Anna Kingsley
Encyclopedia
Anna Madgigine Jai Kingsley (c. 1793 – April or May 1870) was a West Africa
n slave
turned slaveholder and plantation
owner in early 19th century Florida
. At 13 years old, she was captured and sent to Cuba where she was purchased by and married to Zephaniah Kingsley
, a slave trader and plantation
owner. They had four children together. Kingsley freed Anna in 1811 and gave her responsibilities for his plantations in East Florida
. For 25 years, Kingsley's unusual family lived on Fort George Island in modern-day Jacksonville
, where Anna managed a large and successful planting operation. After gaining freedom, Anna was given a Spanish land grant for 5 acres (20,234.3 m²) and held 12 slaves. She later was awarded a land grant of 350 acres (1.4 km²) by the Spanish government.
After the United States took control of Florida and American discriminatory laws threatened the multi-racial Kingsley family, most of them moved to Haiti
. Kingsley died soon after, and Anna returned to Florida to dispute her husband's relatives' contesting Kingsley's will; they sought to exclude Anna and her children from their inheritance. The court honored a treaty between the United States and Spain, and Anna was successful in the court case, despite a political climate hostile toward blacks. She settled in the Arlington neighborhood of Jacksonville, where she died in 1870 at 77 years old. The National Park Service
protects Kingsley Plantation
, where Anna and Kingsley lived on Fort George Island, as part of the Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve
.
Daniel L. Schafer, the biographer of Anna Kingslay, has based his account of her early life on conjecture given his research into the history of the area. Anna Kingsley was born Anta Majigeen Ndiaye in 1793, in a portion of West Africa that was rent by a fierce war between the majority Wolof people
and the minority Fula
. Slave raids were frequent occurrences during incessant violence that left many small villages deserted, as people were abducted to be sold into slavery or they fled in fear for their lives. Following an intensifying of the crisis in 1790, Anta was captured in 1806 when she was about 13 years old, probably by Tyeddo raiders from the Fouta Tooro
. Wolof tradition holds that a mythological figure named Njaajaan Ndiaye established the Jolof Kingdom that existed between 1200 and 1550. Through her father, Anta was a Ndiaye descendant and carried that name. Her mother also had ancestors who had held the title of the Buurba Jolof, or king, of the Wolofs. Although lineages are disputed, there is a belief that Anta may have been the daughter of a still ruling as opposed to formerly ruling branch of the royal family.
Schafer suggests that Anta may have been sent to Gorée Island, a slave debarkation point from the West African coast to the Americas. She sailed to Havana, Cuba; the name of the ship she was aboard is unknown. When Africans arrived in the Western Hemisphere to be sold into slavery, slave traders did not record their given names, but only their age, sex, and sometimes ethnicity, which were most important to buyers. In September or October 1806, Anta was displayed for sale and bought by a slave trader, merchant, and resident of Spanish Florida
named Zephaniah Kingsley
, who was 30 years older than she.
, Kingsley's ship made its way up the St. Johns River
, stopping in an inlet now named Doctors Lake
. Attached to the lake was a dock, the main entrance to Kingsley's plantation which he had named Laurel Grove. Kingsley had become a citizen of Spanish Florida in 1803, likely because it allowed him to continue his international slave trading, at a time when Great Britain and the United States were moving to prohibit it (which they did in 1807). He had been granted the plantation three years before by the Spanish colonial government in exchange for his having brought 74 slaves to the territory. Spain was making generous land grants to attract settlers into Florida. Many years later, Kingsley wrote that he and Anta, now called Anna, had been married in a traditional African ceremony "in a foreign land", which historians have taken to mean Cuba. By the time she arrived at Laurel Grove, she was pregnant.
Laurel Grove was a prosperous plantation that grew oranges, sea island cotton, peas, and potatoes. Over a hundred slaves were gathered there from multiple African ethnic groups; they lived in two groups of houses. Anna, however, lived with Kingsley in his house. At Laurel Grove, as at many other southeastern plantations, Kingsley used the task system to manage work. Slaves were given a quota to fill; when they were finished, they were allowed to pursue other tasks. Some tended personal gardens, while others produced crafts, both of which they were able to sell. Whether due to cultivation techniques or the task system, Laurel Grove was quite successful. One year the plantation made $10,000, which was an extraordinary income at the time, particularly for sparsely populated Florida.
