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79-510: Laurel Grove may refer to the following places in the United States: Laurel Grove was also the name of a Florida plantation of Zephaniah Kingsley and his wife Anna Kingsley . Zephaniah Kingsley In his will, Kingsley called himself a planter, but he was in his younger years first and foremost a slave merchant, and proud to be one: a "very respectful business", in his words. He owned and captained slave ships, and

158-439: A rice plantation near Savannah, Georgia , and several other properties throughout the colonies and Caribbean islands. In total, he owned probably around 200 slaves in all, and thousands of acres of land. Like other British Loyalists , Kingsley Sr. was forced to leave South Carolina with his family, and his properties and business were confiscated by the new government. He relocated to New Brunswick, Canada , in 1782 following

237-529: A " votary of rational policy", he states that his object is "to destroy the prejudice existing against slavery". According to Kingsley, if slavery is practiced with "justice" and "benevolence", slaves are just as happy as free men, equally as virtuous, less "corrupted", far more productive, and "they yield more support and benefit to the state". Furthermore, "the slave or Patriarchal System of Society...is better adapted for strength, endurability and independence, than any other state of society hitherto adopted." In

316-624: A "respectful gentleman" and a "classical scholar", "who would consider it a degradation to be put on a footing with Governor Duval in point of intellect, or education." A Treatise on the Patriarchal, or Co-operative System of Society A Treatise on the Patriarchal, or Co-operative System of Society as it Exists in Some Governments and Colonies in America, and in the United States, Under

395-581: A 13-year-old Wolof girl from what is now Senegal . He married her, he said (there is no documentation), in an African ceremony in Havana soon after purchasing her. It certainly was not a Catholic marriage, and it was not legally recognized by Spanish Florida or the United States during their lives. In another statement Kingsley says he met Anna in Africa while on a slave purchasing trip. Kingsley returned with Anna to Laurel Grove and gradually depended on her to run

474-476: A Quaker, Kingsley made many negative comments on the Christian religion. In his will, he asked that his body be buried "in the nearest, or most convenient place, without any religious ceremony whatsoever, and that it may be excused from the usual indiscreet formalities and parade of washing, dressing, &c., or exposure in any way, but removed just as it died to the common burying ground." Kingsley opposed allowing

553-620: A dozen slaves aboard a Spanish gunboat to escape the conflict. For her loyalty, Anna Jai was rewarded with a grant of 350 acres (1.4 km ) from the Spanish colonial government. Under the terms of the Adams–Onís Treaty of 1819, Kingsley received, much later, $ 113,410 (equivalent to $ 2,257,352 in 2023) from the United States government for damages to Laurel Grove by the Patriots. Abandoning Laurel Grove, in 1814 Kingsley and Anna moved to

632-521: A freedom not routine: the opportunity to hire themselves out when their work was completed, and eventually purchase their freedom for 50% of their market value. Kingsley's main business in Spanish Florida was providing a ready supply of well-trained slaves, who were smuggled by or to planters of Georgia and South Carolina. This, plus his "interracial" family, resulted in Kingsley's being deeply invested in

711-549: A minister got among them. It was now sinful to dance, work their corn or catch fish on Sunday, or to eat catfish because they had no scales; and if they did, they would be tormented with fire and brimstone to all eternity! They became poor, ragged, hungry and disconsolate; to steal from me was only to do justice—to take from me what belonged to them because I kept them in unjust bondage. According to Kingsley, "I encouraged dancing, merriment, and dress, for which Saturday afternoon and Sunday were dedicated, and after allowance their time

790-450: A much better moral character than the ordinary class of corrupted whites of similar condition. Despite this, in slaveholding states, the white majority, who inhabit the "high, healthy country," have “a strong feeling of prejudice against every other shade of color”. As the colored are "absolutely necessary", a "smaller degree of prejudice against color would better comport". However, in our slaveholding states, "the great quantity of whites in

869-452: A petition to President Andrew Jackson, asking him not to reappoint Duval as Territorial Governor. To address these issues, in 1828 Kingsley published a pamphlet, titled A Treatise on the Patriarchal or Co-operative System of Society as it Exists in some Governments and Colonies in America, and in the United States, under the Name of Slavery, with its Necessity and Advantages . The first edition

