147 years ago: The murder of Jackson County Clerk of Court John L. Finlayson

Dr. John L. Finlayson, Clerk of Court for Jackson
County, was murdered on February 26, 1869.
State Archives of Florida/Memory Collection

This week marks the 147th anniversary of the murder of John L. Finlayson, Jackson County's Clerk of Court. State Senator W.J. Purman was wounded in the attack.

The Reconstruction era was at its height in 1869 and Florida was still patrolled by troops of the U.S. Army. Citizens were deprived of their rights under the First and Second Amendments of the Constitution and could even be jailed for such things as carrying a firearm or peacefully assembling.

The people of Jackson County had faced a shocking litany of wrongs in the four years since the war. Rape was legally excused as an "act of war." Kidnapping and false imprisonment were countenanced by Federal officials who then openly defied the local courts after being indicted for their crimes. Teenage girls were dragged before military tribunals.

It has long been assumed that the shootings of John L. Finlayson and W.J. Purman were carried out by assassins attempting to break the power of the Reconstruction government. This is certainly possible but remains unproved. No one was ever arrested for the crime. Purman said at the time that he believed the motive was personal.

The shooting took place on a Friday night:

W.J. Purman, Reconstruction era state senator
from Jackson County, said that the shooting
was not politically motivated.
State Archives of Florida/Memory Collection

SHOCKING MURDER AND ASSASSINATION – Intelligence reached us last night of a shocking assassination and murder which took place at Marianna, Jackson County, on Friday night last, about 8 o’clock. – The victim was Dr. John L. Finlayson, Clerk of the Circuit Court. It seems that Dr. F. and Maj. W.J. Purman were on their way to some place in the village. Maj. P. walking a little behind, and while crossing a vacant lot were fired on by some person behind a tree at a distance of forty yards, one shot striking Dr. Finlayson in the head and penetrating to the brain and another striking Maj. Purman in the neck. Dr. F. survived about two hours, and Maj. Purman was regarded in a critical condition. The perpetrator of this cowardly and shocking murder is unknown, but if there is justice in Florida it is to be hoped that he will not long escape discovery and punishment. (Tallahassee Floridian, March 2, 1869)

Local tradition holds that the fatal shots were fired from behind an ancient tree that still stands in the yard of the historic Davis-West House in Marianna. The home was then rented to Finlayson and Purman.

The two men were an odd pairing. Purman had served in the Union army and had arrived in Jackson County following the war to assist Charles Hamilton in the operation of the local office of the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands. Commonly called the Freedman's Bureau, the agency ostensibly worked to help former slaves as they adapted to life as free citizens. 

In Jackson County, however, the bureau was accused of corruption by both local residents and Federal officials. Purman was at the center of many of the allegations.

Confederate Service Record
Card from the file of John
L. Finlayson.

Finlayson, on the other hand, had been born and raised on his parents' farm just west of Marianna. He served in Capt. Richard Smith's Marianna Dragoons (later Company B, 15th Confederate Cavalry) and had returned home from the war to find that Union raiders had looted the farm. His mother, despite her Unionist sympathies, later said that the destruction was done "by the Yankees, at the instigation of the Devil."

His recent history was not enough to deter the young physician from associating himself with Carpetbaggers like Hamilton and Purman. He was described by a newspaper of the time as "one of the leading radicals" of Jackson County. 

...Dr. Finlayson was born in Jackson county, but a liberal education, a generous nature, and a patriotic spirit, made him a Republican. He was, therefore, a “Scalawag.” Senator Purman was born in the North, but had the audacity to settle in Florida. He was therefore, a “Carpet-Bagger.” And who can doubt that if what politicians and writers allow themselves to say of these classes is believed, some will be found bad enough or fanatical enough to endeavor to exterminate them? And who can avoid the fear that others equally fanatical, equally bad, less accustomed to political affairs, should take up the creed of retaliation, and create other innocent victims? (Pensacola Observer, March 19, 1869).

The author of the above commentary was the editor of the pro-Northern Pensacola Observer. He was correct in fearing that "others equally fanatical, equally bad" might try to retaliate. 

Charles Hamilton, onetime Bureau official in Jackson County and now Florida's sole representative in the U.S. House of Representatives, wrote a private letter to friends still in the county to advocate attacks on local whites by former slaves. Purman, to his credit, intervened and stopped such violence before it could be started.