In 1811, Kingsley granted Anna legal emancipation
, which confirmed her high status at the plantation. Most visitors had assumed she was already a free woman. Legal emancipation was critical to her future. Three children had been born to the Kingsleys by this time: George, born June 1807; Martha, born July 1809; and Mary, born February 1811. Kingsley assured their emancipation as well. Had he died before they were freed, Anna and the children would have been sold. As Kingsley was involved in shipping as well as the slave trade, he was frequently away from the plantation. Laurel Grove had a manager, also a slave who had been freed. Kingsley trusted Anna to represent him at the plantation.Mark Fleszar writes that how much Anna managed Laurel Grove "deserves caution" as Kingsley's letters indicate white overseers were responsible for the day to day issues of the plantation when he was away on business. Kingsley told abolitionist Lydia Child in an interview that Anna was "was very capable, and could carry on all the affairs of the plantation in my absence, as well as I could myself", but he either deliberately misrepresented other details in his life or Child's reporting was inaccurate, calling into question other statements Kingsley was reported to have said. (Fleszar, p. 72.) Much later, Kingsley described his wife as "a fine, tall figure, black as jet, but very handsome. She was very capable, and could carry on all the affairs of the plantation in my absence as well as I could myself. She was affectionate and faithful, and I could trust her." In 1813 as a free woman, Anna Kingsley petitioned the Spanish government for land. She was awarded 5 acres (20,234.3 m²) in Mandarin
across the river from Laurel Grove. She purchased goods and livestock to get her farm started, as well as 12 slaves. Slavery within African societies was a custom with which Anna would probably have been familiar, including the fact that female slaves often married their masters in order to obtain freedom.
Kingsley was kidnapped the same year and held until he endorsed the Patriot Rebellion, an insurgency
by Americans to annex Florida to the United States. Americans and American-supplied Creek Indians raided towns and plantations in north Florida, sending any blacks they captured into slavery, regardless of their legal status. The Patriots took Laurel Grove and 41 of its slaves, using the facilities as its headquarters while it carried out similar raids in the area. Kingsley fled after being released, his whereabouts unknown. To evade the Americans, Anna approached the Spanish and negotiated her escape, bringing along her children and a dozen slaves. She burned Kingsley's plantation to the ground while the Spanish watched. Anna asked the Spanish to return her to her own homestead, and she burned it, too, preventing its use by the Patriots. For her actions, after the war the Spanish government granted Anna 350 acres (1.4 km²).
Thirty-two slave cabins were constructed not far from Kingsley's house. They were constructed of tabby
, made by pounding oyster shells into lime and adding water and sand. The shells came from the massive midden
s left by the Timucua
who previously inhabited the island. Anthropologists suggest that Anna may have had the knowledge to instruct her slaves how to form the tabby because it was widely used in West Africa. The foundation of "Ma'am Anna House" was also constructed of tabby, which proved to be fireproof and more durable than wood. The slave quarters were arranged in a semi-circular pattern that was an anomaly in the South. Some historians have suggested Kingsley arranged them to keep better watch over his slaves. Author Daniel Schafer hypothesized that Anna may have been responsible for the layout of the slave quarters: many African villages were similarly arranged in circular patterns.