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948-477: A plantation on Fort George Island at the mouth of the St. Johns River ; they lived there for 25 years. Anna and Kingsley's fourth and last child was born on Fort George Island in 1824. Kingsley also owned and farmed, using Black labor, plantations at Springfield , Conesfield, and Drayton Island . on the latter he had extensive groves of China oranges. A recent archeological study "has failed to substantiate claims of

1027-591: A prejudice that not only continues to entail ill health and degeneracy on the people, but completely neutralises the physical [defensive] strength of the country, by placing one portion of the inhabitants in hostile array against the other." In other words, Kingsley was advocating deliberate racial mixing, as a step towards eliminating the racial "problem". This he personally practiced; he purchased his first wife in Cuba, and later three other slaves, all of which he freed, as common-law co-wives or concubines . He commented on

1106-516: A prelude to the abolition of it. Abolitionists considered Kingsley's arguments for slavery weak and wrote that logically, the planter should conclude that slavery must be eradicated. Lydia Child , a New York-based abolitionist, included him in 1836 on a list of people perpetuating the "evils of slavery". Although Kingsley was wealthy, learned, and powerful, the treatise was a factor in the decline of his reputation in Florida, and his decision to leave

1185-550: A published Address to the Council, "I consider that our personal safety as well as the permanent condition of our Slave property is intimately connected with and depends much on our good policy in making it the interest of our free colored population to be attached to good order and have a friendly feeling towards the white population." When it became apparent to Kingsley that the Council would not agree to rights for free Blacks and mixed-race people, he resigned his position. In 1824 he

1264-425: A quarter of a mile (400 m) from the main house. Slaves were allowed to padlock their cabins and build porches that faced away from the main house. Both of these features were unusual for slave quarters in the antebellum South. Kingsley was a lenient slave owner: I never interfered with their connubial concerns, nor domestic affairs, but let them regulate these after their own manner. I taught them nothing but what

1343-405: A safe and wholesome remedy for evils which, of all others, are now the most deplorable, because they are morally irreconcilable to the fundamental principles of happiness, and self preservation." Kingsley accompanied his 8-page text with 6 pages of notes, 5 of them occupied by one note, in which he expounds on the harm done by "white preachers (missionaries) from England". The rebel Denmark Vesey

1422-418: A sophisticated slaving business involving illegal importation, training, and smuggling of slaves at Fort George Island during the Kingsley era." Kingsley took three much younger enslaved women as common-law wives (or concubines) and fathered children with at least two of them, totaling nine children in all. Munsila was purchased during an African trip and, like Anna before her, shared Kingsley's cabin during

1501-548: A substantial land grant because he brought 74 slaves to Florida; the Spaniards distributed land according to the number of slaves brought to work it. The plantation grew oranges , sea island cotton , corn, potatoes, and peas. Kingsley's first slaves were brought from his family's plantation in South Carolina. By 1811, he had acquired a total of 100 slaves at Laurel Grove, obtained from Africa via Cuba , as Spain continued with

1580-462: A three-person committee "to consider the duties of masters of slaves and the duties of slaves and free persons of color, and the regulations necessary for their government". On June 19 Kingsley reported that the committee could not agree and asked that it be discharged. Kingsley's position was that Florida should be receptive, like Spain, to free people of color , that they should have some rights, even though less than those of whites. As he stated in

1659-511: A white antislave state. The Brazilian slaves did not respond to the Argentine offers of freedom and protection if they escaped. "This trait of virtue and fidelity in the Brazilian slaves, is to be attributed to humane and just treatment." Under Brazilian law, any slave, in theory, could buy his freedom. Slaves are allowed to own some property, such as "stock". "The persons, properties, and rights...[of]

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1738-555: Is a necessary state of control from which no condition of society can be perfectly free. The term is applicable to and fits all grades and conditions in almost every point of view, whether moral, physical, or political. Kingsley asserted that when slavery is associated with cruelty it is an abomination; when it is joined with benevolence and justice, it "easily amalgamates with the ordinary conditions of life". He wrote that Africans were better suited than Europeans for labor in hot climates (a shared stereotype ), and that their happiness

1817-644: The American Revolutionary War , where the Crown provided him some land in compensation for his losses, and he again became a successful merchant. His son Zephaniah Kingsley Jr. returned to Charleston, South Carolina, in 1793, swore his allegiance to the United States, and began a career as a shipping merchant. His first ventures were in Saint-Domingue , during the Haitian Revolution , where coffee