Local citizens gathered in Marianna in the days following the murder to express their general concern. A committee was appointed and the following resolution was unanimously adopted:

The historic Davis-West House from the murder scene. The
fatal shots were traditionally fired from the oak tree on the
left side of the photograph.

WHEREAS, on the night of the 26th of February, 1869, Dr. JOHN L. FINLAYSON was assassinated, and the same act nearly resulted in the assassination of Major W.J. PURMAN, who was badly wounded, and thinking as we do, and as all men of correct views think, that assassination is a most despicable act, which should be discountenanced and frowned down by all honest men, and deeming that it is very meet and proper that our community should express its abhorrence of the act, we do.

Resolve. That the said act of assassination meets our entire detestation and disapproval. We condemn it as we condemn any action of assassination, and we do not think that any portion of our citizens approve said detestable act.

Resolved, That we concur in opinion with Major Purman that the act was not induced by political feeling, but was caused by personal animosity.

Resolved, that it is the duty of civil authorities to be untiring in their efforts to find out and arrest the perpetrators of this atrocious deed.

Resolved, That these resolutions be published in all the newspapers of Florida.

J.L.G. BAKER, President.

C.W. Davis, Secretary. (Tallahassee Floridian, March 9, 1869).

Gov. Harrison Reed of Florida.
State Archives of Florida/Memory Collection

The assassination of Finlayson and shooting of Purman also echoed loudly in the halls of the State Capitol Building in Tallahassee. Governor Harrison Reed announced on March 9 that the state would offer a $2,000 reward for the capture of the person or persons responsible. The amount was a substantial sum in the lean years that followed the War Between the States (or Civil War).

PROCLAMATION!
$2000 REWARD!
Harrison Reed, Governor of the State of Florida, to all to whom these Presents shall Come – Greeting:

WHEREAS, It has been made known to me that a foul and atrocious murder was committed upon the person of John L. Finlayson, in the town of Marianna, and county of Jackson, in this State, on the night of Friday, the twenty-sixth day of February, A.D. 1869; AND, WHEREAS, At the same time and place, the Hon. W.J. Purman was dangerously wounded by the same individual, to me unknown, and by the discharge of the same weapon which killed said Finlayson:

Now, therefore, I, HARRISON REED, Governor as aforesaid, by the power and authority vested in me, do hereby offer a reward of TWO THOUSAND DOLLARS to any person or persons who may apprehend or give such information as may lead to the apprehension and conviction of the party or parties who committed this foul and desperate murder.

And I hereby enjoy upon all good citizens the duty of aiding, by every means in their power, the exertions of the officers of the law to bring the guilty to punishment.

IN TESTIMONY WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the Great Seal of the State to be affixed, at Tallahassee, this fourth day of March, A.D. 1869.
HARRISON REED, Governor.
Attest: - JONATHAN C. GIBBS, Secretary of State.
March 9, ’69. (Tallahassee Floridian, March 9, 1869)

Such efforts failed. No one was ever brought to justice for the shootings. The mystery over the motive for the attack still exists today, especially because Purman said a short time later that he did not believe the purpose was politcal:

Mr. W.J. Purman has had, in this and the adjoining counties, many enemies, growing out of his conduct as Bureau agent, but it was generally believed that all active animosity on that account had by the time he was shot subsided. We are informed and believe that he had numerous enemies in this and adjoining counties on account of his connection with the collecting of U.S. dues to discharged United States soldiers, who believed that he had collected and defrauded them out of large amounts of the same. Whether their suspicions and charges are well based we are not to determine and do not ourselves charge, but may numerate as one of the numerous causes that has created to him enemies. This coupled with his declarations soon after his shooting, when in a critical situation, such as the law writers assign to establish the rule of evidence by dying declarations, and which declarations can be established by at least three very honorable, moderate and entire reliable gentlemen, that he did not believe the shooting was the result of “political animosity,” “but was done by personal enemies,” places the fact beyond a doubt that it did not partake of and was not prompted by political feeling. (Tallahassee Weekly Sentinel, April 27, 1869)

Unless some new information is discovered, the murder of Clerk of Court John L. Finlayson will remain one of the tragic mysteries of Jackson County's past.

Dale Cox
February 28, 2017

#74 The Battle of the Flowers (100 Great Things about Jackson County, Florida)

Azaleas in bloom at Riverside Cemetery

The bloodless 1867 confrontation remembered today as the "Battle of the Flowers" is #74 on our list of 100 Great Things about Jackson County, Florida.

