 | |
| Total population | |
|---|---|
| unknown | |
| Regions with significant populations | |
 United States ( Florida) | |
| Languages | |
| Spanish | |
| Religion | |
| Predominantly Roman Catholic | |
| Related ethnic groups | |
|
Floridanos (English: Floridians) is a term for colonial residents of the Spanish settlements in St. Augustine and Pensacola [1] who were born in Spanish Florida. [2] Descendants of the original Floridanos can be found throughout the state, especially in St. Augustine, [3] as well as in Miami, Tampa, and Orlando.
Established on September 8, 1565, St. Augustine is the oldest continuously inhabited European settlement in what is now the United States. [4] From that time on, hundreds of Spanish soldiers and their families moved from Cuba to St. Augustine to establish new lives. Following Spain's defeat in the Seven Years' War, Spain ceded Florida to Great Britain in 1763. Almost all of St. Augustine's Spanish settlers left Florida during the period that British ruled East Florida, with many of them moving to Cuba. More than 3,000 Floridanos left Florida for Havana, Cuba between 1763 and early 1764. [5] Spanish Floridians in west Florida mostly fled to Veracruz, Mexico, with about 620 sailing from Pensacola. The term "Floridano" was the term used by the Spanish colonial authorities to designate Spanish Floridian immigrants to Cuba. [6] Spain recovered East Florida and gained control of West Florida through the Peace of Paris of 1783. [7] [8] The governors of the provinces of East and West Florida promoted Spanish migration to them. Florida was ceded to the United States in 1819 by the Adams–Onís Treaty.
In 2010, an historical marker titled "Los Floridanos" that commemorates the Floridanos was unveiled at St. Augustine's Visitor Information Center. [6]
The number of descendants of Spanish settlers in Florida is unknown. However, two of the earliest settlers, Francisco Sanchez and Manuel Solana, are known to have between 500 and 1,000 descendants living in the state. Manuel Solana was a descendant of Alonso Solana who had arrived to Florida in 1613 as a soldier in the Spanish military. These settlers were some of the few Spaniards who remained in Florida when the territory was ceded to Great Britain in 1763. Their descendants founded the Los Floridanos Society in St. Augustine, [9] whose main function is to teach the history and legacy of the first settlers (1565-1763) to interested people. Some people of Cuban origin living in Florida also have ancestors in Colonial Florida. Some of the descendants of East Florida Governor José María Coppinger, who was not a settler of Florida and lived in Cuba his last years, also live in Florida. [10] [11]
St. Augustine is a city in and the county seat of St. Johns County located 40 miles south of downtown Jacksonville. The city is on the Atlantic coast of northeastern Florida. Founded in 1565 by Spanish explorers, it is the oldest continuously inhabited European-established settlement in what is now the contiguous United States.
The history of Florida can be traced to when the first Paleo-Indians began to inhabit the peninsula as early as 14,000 years ago. They left behind artifacts and archeological evidence. Florida's written history begins with the arrival of Europeans; the Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de León in 1513 made the first textual records. The state received its name from that conquistador, who called the peninsula La Pascua Florida in recognition of the verdant landscape and because it was the Easter season, which the Spaniards called Pascua Florida.
West Florida was a region on the northern coast of the Gulf of Mexico that underwent several boundary and sovereignty changes during its history. As its name suggests, it was formed out of the western part of former Spanish Florida, along with lands taken from French Louisiana; Pensacola became West Florida's capital. The colony included about two thirds of what is now the Florida Panhandle, as well as parts of the modern U.S. states of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama.
East Florida was a colony of Great Britain from 1763 to 1783 and a province of the Spanish Empire from 1783 to 1821. The British gained control over Spanish Florida in 1763 as part of the Treaty of Paris that ended the Seven Years' War. Deciding that the colony was too large to administer as a single unit, British officials divided Florida into two colonies separated by the Apalachicola River; the colony of East Florida, with its capital located in St. Augustine and West Florida, with its capital located in Pensacola. East Florida was much larger and comprised the bulk of the former Spanish colony and most of the current state of Florida. It had also been the most populated region of Spanish Florida, but before control was transferred to Britain, most residents – including virtually everyone in St. Augustine – left the territory, with most migrating to Cuba.
Spanish Florida was the first major European land-claim and attempted settlement-area in northern America during the European Age of Discovery. La Florida formed part of the Captaincy General of Cuba, the Viceroyalty of New Spain, and the Spanish Empire during Spanish colonization of the Americas. While its boundaries were never clearly or formally defined, the territory was initially much larger than the present-day state of Florida, extending over much of what is now the southeastern United States, including all of present-day Florida plus portions of Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, and the Florida Parishes of Louisiana. Spain based its claim to this vast area on several wide-ranging expeditions mounted during the 16th century. A number of missions, settlements, and small forts existed in the 16th and to a lesser extent in the 17th century; they were eventually abandoned due to pressure from the expanding English and French colonial settlements, the collapse of the native populations, and the general difficulty in becoming agriculturally or economically self-sufficient. By the 18th century, Spain's control over La Florida did not extend much beyond a handful of forts near St. Augustine, St. Marks, and Pensacola, all within the boundaries of present-day Florida.
