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Spanish West Florida

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Province of West Florida
Province ofViceroyalty of New Spain
1783–1821
Flag of West Florida

CapitalPensacola
Government
• TypeColonial government
Governor
• 1783–1792
Arturo O'Neill de Tyrone
• 1819–1821
José María Callava
History
10 February 1783
• Disestablished
1821
Preceded by		 Succeeded by
British West Florida
Florida Territory

Spanish West Florida(Spanish:Florida Occidental) was a province of theSpanish Empirefrom 1783 until 1821, when both it andEast Floridawerecededto theUnited States.

The region ofWest Floridainitially had the same borders as the erstwhileBritish colony.Much of its territory was gradually annexed by the United States in theWest Florida Controversy.At its greatest extent, the colony included what are now theFlorida ParishesofLouisiana,the southernmost parts ofMississippiandAlabama,as well as thePanhandleofFlorida.WhereasSoutheastern Louisianaandpresent-day coastal Mississippi and Alabamawere annexed either prior to or during theWar of 1812,the land which makes up present-dayFloridawas not acquired until several years later. It became theFlorida Territoryof the United States in 1822.

History[edit]

Spainwas the first European state to colonize the Florida peninsula, expanding northward fromCubaand establishing long-lasting settlements atSt. Augustine,on theAtlanticcoast, as well as atPensacolaandSan Marcos(St. Marks), on theGulf of Mexicocoast.[1]

  • Map showing piecemeal reduction of Spanish control in West Florida[2]p 2
    Map showing piecemeal reduction of Spanish control in West Florida[2]p 2
  • Annotated map of the territorial changes of Spanish West Florida[3]
    Annotated map of the territorial changes of Spanish West Florida[3]
  • Under Spanish rule, Florida was divided by the natural separation of the Suwannee River into West Florida and East Florida (map: Carey & Lea, 1822).
    Under Spanish rule, Florida was divided by the natural separation of theSuwannee Riverinto West Florida and East Florida (map:Carey&Lea,1822).

Following Spain's losses toGreat Britainduring theSeven Years' War,Spain ceded its Florida territory to Britain in 1763. British administrators then divided the territory into two colonies:East Florida,including the Florida peninsula with thecapitalat St. Augustine, andWest Florida,to which was appended part of the territory received from France under the1763 peace treaty.West Florida extended from theApalachicola Riverto theMississippi River,with its capital at Pensacola.[4]

In 1779,Spainentered theAmerican Revolutionary Waron the side ofFrancebut not theThirteen Colonies.[5]Bernardo de Gálvez,governor ofSpanish Louisiana,led amilitary campaign along the Gulf coast,capturingBaton RougeandNatchezfrom the British in 1779,Mobile in 1780andPensacola in 1781.

In the1783 Paris peace treaty,Great Britain returned both Florida colonies toSpanishcontrol. Instead of administering Florida as a single province, as it had prior to 1763,New Spainpreserved the British arrangement of dividing the territory between East and West Florida (Florida OrientalandFlorida Occidental).[6]When Spain acquired West Florida in 1783, the eastern British boundary was the Apalachicola River, but Spain moved it eastward to theSuwannee Riverin 1785.[7][8]The purpose was to transfer San Marcos and the district of Apalachee from East Florida to West Florida.[9][10]

Population and demographics[edit]

When British West Florida surrendered to the Spanish, civilian residents of Pensacola were given the option of staying or leaving with most opting to leave. Pensacola primarily functioned as a British military garrison and most of its inhabitants were directly or indirectly involved with the garrison. At the time of the transfer of West Florida to the Spanish from the British the population of Pensacola excluding its military garrison was about 300. The population of Pensacola would grow, with the civilian population in 1788 being 265 and increasing to 572 by 1791. However, when Spain went to war in April of 1793 some residents left, reducing the population to 400. With the loss of Spanish Louisiana, the population grew further to 1,000 by 1810 and peaked in a census taken on June 13, 1813 at 3,063 people.[11]