In 1824, Anna bore her fourth son John, who was baptized in a Catholic ceremony with the daughter of another of Kingsley's wives. Anna befriended a white woman named Susan L'Engle who was much impressed with Anna, and called her "the African princess". (L'Engle's great-granddaughter, children's author Madeleine L'Engle
, wrote of her stories in a book titled Summer of the Great Grandmother.) Susan L'Engle had the impression that Anna was quite lonely though her jobs at the plantation kept her constantly busy. Kingsley's young niece remembered much later her first impression of Anna:
. Southern states increased restrictions against free blacks after the Nat Turner
Rebellion of 1831. The mixed-race Kingsley family was directly and negatively affected by these "illiberal and inequitable laws", as Kingsley stated in his will. Kingsley transferred all their holdings to the three older children and moved to Haiti
in 1835. Their two oldest daughters had already married white planters in Florida and remained there. Anna and their youngest son followed Kingsley to Haiti in 1838. In all, 60 slaves, family members, and freed employees moved with Kingsley to Haiti to start a plantation called Mayorasgo de Koka
. Because slavery was prohibited in Haiti, Kingsley converted his slaves to indentured servants, who could earn their freedom with another nine years of labor. Kingsley portrayed life in Haiti as idyllic. In 1843, when Anna was 50 years old, Kingsley died on his way to New York, where he was buried.
One of the laws passed by the Territorial Council of Florida that so alarmed Kingsley was the provision that mixed race children could not inherit property. The territory did not recognize interracial or polygamous marriages as legal. The year following Kingsley's death, his sister Martha and her children contested his will as "defective and invalid". Kingsley's sister cited Florida law that forbade black people from owning property, and claimed that Anna and Kingsley's other wives moved to Haiti spontaneously, abandoning the property in Florida to become free people. Anna returned to Florida in 1846 to participate in the Kingsley estate defense, despite the increasingly tense racial climate in Duval County
. The court upheld the treaty signed between the U.S. and Spain stipulating that all free blacks born before 1822 in Florida enjoyed the same legal privileges as they had when Spain controlled East Florida. Anna furthermore asked for and was granted the transfer of ownership of slaves who had been sent to the San Jose plantation when the family had moved to Haiti. Her request to rent slaves to other plantations to maximize her profits was rejected by the courts.
Anna and her children became Union
sympathizers when the American Civil War
broke out the following year. She and other free blacks were evacuated by Union forces when they captured Jacksonville in 1862. She returned home the following year to be closer to her daughters, and died in 1870 at the age of 77.
West Africa
West Africa or Western Africa is the westernmost region of the African continent. Geopolitically, the UN definition of Western Africa includes the following 16 countries and an area of approximately 5 million square km:-Flags of West Africa:...
n slave
Slavery
Slavery is a system under which people are treated as property to be bought and sold, and are forced to work. Slaves can be held against their will from the time of their capture, purchase or birth, and deprived of the right to leave, to refuse to work, or to demand compensation...
turned slaveholder and plantation
Plantation
A plantation is a long artificially established forest, farm or estate, where crops are grown for sale, often in distant markets rather than for local on-site consumption...
owner in early 19th century Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
. At 13 years old, she was captured and sent to Cuba where she was purchased by and married to Zephaniah Kingsley
Zephaniah Kingsley
Zephaniah Kingsley, Jr. was a plantation owner, slave trader, and merchant who built several plantations in the Spanish colony of Florida in what is now Jacksonville...
, a slave trader and plantation
Plantation
A plantation is a long artificially established forest, farm or estate, where crops are grown for sale, often in distant markets rather than for local on-site consumption...
owner. They had four children together. Kingsley freed Anna in 1811 and gave her responsibilities for his plantations in East Florida
East Florida
East Florida was a colony of Great Britain from 1763–1783 and of Spain from 1783–1822. East Florida was established by the British colonial government in 1763; as its name implies it consisted of the eastern part of the region of Florida, with West Florida comprising the western parts. Its capital...
. For 25 years, Kingsley's unusual family lived on Fort George Island in modern-day Jacksonville
Jacksonville, Florida
Jacksonville is the largest city in the U.S. state of Florida in terms of both population and land area, and the largest city by area in the contiguous United States. It is the county seat of Duval County, with which the city government consolidated in 1968...
, where Anna managed a large and successful planting operation. After gaining freedom, Anna was given a Spanish land grant for 5 acres (20,234.3 m²) and held 12 slaves. She later was awarded a land grant of 350 acres (1.4 km²) by the Spanish government.