1896-621: The Deep South in the United States, especially after Indian Removal , sharply increased the domestic demand for slaves. By 1801 Kingsley was involved in the slave trade. Kingsley began to travel to West Africa to purchase Africans to be traded as slaves between America, Brazil , and the West Indies . In 1798 he became a Danish citizen in the Danish West Indies . He continued to make his living trading slaves and shipping other goods into

1975-409: The "convenience" of being able to purchase wives, or sexual partners. He asserted that people of mixed negro and white parents were healthier and more beautiful than either Africans or Europeans, and considered his mixed-race children a barrier to an impending race war. "The red aborigines were in this country a healthy people. The negroes are not only a healthy people, but robust and durable even in

2054-456: The "free colored people... being rich and liberally educated, enjoy great respectability, and having the same interest with the whites, and great influence with the slaves, form a barrier to insurrection." Again, quarteroons with a white father were legally white. In the case of Haiti, or Hayti as he spells it, many liberated slaves remained productive, on plantations, throughout the revolution. Some were armed and defended their masters. But when

2133-604: The "patriarchal restraint of its Colonial system of government" was gone, productivity declined greatly, as there is "less necessity for hard work" in "a healthy, fertile, and mild climate such as Hayti, where few clothes are required, and bountiful nature produces spontaneously the necessities of life." "From all these facts it follows that, under a just and prudent system of management, negros are safe, permanent, productive and growing property, and easily governed; that they are not naturally desirous of change but are sober, discreet, honest and obliging, are less troublesome and possess

2212-574: The 19th century, although the US prohibited the African slave trade in 1807, effective in 1808. Kingsley became a Spanish citizen in Spanish Florida in 1803, and many African slaves were smuggled into the U.S. via Florida. As free Blacks became progressively more unwelcome in Florida, and Kingsley was unable to prevent this, for their security he moved his family to the new Black country, Haiti. Although born

2291-513: The 40,000,000 acres (160,000 km ) ceded by Spain, and removing the Seminole to Indian Territory in keeping with the extinguishing of Indian land claims in other parts of the Southeast in this period. Americans settled in the central portion of north Florida and built productive plantations worked by slaves. The Americans imposed the binary "racial" caste system that they had developed throughout

2370-515: The Name of Slavery, with its Necessity and Advantages , was the first major defense of slavery published in the United States. Written by Florida slave trader, planter, and Quaker Zephaniah Kingsley , it was first published under the signature “A Resident of Florida” in 1828, although Kingsley's name is found at the end of the Preface. It was reprinted three times (1829, 1833, and 1834), indicating significant readership. No other pro-slavery writing in

2449-452: The Southeast; they took their purchases with them, illegally, back to the U.S., where importation of slaves was forbidden as of 1808. Kingsley is indicated with two other gentlemen as Floridians who accumulated great wealth from the Florida slave trade between 1808 and 1821. In 1806, Kingsley, called "one of Florida's most flamboyent slaveholders", took a trip to Cuba, where he purchased Anna Madgigine Jai (born as Anta Majigeen Ndiaye ),

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2528-512: The Southeastern U.S. This system contrasted with the standing practice in which Kingsley was invested, which, based on Spanish law as implemented in Florida, supported three social tiers: whites, free people of color , and slaves. The Spanish government recognized "interracial" marriages and allowed mixed-race children to inherit property. Territorial Governor William P. Duval recommended to President Monroe in 1822 that Kingsley be appointed to

2607-725: The Spanish system of slavery and society. As in the French colonies, certain rights were provided to a class of free people of color , and children of female slaves were allowed to inherit property from their white fathers. "In the Spanish Floridas free people of color...enjoyed tremendously elevated status when compared to virtually any other person of African descent in North America." Kingsley casually changed nationalities based on which would most help his slave trading enterprises. Born British, in 1793 he took an oath of naturalization to

2686-466: The Territorial Council, and McIntosh was angry about the public treatment he had received since the war for his role in it. The insurgents occupied Laurel Grove, using it as a base to raid other plantations and nearby towns. Kingsley left the area. After assuring her safety with the Spanish forces, Anna Jai burned the plantation house down so the rebels could not use it; she took her children and