Fort Mose, originally known as Gracia Real de Santa Teresa de Mose, and later as Fort Mose, or alternatively, Fort Moosa or Fort Mossa, is a former Spanish fort in St. Augustine, Florida. In 1738, the governor of Spanish Florida, Manuel de Montiano, had the fort established as a free black settlement, the first to be legally sanctioned in what would become the territory of the United States. It was designated a US National Historic Landmark on October 12, 1994.
The history of Pensacola, Florida, begins long before the Spanish claimed founding of the modern city in 1698. The area around present-day Pensacola was inhabited by Native American peoples thousands of years before the historical era.
British West Florida was a colony of the Kingdom of Great Britain from 1763 until 1783, when it was ceded to Spain as part of the Peace of Paris.
Vicente Manuel de Céspedes (1721?-1794), also known as Vicente Manuel de Zéspedes, was a Spanish colonel and field marshal in the Spanish Royal Army who served as governor of Santiago de Cuba (1781-1782) and the Spanish province of East Florida (1784-1790).
Juan Francisco Buenaventura de Ayala y Escobar was a prominent Spanish soldier and administrator who governed Spanish Florida from October 30, 1716, to August 3, 1718. The succeeding governor, Antonio de Benavides, a zealous reformer, accused Ayala of trading in contraband with the English, and had him arrested and briefly jailed in the Castillo de San Marcos of St. Augustine. He was eventually exiled to Cuba, where he died in 1727, before he was exonerated and all charges dropped in 1731.
José María Coppinger was a Spanish soldier who served in the infantry of the Royal Spanish Army (Ejército de Tierra) and governed East Florida (1816–1821) and several areas in Cuba including Pinar Del Río, Bayamo, the Cuatro Villas and Trinidad at various times between 1801 and 1834. He was also a member of the Royal and Military Order of Saint Ferdinand and San Hermenegildo.
Antonio Benavides Bazán y Molina was a Lieutenant General in the Spanish Army who held administrative positions in the Americas as Royal Governor of Spanish Florida (1718–1734), Governor of Veracruz (1734–1745), Governor and Captain General of Yucatán province, as well as Governor of Manila in the Philippines. Before his successive appointments to these various positions, he served with distinction in several campaigns of the War of the Spanish Succession in 1710, and perhaps saved the life of Philip V, the first Bourbon King of Spain, at Guadalajara.
Luis Benedit y Horruytiner was a Spanish colonial administrator who held office as governor of Spanish Florida, and viceroy of Sardinia. He was the uncle of Pedro Benedit Horruytiner, who succeeded him as governor of La Florida.
Melchor Feliú (?-1766) was the last governor in the First Spanish Period of Florida's history, governing from March 20, 1762 to July 27, 1763. Feliú oversaw the cession of Florida to Great Britain by the Treaty of Paris on July 21, 1763 and the subsequent immigration of most of the province's Spanish and African inhabitants to Cuba. Some of the Native Americans living in the Spanish Catholic missions also moved away from Florida at this time.
Spanish West Florida was a province of the Spanish Empire from 1783 until 1821, when both it and East Florida were ceded to the United States.
Jesse Fish was a shipmaster, merchant, and realtor who lived in St. Augustine, Florida under both Spanish and British rule, and is infamous in the town's history to this day. He was a schemer involved in contraband trade and illegal real estate deals, and operated as a slaver, smuggler, and usurer. By his slaver activities Fish introduced most of the bozales, or African-born slaves, registered in Spanish Florida during the decade (1752–1763) preceding Spain's cession of Florida to Great Britain. He has been accused of spying for England and Spain as a double agent during the Seven Years’ War, but there is no evidence to support the claim.
Juan Vicente Folch y Juan (1754–1829) was a Spanish military officer who served as the governor of West Florida from June 1796 to March 1811.
Canarian Americans are Americans whose ancestors came from the Canary Islands, Spain. They can trace their ancestry to settlers and immigrants who have emigrated since the 16th century to the present-day United States. Most of them are descendants of settlers who immigrated to Spanish colonies in the South of the modern US during the 18th century. The Canarians were among the first settlers of the modern United States; the first Canarians migrated to modern Florida in 1569, and were followed by others coming to La Florida, Texas and Louisiana.
Jane Gilmer Landers is an historian of colonial Latin America and the Atlantic World who specializes in the history of Africans and their descendants. She is the Gertrude Conaway Vanderbilt Professor of History at Vanderbilt University, director of the Center for Latin American and Iberian Studies, and former associate dean of the college of arts & science.
Juan José Eligio de la Puente y Regidor (1724–1781) was a Spanish Floridian (Floridano) who held various public offices in St. Augustine, Florida and in Havana, Cuba, during the 18th century. He served as chief officer of the Real Contaduría for Spanish Florida, and as principal auditor for the Tribunal de Cuentas in Havana, offices that managed the colonial governments' accounts and expenditures. Puente was a member of St. Augustine's 18th century elite Criollo community, and had a role in many events of that period in the history of Florida. He acquired considerable wealth, became a royal treasury official in Cuba, and influenced Spanish foreign policy in North America.
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