After the United States took control of Florida and American discriminatory laws threatened the multi-racial Kingsley family, most of them moved to Haiti
Haiti
Haiti , officially the Republic of Haiti , is a Caribbean country. It occupies the western, smaller portion of the island of Hispaniola, in the Greater Antillean archipelago, which it shares with the Dominican Republic. Ayiti was the indigenous Taíno or Amerindian name for the island...
. Kingsley died soon after, and Anna returned to Florida to dispute her husband's relatives' contesting Kingsley's will; they sought to exclude Anna and her children from their inheritance. The court honored a treaty between the United States and Spain, and Anna was successful in the court case, despite a political climate hostile toward blacks. She settled in the Arlington neighborhood of Jacksonville, where she died in 1870 at 77 years old. The National Park Service
National Park Service
The National Park Service is the U.S. federal agency that manages all national parks, many national monuments, and other conservation and historical properties with various title designations...
protects Kingsley Plantation
Kingsley Plantation
Kingsley Plantation is the site of a former estate in Jacksonville, Florida, that was named for an early owner, Zephaniah Kingsley, who spent 25 years there. It is located at the northern tip of Fort George Island at Fort George Inlet, and is part of the Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve...
, where Anna and Kingsley lived on Fort George Island, as part of the Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve
Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve
The Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve is located in the city of Jacksonville, Florida, in the United States. The park was established in 1988, and covers 46,000 acres...
.
Early years
Wolof people
The Wolof are an ethnic group found in Senegal, The Gambia, and Mauritania.In Senegal, the Wolof form an ethnic plurality with about 43.3% of the population are Wolofs...
and the minority Fula
Fula people
Fula people or Fulani or Fulbe are an ethnic group spread over many countries, predominantly in West Africa, but found also in Central Africa and Sudanese North Africa...
. Slave raids were frequent occurrences during incessant violence that left many small villages deserted, as people were abducted to be sold into slavery or they fled in fear for their lives. Following an intensifying of the crisis in 1790, Anta was captured in 1806 when she was about 13 years old, probably by Tyeddo raiders from the Fouta Tooro
Kingdom of Fouta Tooro
The Kingdom of Fouta Tooro or the Kingdom of Fuua Tooro was a pre-colonial West African state of the Fula-speaking people centered around the middle valley of the Senegal River...
. Wolof tradition holds that a mythological figure named Njaajaan Ndiaye established the Jolof Kingdom that existed between 1200 and 1550. Through her father, Anta was a Ndiaye descendant and carried that name. Her mother also had ancestors who had held the title of the Buurba Jolof, or king, of the Wolofs. Although lineages are disputed, there is a belief that Anta may have been the daughter of a still ruling as opposed to formerly ruling branch of the royal family.
Schafer suggests that Anta may have been sent to Gorée Island, a slave debarkation point from the West African coast to the Americas. She sailed to Havana, Cuba; the name of the ship she was aboard is unknown. When Africans arrived in the Western Hemisphere to be sold into slavery, slave traders did not record their given names, but only their age, sex, and sometimes ethnicity, which were most important to buyers. In September or October 1806, Anta was displayed for sale and bought by a slave trader, merchant, and resident of Spanish Florida
Spanish Florida
Spanish Florida refers to the Spanish territory of Florida, which formed part of the Captaincy General of Cuba, the Viceroyalty of New Spain, and the Spanish Empire. Originally extending over what is now the southeastern United States, but with no defined boundaries, la Florida was a component of...
named Zephaniah Kingsley
Zephaniah Kingsley
Zephaniah Kingsley, Jr. was a plantation owner, slave trader, and merchant who built several plantations in the Spanish colony of Florida in what is now Jacksonville...
, who was 30 years older than she.
Laurel Grove
After a brief stop in St. AugustineSt. Augustine, Florida
St. Augustine is a city in the northeast section of Florida and the county seat of St. Johns County, Florida, United States. Founded in 1565 by Spanish explorer and admiral Pedro Menéndez de Avilés, it is the oldest continuously occupied European-established city and port in the continental United...