Please click here to see the entire list as it is unveiled.

We observe Memorial Day each year as a day of peace in which we honor and remember our nation's fallen soldiers. The custom was started in the South, where the wives, mothers, sisters and daughters of fallen Confederate soldiers gathered to maintain and "decorate" the graves of their loved ones with flowers. The families and comrades of Union soldiers soon adopted the practice as well and it eventually became a National Holiday.

In the Spring of 1867, however, this practice of memorializing the fallen ignited a bloodless uprising against oppression. The "Battle of the Flowers" was led by three young girls and became a landmark event in the history of Jackson County.

Col. John T. Sprague, U.S. Army
National Archives

The incident took place against the backdrop of the sudden and brutal suspension of Constitutional rights in the South. For two years after the end of the War Between the States (or Civil War), the people of the South for the most part tried to accept the outcome of the conflict. General Robert E. Lee had urged them to remain good citizens and they tried. Slavery was abolished, new state constitutions were drafted, elections were held and the long, difficult task of recovering from the destruction of war became the focus of Southern people of all races.

The U.S. Congress - forgetting President Lincoln's promise of "malice toward none, with charity for all" - decided in 1867 that the South had not been sufficiently "punished" for its role in the war. Military rule was implemented in the South and in April of that year Colonel John T. Sprague of the U.S. Army declared martial law in Florida.

To enforce its will, the government spread troops throughout the state and by May 1 a detachment of armed soldiers patrolled the streets of Marianna. The U.S. Constitution was suspended and the rights to speak freely, peacefully assemble and hold and bear arms were outlawed.

Grave of Lt. Isaac Adams at Riverside Cemetery

In Jackson County, opposition to this new policy manifested itself at Memorial Day when three young girls engaged in a now illegal protest.

On April 26, 1867, the ladies and girls of Marianna had observed Confederate Memorial Day by wearing their mourning dresses and placing flowers on the graves of Southern dead at Riverside and St. Luke's cemeteries. A few days later, in a move that probably was not intended to provoke controversy, a group of former slaves placed flowers on the grave of Lieutenant Isaac Adams at Riverside Cemetery.

Lt. Isaac Adams
Second Maine Cavalry

Adams, an officer in the 2nd Maine Cavalry, had been killed during the Battle of Marianna on September 27, 1864. The city had lost 20% of its male population that day, with the list of killed, wounded or captured including boys as young as 12 and men as old as 76.

Many Jackson County residents were still extremely bitter about the human losses suffered by the community in that battle, but they had said nothing when the family of Lieutenant Adams erected a stone monument at his grave. In May 1867, however, the community was alive with outrage over the suspension of the Constitutional Rights of former Confederate soldiers and their families. The adults of the community said little - at least in public - but three young girls carried out a brief protest to express their opinion of the U.S. Government and its soldiers.

The girls - one of whom had lost a brother in the Battle of Marianna and another of whom had seen a close friend shot down in front of her home - removed the fading flowers from Lieutenant Adams' grave and trampled them in the pathway. In normal times, such an action would not have been against Federal law and likely would have been upheld as an expression of free speech. 1867, however, was not a normal time.

Charles M. Hamilton
Library of Congress

Charles M. Hamilton, an agent of the U.S. Government's Bureau of Freedmen, Refugees & Abandoned Lands, ordered the three teenagers to appear before him to "answer the charge of having desecrated the graves of Union soldiers." Since agents of the "Bureau" were officers in the U.S. Army, Hamilton's order subjected civilians to a military trial, a clear violation of the United States Constitution.

The three teenagers did appear before Hamilton, but to his surprise they were accompanied by their attorney, their families and a huge crowd of supporters. The Marianna Courier described the results of the confrontation:

...An investigation was had, in which no reliable evidence was introduced to support the charge, and the young ladies were immediately released from arrest. We would advise our young ladies for the present, at least, to keep out of the way of these "Union soldiers" dead or alive. As there are no headboards, stones, or cenotaphs in the cemetery to guide your steps, it would be better not to go at all, for fear of treading unawares where you hadn't ought to, to spread flowers, or pick one up to decorate, for it might be called another name and you punished. - Marianna Courier, May 30, 1867.

The people of Marianna believed that Hamilton would have punished the girls had their family and friends not turned out in force. They also considered the agent's attempt to try the three teenagers before a military court to be an egregious abuse of power. The Courier heaped scorn on the agent and suggested that town authorities "immediately provide another avenue to the burial place of our dead that the 'Sacred Spot' be not viewed much less approached, at the peril to the innocent and unsuspecting."

