Florida's Frontiers: (A History of the Trans-Appalachian Frontier)

Florida has had many frontiers. Imagination, greed, missionary zeal, disease, war, and diplomacy have shaped its historical boundaries. Bodies of water, soils and their associated floral and faunal ecology, the patterns of Native American occupation, and ways of colonising have defined where the various old and new world peoples who have invaded Florida since 1500 settled, and the degree to which each prospered as each built its own frontier upon the remains of its predecessors' efforts. A History of Florida's Frontiers tells the story of those frontiers and how the land and the people shaped them during the three centuries from 1565 to 1860. Settlers to La Florida, the American Southeast ca. 1500, found the better natural and human resources on the piedmont or on the western side of Florida's central ridge, while the coasts and coastal plains proved far less inviting. But natural environment was only one important factor in the settlement of Florida. This book also examines how the Spaniards, the British, the Seminole and Miccosuki, the Spaniards once again, and finally Americans constructed their Florida frontiers in interaction with the Native Americans who were present, the vestiges of earlier frontiers, and international events. Paul E. Hoffman takes the near-completion of the range and township surveys by 1860 and of the deportation of most of the Seminole and Miccosuki as marking the end of the Florida frontier, though frontier-like conditions persisted in many parts of the state into the early twentieth century. The book draws from a broad range of secondary works and from the author's research in Spanish archival sources of the sixteenth and seventeenth century.

Table of Contents:
Preliminary List of Figures List of Tables Introduction by Walter Nugent and Malcolm Rohrbough Preface 1. The Secrets of the Land 2. Discovering the Secrets 3. The Spanish Tidewater Frontier, Part I, 1562-1586 4. The Tidewater Frontier, Second Phase, 1586-1608 5. The Inland Frontier, 1608-1650 6. Death, Rebellion, A New Accommodation, and New Defenses: La Florida's Frontiers, 1650-1680 7. The First Contests with the English, 1680-1702 8. The Military Frontier At Last 9. New Tidewater Frontiers, 1763-1790 10. The American Frontier Envelopes East Florida, 1790-1821 11. The American Frontiers, 1821-1860 Appendix: U.S. Confirmed British and Spanish Land Grants, 1764-1820 Notes Bibliography Index

About the Author :
Paul E. Hoffman is Professor of History at Louisiana State University and author of several books including the prize-winning A New Andalucia and a Way to the Orient: The American Southeast during the Sixteenth Century. He is honored by LSU with appointment as the Paul W. and Nancy W. Murrill Distinguished Professor.

Review :
"Hoffman's expertise in the history of the Spanish borderlands is evident as he recounts the story of Florida's frontiers from the age of the entrada to the period of the American settlements. The author's familiarity with the sources is clear as he carefully presents Spain's repeated attempts to overcome Native American resistance, weather, geography, and its own colonial system to establish a successful colony. Thanks to his understanding of the documents and knowledge of recent research, Hoffman (Louisiana State Univ.) unfolds the Spanish-Indian story as instrumental in grasping the first 125 years of La Florida after the arrival of the Europeans. Spanish dependence on the Native peoples for food and labor is clear. Warfare with English and French imperial rivals increased the pressure on this outpost of Spain's global empire, but La Florida survived until overwhelmed by the rising numbers of immigrants from the US. The presence of 642 Europeans in 1574, compared to the 35,000 present in 1830, may reveal something about Spain's potential for success. With numerous highly useful maps and informative figures and tables, Hoffman's volume will inform readers at every level. Upper-division undergraduates and above.October 2002"—J. H. O'Donnell III, Marietta College