Florida Historical Quarterly
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COVER The Fourth of July parade down Pine Street (now North Second Street) in Fort Pierce in 1905 celebrates the formation of St. Lucie County. The county had been formed originally in 1844, and its name was changed to Brevard in 1855. It was recreated on May 24, 1905, as the forty-sixth county in Florida. The photograph shows the Fort Pierce Band, led on horseback by Lee Coats. Courtesy of the St. Lucie County Historical Museum, Fort Pierce. THE FLORIDA HISTORICAL SOCIETY Volume LVII, Number 2 October 1978 COPYRIGHT 1978 by the Florida Historical Society, Tampa, Florida. Second class postage paid at Tampa and DeLeon Springs, Florida. Printed by E. O. Painter Printing Co., DeLeon Springs, Florida. THE FLORIDA HISTORICAL QUARTERLY Samuel Proctor, Editor Donna Thomas, Editorial Assistant EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD Herbert J. Doherty, Jr. University of Florida Michael V. Gannon University of Florida John K. Mahon University of Florida Jerrell H. Shofner Florida Technological University Charlton W. Tebeau University of Miami (Emeritus) J. Leitch Wright, Jr. Florida State University Correspondence concerning contributions, books for review, and all editorial matters should be addressed to the Editor, Florida Historical Quarterly, Box 14045, University Station, Gainesville, Florida 32604. The Quarterly is interested in articles and documents pertaining to the history of Florida. Sources, style, footnote form, original- ity of material and interpretation, clarity of thought, and interest of readers are considered. All copy, including footnotes, should be double-spaced. Footnotes are to be numbered consecutively in the text and assembled at the end of the article. Particular attention should be given to following the footnote style of the Quarterly. The author should submit an original and retain a carbon for security. The Florida Historical Society and the Editor of the Florida Historical Quarterly accept no responsibility for statements made or opinions held by authors. Table of Contents CUBANS IN TAMPA: FROM EXILES TO IMMIGRANTS, 1892-1901 Louis A. Perez, Jr. 129 “CAMP HELL”: MIAMI DURING THE SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR Donna Thomas 141 LEGISLATING A HOMESTEAD BILL: THOMAS HART BENTON AND THE SECOND SEMINOLE WAR Michael E. Welsh 157 REBELLION IN EAST FLORIDA IN 1795 Janice Borton Miller 173 NOTES AND DOCUMENTS: INSIDE THE RING: BISBEE-LEE CORRESPONDENCE, FEBRUARY-APRIL 1880 Peter D. Klingman 187 HONORING THE CONFEDERACY IN NORTHWEST FLORIDA: T HE C ONFEDERATE M ONUMENT R ITUAL W. Stuart Towns 205 B OOK R EVIEWS ......................................................................... 213 B OOK N OTES ................................................................ 242 H ISTORY N EWS ................................................................. 248 SEVENTY-SIXTH ANNUAL MEETING ..................................................... 251 BOOK REVIEWS DANIEL LADD: MERCHANT PRINCE OF FRONTIER FLORIDA, by Jerrell H. Shofner reviewed by Herbert J. Doherty, Jr. E IGHTEENTH -C ENTURY F LORIDA AND THE R EVOLUTIONARY S OUTH , edited by Samuel Proctor reviewed by Jack D. L. Holmes LE CONTE'S REPORT ON EAST FLORIDA, edited by Richard Adicks reviewed by Margaret L. Chapman WORKDAYS: FINDING FLORIDA ON THE JOB, by Bob Graham reviewed by Charlton W. Tebeau T HE G REAT E XPLORERS : T HE E UROPEAN D ISCOVERY OF A MERICA , by Samuel Eliot Morison reviewed by Charles W. Arnade THE INDIANS AND THEIR CAPTIVES, edited and compiled by James Levernier and Hennig Cohen reviewed by Robert E. Smith THE PAPERS OF HENRY LAURENS, VOLUME SIX: AUGUST 1, 1768-JULY 31, 1769, edited by George C. Rodgers, Jr., David R. Chesnutt, and Peggy J. Clark reviewed by Richard Walsh LETTERS OF DELEGATE TO CONGRESS, 1774-1789. VOLUME ONE: AUGUST 1774- AUGUST 1775 and LETTERS OF DELEGATES TO CONGRESS, 1774-1789. VOLUME Two: SEPTEMBER-DECEMBER 1775, edited by Paul H. Smith, Gerard W. Gawalt, Rosemary Fry Plakas, and Eugene R. Sheridan reviewed by Charles F. Hobson THE SOUTHERN EXPERIENCE IN THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, edited by Jeffrey J. Crow and Larry E. Tise reviewed by J. Barton Starr CAPTIVE AMERICANS: PRISONERS DURING THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, by Larry G. Bowman reviewed by J. Leitch Wright, Jr. THE MIDDLE PASSAGE: COMPARATIVE STUDIES IN THE ATLANTIC SLAVE TRADE, by Herbert S. Klein reviewed by Kenneth F. Kiple "D EAR M OTHER : D ON ' T G RIEVE A BOUT M E . I F I G ET K ILLED , I’ LL O NLY B E DEAD.” LETTERS FROM GEORGIA SOLDIERS IN THE CIVIL WAR, edited by Mills Lane reviewed by F. N. Boney THE WHEEL OF SERVITUDE: BLACK FORCED LABOR AFTER SLAVERY, by Daniel A. Novak reviewed by Joe M. Richardson RACE RELATIONS IN THE URBAN SOUTH, 1865-1890, by Howard N. Rabinowitz reviewed by Charles E. Wynes ESSAYS IN SOUTHERN LABOR HISTORY: SELECTED PAPERS, SOUTHERN LABOR HIS- TORY CONFERENCE, 1976, edited by Gary M. Fink and Merl E. Reed reviewed by Edward F. Keuchel S OUTH A TLANTIC U