The Battle of the Flowers was the final straw for many citizens of Jackson County, Florida. The nonviolent protest by the three girls led former Confederates across the county to end their peaceful cooperation with the U.S. authorities who controlled the county. Over the years that followed, these men would stage a successful rebellion against Hamilton and his cohorts. Much blood would be shed in what would be called the "Reconstruction War" or "Jackson County War," but by the time it ended U.S. troops no longer patrolled the streets of Marianna and control of the local government had been returned to the local people.

The First Signs of Violence in the Jackson County Reconstruction War

Marianna before 1900

There had been occasional incidents of violence in Jackson County following the 1865 end of the War Between the States, but none really rose to the level of "outbreak." In early 1866, however, things began to change.

The spark, as was noted in my last post, was the arrival of Charles M. Hamilton in the county (see His name that sat on him was Death...). A Union military officer, Hamilton was sent to Marianna as the agent of the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands, or as it was commonly called, "The Bureau."

Charles M. Hamilton
Library of Congress

Hamilton's decision to vacate all of the labor contracts reached between local farmers and the former slaves or Freedmen living in the county and the mandate that all such agreements be approved by him was in violation of Florida law and created tension in Jackson County. That tension soon led to problems.

On February 22, 1866, for example, James and Eldridge Bates (father and son) became involved in a confrontation with a freed woman named Elizabeth Dozier. The said that she had used abusive language to James Bates' wife and when they told her to leave their property, she refused. This led to a violent confrontation and both men were charged with Assault and Battery.

Jackson County had no courthouse at the time. The most recent one had burned in January of 1865 when fire swept through downtown Marianna, so local stores doubled as offices and courtrooms. In one of these, separate trials were held for the two Bates men.

One of the juries, uniquely, included Samuel Fleishman, a local merchant and Unionist who had left Jackson County during the recent war. He had returned after the conflict ended and resumed his place in the local business community. He later would lose his life in the Jackson County Reconstruction War, but in early 1866 was accepted as just another member of the community and there is no indication of trouble of any kind between him and his neighbors.

After deliberating, the juries in both cases found the men not guilty.

During the confrontation at the Bates farm, a freedman named John Dozier had gone to the assistance of Elizabeth Dozier. Eldridge Bates faced an additional charge of Assault and Battery for attacking him. Based on the testimony of a witness named Bob Blackshear, also a freedman, Eldridge was found guilty and was fined $75, a fairly standard fine in assault and battery cases of the time.

The trial proved several points that have been questioned by some writers. First, it showed that in 1866, when the judicial system was still in the hands of local residents, the freed people of Jackson County could get justice in the courts. The newly discovered records of the Eldridge Bates trial also show that former slaves were accepted as witnesses in court and that their words were given due consideration by local juries.

In the case involving Elizabeth Dozier, a not guilty verdict was returned, but in the case involving John Dozier, the testimony provided by Blackshear was considered conclusive and Eldridge Bates was found guilty.

While the Bates case was making its way through the local courts, a more direct attack on the occupation authorities themselves took place. Jack Myrick and James Finlayson became involved in a physical altercation with a soldier from the 7th U.S. Infantry.

The regiment then maintained a small garrison in Marianna to enforce the edicts of Bureau agent Charles Hamilton and the sight of blue-coated soldiers walking the streets was a difficult one for some of the former Confederates, particularly those who had suffered greatly during the war.

St. Luke's Episcopal Church
This structure replaced the one burned during the Battle of Marianna but
was of similar design and construction.

Jack Myrick (John T. Myrick, Jr.) was one of those who had suffered enormously at the hands of Union soldiers during the war. On September 27, 1864, he had turned out with the local home guard to fight in the Battle of Marianna. Jack, his brother Littleton and their friend Woody Nickels all had taken up stations in St. Luke's Episcopal Church during the battle. When Federal troops set fire to the structure to dislodge the Confederates inside, they tried to come out and surrender.

Of the three, only Jack survived. Littleton Myrick was shot down in the church door and allowed to fall back into the flames and burned to death. Woody made it out, but was shot by a Union soldier. As he tried to crawl away from the intense heat of the burning church, he was killed when a Union soldier bashed in his head with a musket butt. Jack nearly suffered the same fate, but was taken prisoner instead.