, Kingsley's ship made its way up the St. Johns River
St. Johns River
The St. Johns River is the longest river in the U.S. state of Florida and its most significant for commercial and recreational use. At long, it winds through or borders twelve counties, three of which are the state's largest. The drop in elevation from the headwaters to the mouth is less than ;...
, stopping in an inlet now named Doctors Lake
Doctors Lake
Doctors Lake is a body of water located off the St. Johns River in Clay County, Florida. Despite its name, it is not a true lake, as it is actually an inlet, openly connected to the St. Johns. Because of the estuarine nature of the St. Johns, Doctor's Lake is itself somewhat brackish.Many docks...
. Attached to the lake was a dock, the main entrance to Kingsley's plantation which he had named Laurel Grove. Kingsley had become a citizen of Spanish Florida in 1803, likely because it allowed him to continue his international slave trading, at a time when Great Britain and the United States were moving to prohibit it (which they did in 1807). He had been granted the plantation three years before by the Spanish colonial government in exchange for his having brought 74 slaves to the territory. Spain was making generous land grants to attract settlers into Florida. Many years later, Kingsley wrote that he and Anta, now called Anna, had been married in a traditional African ceremony "in a foreign land", which historians have taken to mean Cuba. By the time she arrived at Laurel Grove, she was pregnant.
Laurel Grove was a prosperous plantation that grew oranges, sea island cotton, peas, and potatoes. Over a hundred slaves were gathered there from multiple African ethnic groups; they lived in two groups of houses. Anna, however, lived with Kingsley in his house. At Laurel Grove, as at many other southeastern plantations, Kingsley used the task system to manage work. Slaves were given a quota to fill; when they were finished, they were allowed to pursue other tasks. Some tended personal gardens, while others produced crafts, both of which they were able to sell. Whether due to cultivation techniques or the task system, Laurel Grove was quite successful. One year the plantation made $10,000, which was an extraordinary income at the time, particularly for sparsely populated Florida.
In 1811, Kingsley granted Anna legal emancipation
Emancipation
Emancipation means the act of setting an individual or social group free or making equal to citizens in a political society.Emancipation may also refer to:* Emancipation , a champion Australian thoroughbred racehorse foaled in 1979...
, which confirmed her high status at the plantation. Most visitors had assumed she was already a free woman. Legal emancipation was critical to her future. Three children had been born to the Kingsleys by this time: George, born June 1807; Martha, born July 1809; and Mary, born February 1811. Kingsley assured their emancipation as well. Had he died before they were freed, Anna and the children would have been sold. As Kingsley was involved in shipping as well as the slave trade, he was frequently away from the plantation. Laurel Grove had a manager, also a slave who had been freed. Kingsley trusted Anna to represent him at the plantation.Mark Fleszar writes that how much Anna managed Laurel Grove "deserves caution" as Kingsley's letters indicate white overseers were responsible for the day to day issues of the plantation when he was away on business. Kingsley told abolitionist Lydia Child in an interview that Anna was "was very capable, and could carry on all the affairs of the plantation in my absence, as well as I could myself", but he either deliberately misrepresented other details in his life or Child's reporting was inaccurate, calling into question other statements Kingsley was reported to have said. (Fleszar, p. 72.) Much later, Kingsley described his wife as "a fine, tall figure, black as jet, but very handsome. She was very capable, and could carry on all the affairs of the plantation in my absence as well as I could myself. She was affectionate and faithful, and I could trust her." In 1813 as a free woman, Anna Kingsley petitioned the Spanish government for land. She was awarded 5 acres (20,234.3 m²) in Mandarin
Mandarin, Florida
Mandarin is a neighborhood located in the southern most portion of Jacksonville, in Duval County, Florida, United States. It is located on the eastern banks of the St. Johns River, across from Orange Park...
across the river from Laurel Grove. She purchased goods and livestock to get her farm started, as well as 12 slaves. Slavery within African societies was a custom with which Anna would probably have been familiar, including the fact that female slaves often married their masters in order to obtain freedom.