2765-615: The United States was reprinted as often. Kingsley believed that free people of color , better treated in Spanish Florida than in the Southern United States , should be allowed to own property, and other rights, and made the case that they were good citizens and beneficial to the country in which they lived. Daniel Stowell included an annotated edition of the Treatise in his Balancing Evils Judiciously: The Proslavery Writings of Zephaniah Kingsley (see previous note). The Treatise

2844-513: The United States. In 1798 he swore allegiance to Denmark, and in 1803 to Spain ( Spanish Florida ), All residents of Spanish Florida who did not leave automatically became American citizens , as is also seen in Kingsley's appointment to the Florida Territorial Legislature in 1822 (in appointing him, President James Monroe called him "one of the most fit and discreet persons in our territory.") At his death his nationality

2923-463: The base of degradation." In Kingsley's opinion, "the colored race" was "superior to us, physically and morally. They are more healthy, have more graceful forms, softer skin, and sweeter voices. They are more docile and affectionate, more faithful in their attachments, and less prone to mischief, than the white race. If it were not so, they could not have been kept in slavery." Kingsley himself reports that he spoke "several African dialects". When he

3002-460: The body of the Treatise , he sets forth the view that blacks are better suited than whites for working in a hot climate. "The negro under the management of a just, conscientious and humane master (of which description it will certainly be allowed that there are some)...will surely enjoy a happier and more enviable state of existence than the poor white man... who has to contend with cold and hunger, besides religious and moral tyranny." "The labor of

3081-572: The border into the Spanish colony and began raiding the few settlements in northeast Florida. They enslaved the black people they captured. In 1813, the Americans captured Kingsley and forced him to sign an endorsement of the rebellion. John McIntosh, owner of the Fort George Plantation before Kingsley, accused him in 1826 of financially supporting the war. The accusation was likely politically motivated, as Kingsley suddenly resigned his position on

3160-536: The charge of cohabitation with a Black. Kingsley was rich, the wealthiest planter in the Territory. (After his death in 1843, his estate was valued at $ 77,300, equivalent to $ 2,527,710 in 2023. ) His plantation was a great success; during one year alone it produced crops worth $ 10,000 (equivalent to $ 286,125 in 2023). The plantation produced oranges, sea island long-staple cotton, indigo , okra , and other vegetables. Approximately 60 slaves were managed under

3239-406: The enslaved to participate in Christian religious worship. "All the late insurrections of slaves, he claimed, are to be traced to influential preachers of the gospel." My object in this long digression is to show the danger...of superstition (by some called religion) among Negroes whose ignorance and want of rationality render them fit subjects. I purchased more new Negroes. A man calling himself

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3318-490: The free people of color...are protected by law," and "the free children of quarteroons and a white man are white by law." In the British colonies (he claims this is also true of the "Spanish, French, and Dutch colonies") the "free colored people" are "gradually rendered fit to take place of the whites, whose lives have long been uselessly sacrificed to a hot climate, which does not, nor can ever agree with them." In fact, many of

3397-471: The head of the table"; they were "surrounded by healthy and handsome children" in a parlor decorated with portraits of African women. The plantation featured a main house and a two-story structure called the "Ma'am Anna House". It had the main kitchen on the ground floor and living quarters on the second. Anna lived there with her children, as was the custom among the Wolof people. This also protected Kingsley from

3476-439: The institution of slavery, others believed that Kingsley's support of a free class of blacks was a prelude to abolition of slavery. Abolitionists considered Kingsley's arguments for slavery weak and wrote that logically, the planter should conclude that slavery must be eradicated. Lydia Child , a New York-based abolitionist, included Kingsley in 1836 on a list of people perpetuating the "evils of slavery". Although Kingsley

3555-507: The negro, under the wholesome restraint of an intelligent direction, is like a constant stream." According to Kingsley, a slave state is more powerful in case of war. He examines other "slave holding states". In the case of Brazil, the war between Brazil and "the Republic of Buenos Ayres" (he refers to the Cisplatine War ) shows the strength of a slave state contrasted with the weakness of

3634-411: The new Council, but Monroe did not appoint him until the following year, when he was described as an "enlightened and valuable citizen of Florida" in the first book on the new Territory. He was also recommended by Joseph Marion Hernandez , Florida's nonvoting delegate to Congress before the territory was admitted as a state. On June 2, now a member of the Territorial Council, Kingsley was appointed to