Even though he was only 15 years old, he was sent north to spend a brutal winter in the icy hell of the Elmira Prison Camp in Elmira, New York. Elmira was a deadly place and more than half of the Marianna prisoners sent there never came back. Those who did survive had suffered from a winter of disease, cold, malnutrition and abuse.

Jack Myrick came home a year older and a lifetime more embittered. With no prospects for any kind of future, he began to associate with a group of friends, most of whom were of the same age: Billy Coker, Pete Alderman, James Finlayson and others.

Capt. Richard Comba
7th U.S. Infantry

Captain Richard Comba, the officer in charge of the detachment of soldiers at Marianna, took Jack and James into custody following their alleged attack on the soldier from his unit. He wanted both tried before a military tribunal, but higher ranking officers decided instead to let the local courts deal with the two. They remained in the system for some time, but ultimately never were brought to trial.

Other incidents took place as well. The number of assault and battery cases in the county started to grow, a local school teacher was threatened, but the real violence was yet to come.

I will continue to post on Jackson County's Reconstruction War over coming weeks, so be sure to check back often.

"...His name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him."

Charles M. Hamilton

And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth. - Revelation 6:8.

The Reconstruction era in Jackson County took an ominous turn early in 1866 when a Union officer named Charles M. Hamilton arrived in Marianna. To quote the verse from the Book of Revelation, "Hell followed with him."

Hamilton came to Marianna to head up the local office of the Bureau of Freedmen, Refugees and Abandoned Lands (commonly called the Freedman's Bureau). This was the organization tasked by the U.S. Government with overseeing the transition of the former slaves into their new roles as citizens of the country. In most areas of the South, the Bureau's work without violence. In Jackson County, that would not be the case and Hamilton himself was the cause of much of what followed.

When he first arrived in Jackson County, Hamilton was surprised to find that the local whites were "pretty well disposed to the freedmen" and that no significant problems were taking place. This was because the people of both races, after hearing from the governor the previous fall, had moved forward with making arrangements to get the county's farms back into operation.

Gov. William Marvin

Governor William Marvin, the appointed military governor of Florida, had addressed public meetings in Marianna on September 16 and 17, 1865, explaining to the freed people what it meant to be free:
 

…You must be contented with having your freedom, and what else you have you will have to get by work. And when you shall have made it by hard work, you will know how many days of hard toll it cause you to get it, and then you will rightly value it, and take care of it. You now are at liberty to go to work for yourselves; you have none other to work for. You belong now to no man; you have ceased to be property; you never will be sold again; and if you will struggle hard and do right, live as good men and women, and you will prosper, if not, you will suffer.- Gov. William Marvin, September 17, 1865.

The governor had urged all of the county's citizens, both white and white, to cooperate and do what they could to begin producing badly needed food as quickly as possible. And the citizens had responded. Per the governor's instructions, they entered into hundreds of contracts.

These contracts basically were sharecropping agreements. Few of Jackson County's landowners had any real money left after the war, so they offered a share of the crop plus housing, food and other supplies to the freedmen in exchange for them helping to return the farms to production. Surviving examples of these contracts show that they were well done and that the landowners tried to be fair.

Charles M. Hamilton

When Charles Hamilton arrived in early 1866, before even the first post-war crop could be planted, he immediately and illegally invalidated these contracts.

Under Florida law, the labor contracts were under the regulation of the county judge and nothing in either state or federal law gave the Freedman's Bureau any control over existing agreements. Hamilton, however, overruled the law and assumed responsibility for the contracts himself.

Not only did he require that all agreements be made using a printed form he prepared himself, he also required that both landowners and freedmen pay him fees for stamps to be placed on the documents. It was the first step in an assumption of power by the Bureau that far surpassed anything attempted anywhere else in Florida.

The consolidation of power by Hamilton and the Bureau was the spark that soon led to the first outbreaks of violence in Jackson County. The agent's arrival in Marianna, in fact, reasonably could be called the first "shot" in Jackson County's Reconstruction War.