Kingsley was kidnapped the same year and held until he endorsed the Patriot Rebellion, an insurgency
Insurgency
An insurgency is an armed rebellion against a constituted authority when those taking part in the rebellion are not recognized as belligerents...
by Americans to annex Florida to the United States. Americans and American-supplied Creek Indians raided towns and plantations in north Florida, sending any blacks they captured into slavery, regardless of their legal status. The Patriots took Laurel Grove and 41 of its slaves, using the facilities as its headquarters while it carried out similar raids in the area. Kingsley fled after being released, his whereabouts unknown. To evade the Americans, Anna approached the Spanish and negotiated her escape, bringing along her children and a dozen slaves. She burned Kingsley's plantation to the ground while the Spanish watched. Anna asked the Spanish to return her to her own homestead, and she burned it, too, preventing its use by the Patriots. For her actions, after the war the Spanish government granted Anna 350 acres (1.4 km²).
Fort George Island
Kingsley purchased another plantation on Fort George Island, near the mouth of the St. Johns River in 1814. The owner's house had been looted and vandalized, but every other structure on the property was destroyed. While the slave quarters and various other buildings were being constructed, Anna moved in between Fernandina and Fort George Island, taking over managing the plantation while Kingsley was away on business. At some point in the 1820s, they built a separate kitchen connected to the main house by a covered walkway. It had a room above it where Anna lived with her children. Called the "Ma'am Anna House", this followed the common West African custom of wives' living separately from their husbands, particularly in polygamous marriages. Kingsley took three other wives, all slaves, while at Fort George Island. Two of them brought children.Thirty-two slave cabins were constructed not far from Kingsley's house. They were constructed of tabby
Tabby (cement)
Tabby is a building material consisting of lime, sand, water, and crushed oyster shells. It was developed and used by English colonists in Beaufort County and on the Sea Islands of coastal South Carolina, in coastal Georgia, and in northern Florida in the Southern United States...
, made by pounding oyster shells into lime and adding water and sand. The shells came from the massive midden
Midden
A midden, is an old dump for domestic waste which may consist of animal bone, human excrement, botanical material, vermin, shells, sherds, lithics , and other artifacts and ecofacts associated with past human occupation...
s left by the Timucua
Timucua
The Timucua were a Native American people who lived in Northeast and North Central Florida and southeast Georgia. They were the largest indigenous group in that area and consisted of about 35 chiefdoms, many leading thousands of people. The various groups of Timucua spoke several dialects of the...
who previously inhabited the island. Anthropologists suggest that Anna may have had the knowledge to instruct her slaves how to form the tabby because it was widely used in West Africa. The foundation of "Ma'am Anna House" was also constructed of tabby, which proved to be fireproof and more durable than wood. The slave quarters were arranged in a semi-circular pattern that was an anomaly in the South. Some historians have suggested Kingsley arranged them to keep better watch over his slaves. Author Daniel Schafer hypothesized that Anna may have been responsible for the layout of the slave quarters: many African villages were similarly arranged in circular patterns.
In 1824, Anna bore her fourth son John, who was baptized in a Catholic ceremony with the daughter of another of Kingsley's wives. Anna befriended a white woman named Susan L'Engle who was much impressed with Anna, and called her "the African princess". (L'Engle's great-granddaughter, children's author Madeleine L'Engle
Madeleine L'Engle
Madeleine L'Engle was an American writer best known for her young-adult fiction, particularly the Newbery Medal-winning A Wrinkle in Time and its sequels A Wind in the Door, A Swiftly Tilting Planet, Many Waters, and An Acceptable Time...
, wrote of her stories in a book titled Summer of the Great Grandmother.) Susan L'Engle had the impression that Anna was quite lonely though her jobs at the plantation kept her constantly busy. Kingsley's young niece remembered much later her first impression of Anna:
I remember her very distinctly. She was not black, and had the most beautiful features you ever saw. She was a most imposing and very handsome woman. Her smooth, light brown skin, her dark-eyes and wavy [sic] made her outstanding, and I would not keep my eyes away for admiration. She was quiet and moved with regal dignity—I have never seen anything like her, before or since. Her daughter was there also, and she was very light in color, but not as good-looking as her mother. I was six or seven years old at the time. I was Kingsley’s niece. The next morning my aunt, Mrs. Gibbs, sent two servants for us with a horse and buggy, and we were carried over to Newcastle. My mother was furious that we had spent the night at Ma’m Anna’s, but it could not be helped.
