Florida Genealogy & History Resources

The Memorial is transcribed as it appears in the above source with punctuation and spellings retained.

Memorial To Congress By Citizens Of The Territory
[NA:HF, 22 Cong., 1 sess.:DS] [Referred January 28, 1833]

To the Honorable the Senate and house of Representatives of the United States.

The Petition of the undersigned Citizens of the Territory of Florida respectfully sheweth, that for several years past the legislation of the said Territory has been calculated materially to disturb the peace and happiness and to injure the property of the ceded inhabitants of the late provinces of Spain who are by the Treaty now Citizens of the United States. Your Petitioners are aware that the evils of which they complain have not arisen from any thing inherent in the institutions and Laws of the United States, but have their origin in the illiberal prejudices of a local government totally at variance with the liberal spirit and generous policy of the nation and age in which we live: it will not be necessary for us in appealing to so intelligent a body as the one we address, to say that every nation and people have particular customs and habits which if not at War with the institutions of other countries are universally viewed with great toleration and indulgence. The principle has been carried so far in other countries where there was an established religion that the ceded inhabitants were permitted to retain theirs. There are doubtless some practises in all countries tolerated by National indulgencies that may not be approved by all the people of the United States; but those are diseases of the body politic to be changed by example and public sentiment and not by the nostrums of political quackery which will nauseate and disgust every one whose misfortune it has been to be transfered to the United States.

The laws to which your Memorialists chiefly object as coming under the designation above mentioned are mostly those of the last Session of Council relating to free people of color: it cannot have escaped the observation of your honorable body that in all slave-holding countries some portion of the population and not a very inconsiderable part have without the formalities of Marriage ceremonies, children by colored women. in all Spanish countries they were free and admitted to most of the rights of Spanish subjects especially to the natural and inherent right of legal protection from which they are now excluded: however these practises may be at variance with the national prejudices of a portion of the United States they existed in the recently acquired country and are not to be extinguished at once by intolerance and persecution or any other moral or political fanaticism: These evils are not to be rooted out by legal penalties any more than faith is to be controuled by the terrors of the Inquisition and a resort to one is no more to be justified than to the other. The Legislative Council of Florida however acting upon the idea of bringing every thing to their own standard of moral perfection: as the Tyrant of antiquity did to His bed, have denounced penalties and imposed taxes on this class of population only on account of their color: These unfortunate people are not only requited to pay the usual taxes which other citizens pay but they are required to pay from five to ten dollars each on both sexes over fifteen years of age because of their color, in addition, and to be sold as slaves for life if they should be too poor to pay these odious and unequal taxes; besides being outlawed and excluded from all legal redress for injuries done either to their persons or properties: connected with this also is a law to break up all those paternal obligations and ties of natural affection which have existed for years past by imposing a fine of one thousand dollars with the penalty of disenfranchisement upon every White person who is suspected of having a connexion with a coloured woman and the like penalty for inter-marying with any person suspected to be of colored origin or for performing such ceremony.

The Legislative Acts of Florida are now replete with many cruel and unjust laws but those of mental persecution and proscription for the virtuous and sacred ties of domestic life and parental affection are certainly the most tyrannical and the most repugnant to the free institutions of our republican government and perfect novelties in modern legislation.

Your Memorialists therefore humbly pray that all those cruel, unnecessary and most impolitic laws not authorised by the Constitution of the United States be repealed and annulled and your Petitioners as in duty bound will ever pray &'

[Signatures]
Z. Kingsley
Charles W. Clarke
Geo:-JF:-Clarke
F: Richard
Edward H Sams
D.S. Gardiner

F J Ross
Sam Kingsley
J.A. Coffee
Rocque Leonardi
Ant' Lazari
Adam Cooper

[Endorsed] Florida-Inhts of Memorial To Congress complaining of certain acts of the Legislative councils-Jany 28. 1833 Refd to the Committee on the Territories, White1 F.42 Terri

Florida was governed by Spain prior to its United States territorial status. During this period (1783-1821), allotments of land were officially granted to settlers in one of two ways.