RBAN S TUDIES , V OLUME 2, edited by Jack R. Censer, N. Steven Steinert, and Amy M. McCandless reviewed by Walter B. Edgar CUBANS IN TAMPA: FROM EXILES TO IMMIGRANTS, 1892-1901 by LOUIS A. PEREZ, JR. * HE TEN YEARS WAR which began in 1868 came to an un- heralded end in the interior of Camaguey Province in eastern Cuba. A decade after the “Grito de Yara,” Cubans and Spaniards met in the remote village of Zanjon to put a formal, if only ceremonial, end to the ill-fated struggle for Cuban independence. The Pact of Zanjon in 1878 brought to an end one cycle of im- migration and precipitated the onset of another. The outbreak of hostilities in Cuba in 1868 set into motion the first in a series of population dislocations. Separatists unable to participate in the armed struggle, together with thousands of sympathizers seek- ing to escape the anticipated wrath of Spanish colonial adminis- tration, scattered throughout Europe, Latin America, and the United States. By the end of the first year of armed struggle, some 100,000 Cubans had sought refuge abroad. 1 A peculiar broadcast fixed the distribution of Cuban exiles. A small group of separatists, largely of patrician origins, wealthy, and capable of enjoying a felicitous exile, settled in ‘Europe. Other separatists, consisting in the main of middle class profes- sionals and businessmen, emigrated to New York, Philadelphia, and Boston. A third group, by far the largest, consisted of Cuban workers. Unable to sustain exile without both employment and a dependable source of income, these workers tended to settle in the southeastern portion of the United States, most notably Florida-first Key West and later Tampa. Political unrest in Cuba unfolded against a larger economic drama. By the middle of the nineteenth century, key sectors of the Cuban economy had become dependent on the North Amer- ican market. Economic dislocation in the United States reverb- * Mr. Perez is professor of history at the University of South Florida, Tampa. 1. Fernando Portuondo del Prado, Historia de Cuba, 6th ed. (Havana, 1957), 438. [129] 130 FLORIDA HISTORICAL QUARTERLY erated directly, and often with calamitous repercussions, in Cuba. The panic of 1857 in the United States precipitated pressure for higher tariff duties on items manufactured abroad. 2 During the Civil War, moreover, a succession of laws raised the average rate of tariff on dutiable goods to a high of 40.3 per cent. The effect on the Havana cigar industry was immediate. Panic gripped the manufacturers, and many factories went into bankruptcy and ceased operations. 3 The disruption of the Havana factories resulted in a major reorganization of the industry. Several of the more resourceful manufacturers, seeking to penetrate the high tariff wall, relocated their operations in the United States. Since the 1830s, Key West had served as a site of modest cigar manufacturing. 4 In the 1860s the city provided Cuban manufacturers an ideal setting for the production of cigars. Key West offered easy access to the tobacco regions of western Cuba and the commercial centers of Havana. Moreover, the labor required to produce the much- coveted Havana cigar was readily available. In 1869, as the war in Cuba deepened, the Spanish cigar manufacturer Vicente Martinez Ybor left Havana and established his El Principe de Gales factory in Key West.5 From this modest start, Key West emerged within a decade as the major cigar manufacturing center in the United States. 6 Almost from its inception, the fate of the cigar industry in the United States was very much linked to developments in Cuba. Repression of Cuban separatists during the Ten Years 2. For a discussion of economic conditions of the period, see George W. Van Vleck, The Panic of 1857 (New York, 1943). 3. Julio LeRiverend, Historia economica de Cuba, 2nd ed. (Havana, 1965), 167-96. 4. For the early antecedents of cigar manufacturing in Key West, see Gerardo Castellanos G., Motivos de Cayo Hueso: contribucion a la historia de la emigracion revolucionarias cubanas en los Estados Unidos (Havana, 1935). 5. Manuel Deulofeo, Heroes del destierro. La emigracion: notas historicas (Cienfuegos, 1904), 11. For a complete study of Vicente Martinez Ybor, see Glenn Westfall, “Don Vicente Martinez Ybor, the Man and His Empire: The Development of the Clear Havana Industry in Cuba and Florida in the Nineteenth Century” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Florida, 1977). 6. Jefferson B. Browne, Key West: The Old and the New (St. Augustine, 1912; facsimile ed., Gainesville, 1973), 117-18. See also Joseph M. Leon, “The Cigar Industry and Cigar Leaf Tobacco in Florida During the Nineteenth Century” (M.A. thesis, Florida State University, 1962), and Westfall, “Don Vicente Martinez Ybor, the Man and His Empire.” CUBANS IN TAMPA 131 War contributed to swelling the exile population. 7 As wartime conditions in Cuba forced Havana cigar factories to close, many unemployed workers migrated to Key West in search of work. Similarly, the end of the Ten Years War had far-reaching consequences on the Cuban community in Key West.