Haiti and return to Florida
After Spain ceded control of Florida to the U.S. in 1822, the new state government progressively enacted stricter ordinances separating the races, as was common among other states in the US SouthSouth
South is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating direction or geography.South is one of the four cardinal directions or compass points. It is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to east and west.By convention, the bottom side of a map is south....
. Southern states increased restrictions against free blacks after the Nat Turner
Nat Turner
Nathaniel "Nat" Turner was an American slave who led a slave rebellion in Virginia on August 21, 1831 that resulted in 60 white deaths and at least 100 black deaths, the largest number of fatalities to occur in one uprising prior to the American Civil War in the southern United States. He gathered...
Rebellion of 1831. The mixed-race Kingsley family was directly and negatively affected by these "illiberal and inequitable laws", as Kingsley stated in his will. Kingsley transferred all their holdings to the three older children and moved to Haiti
Haiti
Haiti , officially the Republic of Haiti , is a Caribbean country. It occupies the western, smaller portion of the island of Hispaniola, in the Greater Antillean archipelago, which it shares with the Dominican Republic. Ayiti was the indigenous Taíno or Amerindian name for the island...
in 1835. Their two oldest daughters had already married white planters in Florida and remained there. Anna and their youngest son followed Kingsley to Haiti in 1838. In all, 60 slaves, family members, and freed employees moved with Kingsley to Haiti to start a plantation called Mayorasgo de Koka
Mayorasgo de Koka
Mayorasgo de Koka was a tract of land purchased by Zephaniah Kingsley in 1837 as part of his "colonization experiment" in Haiti. It is located in the province of Puerto Plata, in the north coast of the Dominican Republic....
. Because slavery was prohibited in Haiti, Kingsley converted his slaves to indentured servants, who could earn their freedom with another nine years of labor. Kingsley portrayed life in Haiti as idyllic. In 1843, when Anna was 50 years old, Kingsley died on his way to New York, where he was buried.
One of the laws passed by the Territorial Council of Florida that so alarmed Kingsley was the provision that mixed race children could not inherit property. The territory did not recognize interracial or polygamous marriages as legal. The year following Kingsley's death, his sister Martha and her children contested his will as "defective and invalid". Kingsley's sister cited Florida law that forbade black people from owning property, and claimed that Anna and Kingsley's other wives moved to Haiti spontaneously, abandoning the property in Florida to become free people. Anna returned to Florida in 1846 to participate in the Kingsley estate defense, despite the increasingly tense racial climate in Duval County
Duval County, Florida
Duval County is a county located in the U.S. state of Florida. As of 2010, the population was 864,263. Its county seat is Jacksonville, with which the Duval County government has been consolidated since 1968...
. The court upheld the treaty signed between the U.S. and Spain stipulating that all free blacks born before 1822 in Florida enjoyed the same legal privileges as they had when Spain controlled East Florida. Anna furthermore asked for and was granted the transfer of ownership of slaves who had been sent to the San Jose plantation when the family had moved to Haiti. Her request to rent slaves to other plantations to maximize her profits was rejected by the courts.
Anna and her children became Union
Union (American Civil War)
During the American Civil War, the Union was a name used to refer to the federal government of the United States, which was supported by the twenty free states and five border slave states. It was opposed by 11 southern slave states that had declared a secession to join together to form the...
sympathizers when the American Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
broke out the following year. She and other free blacks were evacuated by Union forces when they captured Jacksonville in 1862. She returned home the following year to be closer to her daughters, and died in 1870 at the age of 77.
External links
- "Kingsley Plantation National Historic Site", National Park Service
- Rosalie Turner, Freedom Bound (2006), a historical novel based on the life of Anna Kingsley
- Papers Concerning the Will of Zephaniah Kingsley, 1844, 1846, State Library & Archives of Florida