1. Under a Royal Order dated 29 October 1790, acreage was granted to settlers who petitioned the Spanish governor of Florida. In this memorial, the petitioner specified the amount of acreage desired, according to the family size and number of slaves, and the location desired. The governor responded in one of two ways. He would give the petitioner title of absolute property or a concession which allowed possession but not title until certain requirements were fulfilled. In most cases, the petitioner had to cultivate the property for a specified time.
2. Grants of land were made while Spain was negotiating the transfer of Florida to the United States, between February 1819 and July 1821. These are commonly referred to as Donation Act grants.

After Florida passed out of Spain's control, the United States began a process of verifying these land grants through the Land-Grant Act. Commissioners who were appointed for East and West Florida to investigate land claims. East Florida Commissioners were located in St. Augustine; Pensacola was the site for the West Florida Commissioners.

LOCAL HISTORIES
A source of genealogical and historical research

Local family histories and Family Bibles for East Florida are located in the genealogy collection of the Jacksonville (Florida) Public Library (among other locations). Family histories are not regarded as primary sources and contain their fair share of errors. On occasion, even a Family Bible contains dates or other data which is at odds with primary source material. With that in mind, these can be rich genealogical sources and often answer long-held family puzzles.

The PK Yonge Library of Florida History in Gainesville, Florida contains manuscripts which can be researched for references to specific famillies. The site can be accessed though the internet, however, the holdings are irreplaceable and must be examined at the Library.

• The Florida Mirror (Fernandina) 1878-1885.
• The Artisan (Jacksonville) 1915-1916.
• The Daily Florida Union (Jacksonville) 1877.
• The Florida Journal (Jacksonville) 1884.
• The News (Jacksonville) 1850-1852.
• The News/The Florida News (Jacksonville) 1852-1855.
• The Florida Daily Times/The Florida Times Union 1881-Present.
• The Florida Times Union/Star Edition 1950-1966.
• The Metropolis/Jacksonville Journal 1905-1988.
• The Ancient City (St. Augustine) 1850-1854.
• Florida Herald & Southern Democrat (St. Augustine) 1839-1869.
• St. Augustine Examiner 1859-1869.
• St. Augustine News 1838-1845.

Census returns for genealogical or historical research for Northeast Florida are available for the following years. Some returns are on microfilm, others are found in issues of the Florida Historical Quarterly, a publication of the Florida Historical Society, and still other census records have been transcribed and placed online.

EAST FLORIDA COUNTIES INCLUDE DUVAL, NASSAU AND ST. JOHNS

SPECIAL COLLECTIONS:

• 1763-1771 - East Florida
• 1783 - Spanish Census of Florida
• 1786 - St. Augustine, Florida
• 1814 - East Florida Spanish Census
• 1864 - Fernandina (Nassau) Florida
• 1865 - Colored Persons on Amelia Island, Florida
• 1895 - Nassau County, Florida

U.S. CENSUS (State of Florida only):

• Through 1920

I began my journey into Florida history research about ten years ago when I began a historical novel on a pioneer family.

Originally focused on Isaiah Hart, the man who is credited with founding Jacksonville, FL, the novel quickly became an engrossing study of the entire locale of Northeast Florida. My main interest switched from Isaiah to his sister, Rebeckah, who in fact had settled in the area well before he did. Since this was a historical novel, I became a self-learner, studying genealogy along with area history.

Frequent visits to the Florida Collection of the Main Library in Jacksonville gave me loads of intriguing data, especially the old land records kept by the Spanish. But all the historical collections brought even more questions as I tried to piece together events from a century past. I traveled to Gainesville and sat for a day with archives, reading correspondences from the Spanish governor regarding the Hart family, and still more dilemmas arose.

It's been years since I began my quest. I gave my novel a name: Rebeckah: A Florida Pioneer Woman, and drafted several chapters. I stood at her gravesite. I met with Hart family descendants living in Florida and Utah. I corresponded with other researchers and authors including Prof. Daniel Schafer (UNF), James Ward and Canter Brown. But finding first-person accounts by my heroine, Rebeckah Hart, was an elusive venture. She was written about, and there were episodes in which she was mentioned. But none of that historically imperative primary source material was to be found!

The historical biography became an historical fiction. Then time for research became less available. I arranged my notes, the drafts of the book and scores of Florida-related texts into neat bookshelves. There it all waits. There Rebeckah waits for me to finish her story.