This was the opinion of John Wallace, himself a freedman, who had served in the Second U.S. Colored Troops and fought on the Union side at the Battle of Natural Bridge during the Civil War. He went on to become a teacher and legislator in Florida after the war and summed up his opinion of the cause of the violence in Jackson County as follows:

...The two races became arrayed against each other in deadly hostility, which led to frequent occurrences of violence and bloodshed. This state of things was not due to the enmity of the whites to the blacks, nor their opposition to the new law enfranchising the latter - though they were opposed to it, of course - nor was it due to any natural bad temper or hatred of the whites on the part of the colored people, for under ordinary circumstances there are no more peaceable people in the world than the inhabitants of Jackson County, of both colors, and they would have passed through the ordeal of reconstruction without a jar or disturbance, had it not been for the evil influence of the very men who were delegated to preserve peace, to administer justice, and to promote good fellowship and kindly relations between the freedmen and their former owners. - John Wallace, Freedman and State Legislator.

It did not take long after Hamilton's arrival for things to begin to change in Jackson County.  I'll continue to post on the Reconstruction War in coming days and weeks, so be sure to check back often. 

 

Reconstruction #2 - Sanders and his Raiders

Battle of Newton Monument

This is the second part of a continuing series on the Reconstruction War in Jackson County, Florida. To read part one first, please visit:

While the planned attack on Campbellton by Pittman's raiders was turned back, Jackson County's problems with such groups were far from over. In fact, a second such group took up a position in the swamps of Forks of the Creek between Campbellton and the modern town of Malone.

The outlaws were led by Joseph Sanders, a lieutenant in the First Florida Cavalry (U.S.) who had gone out on a minor raid and then failed to return to Pensacola as ordered. Before the end of the war he and his men attempted a raid on Newton in Dale County, Alabama, but were driven off in a bloody repulse remembered today as the Battle of Newton. Sanders by then was facing an arrest order from General Asboth and finally decided to return to headquarters. He was then dismissed from the army for the "good of the service."

Now out of the military, he came back to Jackson County, raised a party of raiders and once again took up a position in the swamps of the Forks of the Creek, from which he raided homes, farms and communities:

…Sanders, it will be recollected, is an old deserter, and commanded a large squad of “Bush-whackers,” and has now a considerable number of thieves, cut-throats and robbers following him, who commit all kinds of depredations. Where are the authorities, that the fiend of hell isn’t taken up and dealt with? No such a consummate scoundrel should longer be allowed to breathe the balmy air of Florida, or “drink of the waters thereof.”

Major Nathan Cutler

The truth was that the people of Jackson County really had no one other than themselves to depend on in dealing with such outlaws. Federal troops did finally reach Marianna in the early summer of 1865, but they were few in number and rarely seemed to have ventured outside of Marianna. Among the commanders of these units was Major Nathan Cutler, the now 21-year-old Harvard educated lawyer who had been seriously wounded at the Battle of Marianna on September 27, 1864. He had remained under medical care at the home of Mayor Thomas M. White for months after his wounding and was generally held in high regard by the people of the community. Cutler, however, could do little more than advise them on what course of action he thought the U.S. Government might take regarding them. Even he did not know for sure.

Cutler did sign off on pardon applications for some of the local men, among them Colonel James F. McClellan, and advised both freedmen and whites to maintain the peace as well as possible. All the local people could do was continue to wait and hope for the best.

 

It was not until June 25, 1865, that the War Department finally began to implement a plan for the military governance of the former Confederate states. Major General J.G. Foster, a well-known pre-war resident of Florida, was named to the command of the state on that day. He was directed to establish his headquarters in Tallahassee.

Marianna in the late 1800s

In Marianna, meanwhile, a meeting convened to discuss what might be done to restore Florida’s allegiance to the Union as quickly as possible. What took place at this meeting and who was involved remains a mystery. So far as is known, no delegates were appointed to meet with Federal authorities on the topic. A newspaper report on the session did not that corn crops were abundant in Jackson County, but that not much cotton was being grown.

It took until August 7^th for General Foster to take up his command in Tallahassee and begin the process of organizing affairs in Florida. He issued orders from the capital city on that date assigning General Asboth to the command of the part of the state that included Jackson County:

…The District of West Florida to be commanded by Brig. Gen. A. Asboth, U.S.V., Headquarters at Barrancas; to include all that part of Florida lying West of the Chattahoochie River, excepting ten (10) miles around Apalachicola. The troops in this District will constitute the 31 Separate Brigade.

It was now becoming clear that military law would be the order of the day, at least for the foreseeable future. For the time being county officials continued to see to their responsibilities as well as they could, but they had no idea whether their actions were legal or, in fact, whether they even still held their posts.

I will continue to post on the Reconstruction War over coming days, so be sure to check back regularly.