3713-494: The only woman Kingsley named as his wife was Anna. Primary documentation by Kingsley is scarce, but historians consider Flora, Sarah, and Munsila as "lesser wives", or "co-wives" with Anna. Stowell suggests " concubines " is perhaps a more accurate description of their status. Kingsley lavished all his children with affection, attention, and luxury. They were educated by the best European tutors he could find. When he entertained visitors at his Fort George plantation, Anna sat "at

3792-490: The permanent condition of our Slave property" ("the most numerous, valuable & productive class [of] our population"). In other words, and he cites examples, the free blacks would side with the whites in protecting them from slave insurrection or other slave misconduct. This "Address", having fallen on deaf ears, was followed by his resignation from the Legislative Council. Within 10 years, Kingsley, in despair over

3871-404: The plantation in his absence. although Mark Fleszar writes that interpretation of how much Anna managed Laurel Grove "deserves caution". It comes from a remark of Kingsley to abolitionist Lydia Maria Child , but other details of his life he gave her are questionable. In 1811, Kingsley petitioned the colonial Spanish government to free Anna and their three mixed-race children, and the request

3950-497: The punishment was quite light, for they hardly ever failed in doing their work well. "A patriarchal feeling of affection is due to every slave from his owner, who should consider the slave as a member of his family," wrote Kingsley. Following the transfer of Florida from Spain to the United States in 1821, Florida's Territorial Council (the Territory's governing body) began to establish an American government. The Council focused primarily on allowing immigrants to Florida access to

4029-468: The situation of free blacks, departed from the United States. He moved with his multiple wives, slaves, and free blacks to a new plantation, Mayorasgo de Koka , in what is now the Dominican Republic but at that time was part of Haiti. In the meantime, he attempted to influence public opinion towards "free people of color" by means of his self-published Treatise . In the Preface, declaring himself

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4108-521: The slave trade in its colonies. Kingsley trained the slaves at Laurel Grove in agricultural vocations to prepare them for future sale; he provided slave buyers from Georgia with skilled artisans, which allowed him to charge 50 percent more than the usual market price per slave. At Laurel Grove, there was a blacksmith shop and a carpenter's shop. Slaves were trained in blacksmithing , carpentry, and cotton ginning , as well as field work. Many of Kingsley's slaves were sold to Georgians and other planters in

4187-480: The slave trade several years" before settling . Some of his slaves were bought "on the coast of Africa"; that is where he says he bought his wife Anna, although he also said he purchased her in Havana, Cuba (see above). Spain was offering land to settlers in order to populate Florida, so Kingsley petitioned the governor for land but was turned down. After waiting, he purchased in 1803 a 2,600-acre (11 km ) farm for $ 5,300 (equivalent to $ 107,837 in 2023). It

4266-477: The swamps. The intermediate grades of color are not only healthy, but when condition is favorable, they are improved in shape, strength and beauty.... Daily experience shows that there is no natural antipathy between the casts [sic] on account of color; and it only requires to repeal laws as impolitic as they are injust and unnatural; which confound beauty, merit and condition in one state of infamy and degradation on account of complexion, and to leave nature to find out

4345-427: The task system: each slave had a quota of work to do per day. When they were finished, they were allowed to do what they wished. Some slaves had personal gardens which they were allowed to cultivate, and from which they sold vegetables. Thirty-two cabins were constructed for and by the slaves, made from tabby , which made them durable, insulated, and inexpensive, although labor-intensive. The cabins were located about

4424-605: The trip. Flora, 20 when her relationship with Kingsley began, was the daughter of a lifelong friend. Sophy was the only other person at Laurel Grove who was from Jolof, like Anna, and only the two spoke the Jolof language. Anna and Sophy were shipmates on the trip from Africa. Kingsley's relationships with the women have been called "complex at best". He eventually freed each of the slave women: they were named Flora Kingsley, Sarah Kingsley, who brought her son Micanopy; and Munsilna McGundo, who brought her daughter Fatima. In his will,

4503-578: The up country is at all times ready to put down or exterminate all the colored people in the case of insurrection." They govern by "fear and force", instead of "wisdom and policy". North Carolina, "by the liberal provisions of her constitution and enlightened policy to her free, colored people", is the state most favorable to free blacks; "I believe no disadvantage has ever been perceived in North Carolina from its free citizens of color being allowed to vote". (The right of free North Carolina blacks to vote