Between where Pensacola ended and the American settlements began, control of the land was left to several Native American tribes: the Cherokee, the Chickasaw, the Choctaw and the Creek, which altogether had a population of 45,000.[11]

With the arrival of the Spanish in West Florida, they did not revive themission systemthey had left behind when the British gained control of Florida in 1763. The Spanish adopted a policy that allowed for religious freedom among those who lived there, but did not permit them to practice any faith other thanRoman Catholicismin public.[12]

The Spanish aided the migration of theFrench Acadiansto the colony's Louisiana bayous by subsidizing their "transportation, maintenance, and financial aid" between 1783 and 1785 and their migration to Louisiana resulted in theCajun cultureforming.[12]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^Hernández, Roger E. (1 September 2008).New Spain: 1600-1760s.Marshall Cavendish. p.37.ISBN978-0-7614-2936-4.
  2. ^Chambers, Henry E. (May 1898).West Florida and its relation to the historical cartography of the United States.Baltimore, Maryland: The Johns Hopkins Press.
  3. ^Cox, Isaac Joslin(1918).The West Florida Controversy, 1798-1813 – a Study in American Diplomacy.Baltimore, Maryland: The Johns Hopkins Press.isaac cox west florida.
  4. ^Pitot, James(1761–1831)(1979).Observations on the Colony of Louisiana, from 1796 to 1802.Baton Rouge, Louisiana, U.S.: Louisiana State University Press. p. 147.ISBN978-0-8071-0579-5.{{cite book}}:CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  5. ^Tucker, Spencer; Arnold, James R.; Wiener, Roberta, eds. (30 September 2011).The Encyclopedia of North American Indian Wars, 1607–1890: A Political, Social, and Military History.ABC-CLIO. p. 751.ISBN978-1-85109-697-8.
  6. ^James G. Cusick (1 April 2007).The Other War of 1812: The Patriot War and the American Invasion of Spanish East Florida.University of Georgia Press. p. 144.ISBN978-0-8203-2921-5.
  7. ^Wright, J. Leitch (1972). "Research Opportunities in the Spanish Borderlands: West Florida, 1781-1821".Latin American Research Review.7(2). Latin American Studies Association: 24–34.doi:10.1017/S0023879100041340.JSTOR2502623.Wright also notes, "It was some time after 1785 before it was clearly established that Suwannee was the new eastern boundary of the province of Apalachee."
  8. ^Weber, David J. (1992).The Spanish Frontier in North America.New Haven, Connecticut, USA: Yale University Press. p. 275.ISBN0300059175.Spain never drew a clear line to separate the two Floridas, but West Florida extended easterly to include Apalachee Bay, which Spain shifted from the jurisdiction of St. Augustine to more accessible Pensacola.
  9. ^"The Evolution of a State, Map of Florida Counties - 1820".10th Circuit Court of Florida.Retrieved2016-01-26.Under Spanish rule, Florida was divided by the natural separation of the Suwanee River into West Florida and East Florida.
  10. ^Klein, Hank."History Mystery: Was Destin Once in Walton County?".The Destin Log.Retrieved2016-01-26.On July 21, 1821 all of what had been West Florida was named Escambia County, after the Escambia River. It stretched from the Perdido River to the Suwanee River with its county seat at Pensacola.
  11. ^abMcAlister, L. N. (1958)."Pensacola During the Second Spanish Period".Florida Historical Quarterly.37(3–4).RetrievedSeptember 2,2023– via STARS.
  12. ^abHolmes, Jack D. L. (Spring 1973)."Spanish Religious Policy in West Florida: Enlightened or Expedient?".Journal of Church and State.15(2): 259–269.doi:10.1093/jcs/15.2.259.JSTOR23914640.RetrievedSeptember 2,2023– via JSTOR.

Bibliography[edit]

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