Trial & Error: Royal Authority & Families in the Colonization of the British Floridas, 1763-1784 by Deborah L. Bauer A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of History College of Arts and Sciences University of South Florida Major Professor: Philip Levy, Ph.D. Brian Connolly, Ph.D. Frances L. Ramos, Ph.D. Robin F.A. Fabel, Ph.D. Date of Approval: November 12, 2019 Keywords: East Florida, West Florida, British Crown, Atlantic World, marriage, borderlands Copyright © 2019, Deborah L. Bauer Dedication A native New Englander, my mother's favorite poem was Robert Frost's "The Road Not Taken." The poem’s final lines capture one my mother's all-time favorite images and emotional sentiments: "somewhere ages and ages hence: two roads diverged in a wood, and I...I took the one less traveled by and that has made all the difference." I dedicate this work to my mother, Diane, and to my father, Frederick, with love, gratitude, appreciation, and respect. For me, they have made all the difference. Acknowledgements In another life, I discovered British Florida by accident. Dr. Daniel L. Schafer introduced the twenty-one-year period of British control of my home state during an out-of-area seminar required for my Master's Thesis. At the time, I fancied myself a historian of Medieval Britain who could do her research and live in Florida while working on that topic. The choice of which seminar to take had come down to what I considered to be the lesser of two evils: the history of World War II or Florida History. As a native Floridian, the latter won. At a loss for how to proceed for a suitable topic for the class’ required research paper, I visited Dr. Schafer's office one day during his office hours. He told me about a woman who had lived in St. Augustine and who had been married to an important government official in the British colonial administration. He had a letter he had found in the archives of the Jacksonville Public Library and suggested that I should see what I could find out about Forbes. Dr. Schafer considered Dorothy Murray Forbes to be a silly and spoiled little girl who did not know what she was getting into when she married the Reverend John Forbes in 1769 and left the comforts of Boston for the frontier of St. Augustine. I quickly came to view her as something much more. Once I discovered the Jacksonville letter to be only a partial transcript, I knew I had to find out more about Dorothy. My pursuit of information about Dorothy's life and the sources that documented her fate became a major focus of my life for the next decade. Without Dr. Schafer's advice, the research that served as the basis for this dissertation would not exist. I owe him a great debt of gratitude for his knowledge, suggestions, and kind support in the early phase of my research on women who lived in British Florida. The Florida Online website project at the University of North Florida also provided the original funds that began my research odyssey and allowed me to travel for the first time but not the last to the archives of the Massachusetts Historical Society and the New York Historical Society. To Dr. Schafer, all I can say is thank you. I continued the research that became the foundation of this dissertation before I even began my studies at the University of South Florida. Alissa Craddock of the University of North Florida's Interlibrary Loan Department and Joanie Reynolds and Kristen Palmiere of the University of Central Florida's Interlibrary Loan Department facilitated the first stage of research when I collected scattered primary and secondary sources from across the United States. The Interlibrary Loan staff at the University of South Florida continued those efforts when I began my doctoral program in 2009. I have always believed that librarians are the lifeblood of a historian’s success. Without these ladies and their hard-working staffs, I could not have accumulated the substantial body of primary sources and secondary literature that resulted in my manuscript. The time, effort, and patience of the librarians made my research accomplishments possible. Over the course of my research on British Florida, several institutions provided funding for me to go on research trips to archives in the United States and abroad. The National Endowment for the Humanities provided two one-week scholarships for me to conduct participate in teaching workshops that integrated research opportunities at institutions in Boston, Massachusetts and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania during the Landmarks in History Workshops in 2008 and 2009. Thank you to the archival staff of the Massachusetts Historical Society (MHS), the Milton Historical Society, the Forbes House Museum, the Baker Library at the Harvard University School of Business, the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, and the American Philosophical Society. A special thank you to Peter Drummey of MHS for letting me have access to the original folios and letters that constitute the Forbes Papers when the ancient microfilm of the collection proved insufficient to read clearly on the available readers. I also which to thank Roderick Mcdonald, Michelle Craig Mcdonald, and Patrick Spero for their advice and assistance during my time in Philadelphia. Roderick, Michelle, and Patrick took a young adjunct community college professor and treated me like I was a seasoned and advanced colleague. I will always respect them and be thankful to them for their kindness. Thanks are also due to the National Archives staff in Washington D.C. and the Federal Records Center in Philadelphia. I must express my gratitude to the staff at the Massachusetts Archives in Boston, the Georgia Archives in Morrow, the State Archives of Florida in Tallahassee, and the Mississippi Department of Archives and History in Jackson. I also wish to thank the staff of archives held by the Rhode Island Historical Society, the South Carolina Historical Society, and the Lower Cape Fear Historical Society in North Carolina for helping me locate sources remotely via correspondence. A faculty research grant from American Military University provided funding for three weeks of summer research that I conducted in Great Britain in 2012. Thank you to the wonderful staff at the National Archives (formerly the Public Records Office) at Kew and the British Library for assisting me while I was in London during the calm before the storm of the Summer Olympics in June 2012. I also owe an extreme debt of gratitude to the descendants of Elizabeth Pilot who allowed me access to their copy of Pilot's diary on a chaotic trip to Bangor, Northern Ireland during a mass transit/rail strike. I owe a special debt of gratitude to three institutions in Florida and their excellent personnel. James Cuisick of the PK Yonge Library of Florida History at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Charles Tingely of the Research Library at the St. Augustine Historical Society in St. Augustine, and Dean DeBolt of Special Collections at the University of West Florida in Pensacola facilitated access to crucial documents. I also wish to thank the staff of the Pensacola Historical Society (now Historic Trust) for their help in obtaining important West Florida sources. It has often been said that successful long-term research projects like the one that resulted in this dissertation are possible only because a community of scholars makes it so. I owe a great debt to senior scholars Carole Watterson Troxler, J. Barton Starr, Amy Turner Bushnell, Kathleen Deagan, and Margo Stringfield for their time, patience, and efforts on my behalf. Even if their kindness was as simple as speaking to me for five minutes during a conference reception, chairing or commenting on a conference panel with me, or allowing me to pick their brains via email, I would not have gained the needed insight which shaped this dissertation without their help. Although she unexpectedly passed away in a house fire in the summer of July 2017, I also must thank Constance B. Rynder. Connie was the first historian who ever believed in me and my research abilities. She took a chance on an intelligent and mildly irritating overachiever undergraduate honors student when she did not have to do so. Never naturally a patient woman, she had the patience of a saint which made our mentorship and subsequent friendship possible. I miss her terribly, but I know she is looking down from somewhere with a smile on what I have accomplished because of her help, support, and faith. I also want to thank Rosalind J. Beiler and Ezekiel Walker of the University of Central Florida. Dr. Beiler served for me as the first example of what a successful historian of Early America could be like. I will be forever grateful for Dr. Walker’s knowledge and insight into historiography and the place of Africa and slavery in the Atlantic World. Their support again helped me to transition from a somewhat well-meaning but cocky researcher to a serious historian who could engage with complex historical arguments with the hope of one day making my own. I like to think that day has finally come because of them. A special note of thanks must also be extended to the friends who have helped me through the dissertation process. Rachel Nostrom provided a kind ear when I needed to reason things out and make sure I was on the right track several times throughout the process with particular emphasis on giving me her opinion on the application of certain archaeological theories to my research.