4582-466: The women were enslaved, what Kingsley did with them did not concern anyone else. He had nine mixed-race children with these wives, and no white children. He educated his children to high standards and worked to ensure he could settle his estate on them and his wives. He encouraged his children to marry whites, his daughters to marry wealthy white men from the East. His first wife, Anna Madgigine Jai Kingsley ,

4661-464: Was 13 years old when Kingsley purchased her in Havana in 1806; he remarked on the convenience of buying a wife. He said that he had married her, which he never said of his three other concubines or common-law wives: "celebrated and solemnized by her native African customs altho' never celebrated according to the forms of Christian usage". (Another source says that Kingsley married Anna in Africa, before she

4740-647: Was Haitian, acquired in 1836. Kingsley was born in Bristol , England, the second of eight children, to Zephaniah Kingsley Sr. , a Quaker from London , and Isabella Johnstone of Scotland . The elder Kingsley moved his family to the Colony of South Carolina in 1770. His son grew up in Charleston, South Carolina , where the father became a successful merchant. At the age of 15 he was sent to London for his education, although details are lacking; Zephaniah Kingsley Sr. purchased

4819-573: Was abolished in 1808) when the ship was captured by the U.S. Coast Guard . Not knowing what to do with so many indigent people, the Coast Guard turned them over to Kingsley, who was the only person in the area who could care for such a number. During a short-lived insurgency that became known as the Patriot Rebellion , in an attempt to annex Florida to the United States, American forces, American-supplied Creek , and renegades from Georgia crossed

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4898-543: Was actively involved in the Atlantic slave trade . A document of 1802 records his arrival at Havana as First Officer of the Superior with 250 Africans, and another of 1808, 60 slaves to a Spanish land grant. He was also pro-slavery, but by the standards of the day, he was a liberal slave owner. He has been called "a man ahead of his time." He was a relatively lenient slaveholder who respected slave families and allowed his enslaved

4977-487: Was awarded five acres in Florida in a land grant by the Spanish government. She purchased slaves to help farm it. Zephaniah Kingsley became involved in the shipping industry, including the coastwise trade , related to his large-scale domestic slave trading, which continued in the US after the Atlantic trade was prohibited. While at Laurel Grove, Kingsley was attempting to smuggle in 350 slaves (the international slave trade

5056-494: Was common in the Muslim culture they came from, and eventually manumitting all of them. He claimed to have married one of them, and the marital status of the others does not seem to have ever been an issue. (Kingsley was not alone in this, as several other prominent Florida men had Black mistresses/common-law wives, during the second Spanish period [1783–1821]. ) Certainly they could not marry under Territorial Florida law, but since

5135-478: Was granted. The Laurel Grove plantation during one year earned $ 10,000 (equivalent to $ 183,120 in 2,023), which was an extraordinary amount for Florida. With his earnings, Kingsley purchased several locations on the opposite side of the St. Johns River, including St. Johns Bluff, San Jose, and Beauclerc in what is now Jacksonville, and Drayton Island farther south near Lake George . After gaining freedom, Anna Kingsley

5214-485: Was heavily involved in religion. While inveighing against "superstition", he does note that two "influential negroes", loyal to their masters and preventing others from escaping, "were Africans and professors of the Mahomedan religion". He also speaks against "a favorite project of some of our least mathematical economists", the transporting of slaves to Africa, which he saw as prohibitively expensive. "A great opportunity

5293-569: Was his main interest as an export crop. He lived in Haiti for a brief period while the fledgling nation was working to create a society based on former slaves transitioning into free citizens. Kingsley traveled frequently, prompted by recurring political unrest among the Caribbean islands. Kingsley stood alone among Southern statesmen in maintaining that Blacks were just as intelligent as whites. He ridiculed racism, observing that "color ought not to be

5372-560: Was in command of a slaving ship, his crew of sailors were all Black men, most of them enslaved. His farm at Laurel Grove, staffed by Africans without white people present, has been called "a transplanted African village". He supported following African customs. He was in favor of "interracial" marriage, called "amalgamation" at the time, which produced, he explained in a pamphlet Treatise , healthy, beautiful children. He followed his own advice, and took four enslaved African women as concubines or common-law wives, practicing polygamy, as

