1829, by giving congressional approval to Webbville, provided that the proceeds from the sale of one-half of the town's lots be spent on public education. Webbville followed through, raising $7,000 for the construction of a public school.

The beloved old Jackson County Courthouse as it
appeared on a postcard during the mid-20th century.

The Federal courts followed the decision of the U.S. Congress. The U.S. District Court for the Western District of Florida convened in Webbville in September 1829, as did the Superior Court for Jackson County. 

Webbville thus became - and remains - the official county seat of Jackson County. The town no longer exists, but its designation by Congress has never been overturned.

Marianna, meanwhile, went forward with the construction of its courthouse and jail. Robert Beveridge, however, never deeded the square on which these were built to Jackson County. The legislative council finally imposed a fine against any public official that did not conduct business from the new courthouse, a move that had the result of shifting the county's public business to Marianna although Webbville still remained the official county seat.

As has been noted, Beveridge's lands became the property of the City of Marianna as the city was formally organized. He payed taxes on them until that time.

The beautiful live oak on the northeast corner of Courthouse
Square was planted by Aesop Bellamy in 1873 and can be
seen in the far left of the 1880s photo above.

A thorough search of the deeds and other records in the Clerk of Courts office and archives of the Jackson County Courthouse, as well as the private records of Florida Land Title & Trust, reveals no deed or other document showing that the city ever gave the county title to the square.

Jackson County has since spent untold dollars maintaining and operating five different courthouses on the square, even though the square has apparently remained the property of the City of Marianna the entire time.

Which brings us to today and the controversy that has grown over the future of the live oaks that surround the Jackson County Courthouse. 

Unless the county can provide some long lost proof that it actually owns the square, then its own records indicate that the trees and the dirt in which they grow - as well as the dirt on which the courthouse stands - actually belong to the City of Marianna.

This fact raises serious questions over whether the Board of County Commissioners has any authority at all for any of its actions regarding the trees or square. The city, probably through lack of knowledge that it still owned the square, has never intervened in the construction of courthouses on the site so it is possible that the county may legally own the actual footprint of the the courthouse.

The rest of the square, however, is unfenced public land and appears to be owned by Marianna and its citizens. Unless the county commissioners can prove otherwise, the City of Marianna is the entity that should be making decisions about the courthouse square and its trees.

Note: To learn more about the early history of the area and the political battle between Marianna and Webbville, please consider:

Book:  The History Of Jackson County, Florida: The Early Years

Kindle E-book:  The History of Jackson County, Florida: The Early Years