5451-417: Was lost of colonising more rationally at the evacuation of the Spanish part of Saint Domingo [Haiti], where there would have been ample room for all the colored people of the U. States, within five days sail of Charleston ." Although it was published four times, reception was mixed. While some Southerners used it to defend the institution of slavery, others saw Kingsley's support of a free class of blacks as

5530-450: Was maximized when they were rigidly controlled; their contentment was greater than whites of a similar class. He asserted that people of mixed race were healthier and more beautiful than either Africans or Europeans, and considered mixed-race children, such as his own, a step against an impending race war. Although his pamphlet was published four times, all at his own expense, reception to it was mixed. While some Southerners used it to defend

5609-452: Was named Laurel Grove, and its main entrance was a dock on Doctors Lake . Enlarged several times, it occupied two miles along the river and lake, in its entirety where the city of Orange Park is today. (Kingsley eventually owned some 32,000 acres (130 km ) in Florida, and was one of the wealthiest men in the Territory.) Kingsley arrived with 10 slaves and began to cultivate the property immediately. Another source stated he received

5688-416: Was no longer a member. Through the 1820s the Council began to enact strict laws separating the races, and Kingsley became worried about his future and the rights of his family to inherit from him. ( Like other Southern states , Florida by 1860 abhorred free Blacks, viewing them as a threat to slavery, made their lives difficult, and encouraged them to leave the state.) In the early 1830's Kingsley circulated

5767-460: Was preceded by Kingsley's "Address to the Legislative Council of Florida [of which he was a member] on the subject of its Colored population", about 1826. In this speech, published in 2000, he calls upon the Legislative Council to accommodate the "free colored population", so that they have a "friendly feeling toward the white population". This is necessary for "our personal safety as well as

5846-451: Was published without his name, signed simply "An inhabitant of Florida". His name was added in the 2nd edition, with the note that he is a "slave owner", who has lived "by planting in Florida for the last twenty-five years, disavow[ing] all other motives but that of increasing the value of his property." The pamphlet had a second edition in 1829 and was reprinted again in 1833 and 1834, showing significant readership. In it, he wrote: Slavery

5925-592: Was sent or taken to Havana, and that his false testimony of having purchased her in Havana was part of a strategy to make Anna definitively free; he first had to demonstrate that she had been enslaved, before he could free her. ) He emancipated Anna Jai when she turned 18, and trusted her with running his plantation when he was away on business. His children with Anna were his favorites; they were brought up in luxury, in his own home, and received excellent European educations.[6]: 154  The instability affected his business interests. Development of new cotton plantations in

6004-476: Was taken away in 1835. ) As in the British West India colonies, taxes should be the same on everyone, "and the law both criminal and civil should be as impartial as the sun". Southern plantations will be most productive if: "How much more meritorious and laudable [than improving domestic animals] would that philanthropist be to whose energy and moral courage mankind were indebted for exposing and removing

6083-578: Was useful [religion was to Kingsley "not useful"] and what I thought would add to their physical and moral happiness. I encouraged as much as possible dancing, merriment and dress, for which Saturday afternoon and night, and Sunday morning were dedicated; and, after allowance, their time was usually employed in hoeing their corn, and getting a supply of fish for the week. ... They were perfectly honest and obedient, and appeared quite happy, having no fear but that of offending me; and I hardly had occasion to apply other correction then shaming them. If I exceeded this,

6162-526: Was usually employed in hoeing their corn and getting a supply of fish for the week." He made a point of remarking that his marriage to Anna, "celebrated and solemnized by her native African customs," was not Christian. Many of Kingsley's slaves were Muslims; this is also suggested in the semi-circular, crescent arrangement of the cabins, and by Kingsley's four wives. "He seems to have shared some of her [Anna's] Mohammedan principles." According to Kingsley, interviewed by Lydia Maria Child , he "carried on

6241-583: Was wealthy, learned, and powerful, the treatise is believed to have contributed to the decline of his reputation in Florida. He became embroiled in a political scandal with Florida's first governor, William Duval . The governor was quoted in newspapers making scathingly critical remarks about Kingsley's motives and his mixed-race family after the planter petitioned to have Duval removed from his office for corruption. He petitioned President Andrew Jackson not to reappoint Duval as Territorial Governor. Florida's congressional delegate, Joseph M. White , called Kingsley

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