HomeMy WebLinkAboutMills O Burnham Memoir - Ranson 1926PREFACE
When nearing the close of Life's allotted span, threescore
and ten, the average man dwells more on past events than on
those of the present or the future, which is but natural, as
contemplating with greater interest the larger part than the
smaller one.
To Disraeli, Ibelieve, is attributed the saying:
"Youth a blunder;
Manhood a struggle;
Old Age a regret.'
And in these, my declining days, my chief regret is that I
did not learn more from my forebears of the history of Thiers;
thus I have endeavored to record that which (without my Aid)
would be forever lost to the descendants of the 3arnham family
and friends.
I am thus thankful for the privilege accorded me to have
been able to collote, for the family of which I am a member
by marriage, evidences of the manner in which both the men
an! nhe women K former days met such trials and perils as
�ce UP inheritance of all pioneers who, in advance of
civilization, fight their way throunh tracklpss wl3ds in order
to fit the Earth for future saFe and habitable conditions.
Robert Hanson
#346 S. Charlotte St.
St. AuFustine, Fla.
A MEMOIR OF
CAPTAIN MILLS OLCOTT BURNHAM
a Florida Pioneer
Written for members of his Family and Friends
and all interested in the State's early history
mm
Robert Ranson
St. Augustine, Florida
June, 1926
Mills Olcott Burnham was born on the eighth day of
September, A.D. 1817, of English parentage, in Thetford, Orange
County, Vermont, and died at Cape Canaveral, Florida, on April
the seventeenth, 1886, at the age of sixty-eight years and
seven months.
As a small boy he moved with his parents to LarsinburF,
now a part of Troy, New York, was educated in the common schools
and later served an a7prentioeship in the Watervliet Government
Arsenal and learned the trade of a gunsmith, at whi3h he became
vory proficient and which served him later, in his frontier
"..1fe to vood advantage.
On September the ninth, 035, at the early age of 18 he
married Mary McCuen, age 26, who par hqrn in vhR norK of
Ireland of Protestant stock and who had immiErated to this
country as a child with her parents, and the ceremcny was
performed by the Reverend Phineas Whipple, rector of the
Protestant Episcopal Church of Lansinburg.
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In the fall of 1837, two years later, Captain Burnham
went South by the advice of his physician, supposing that his
lungs were affected, and sailed on the schooner Peru, Captain
Pearce, for Arey's Ferry, there known as the Arsenal of the
South. This was located on Black Creek, near Middleburg, in
Duval County, East Florida, and in 1837-1838 was under the
commanlbf Captain J. C. DeLagnel and Lieutenant John F. Metcalf,
Ordinance Officers.
He spent the winter of 1837-38 in Florida and so improved
was his health that he returned to New York, and in August, 1839,
brought his wife and two children, Mills a boy, and Frances a
girl, to Florida on the brig Ajax, settled in Jacksonville and
made Florida his pr7n-amf.L-LL_home, never going north again except
to Charleston, 30014 Cqrolina, on occasional trips during the
Forties.
just a 01impse at Florida about the time of
Burnham's arrival miy be cf interest.
Two years previously, in the early spring of
1835, a severe freeze had completely destroyed all
the oranFe Froves, and an old magazine of that
year records that in and around St. Aus7ustine it
had ki2led all the oranges, lemons, limes and
avocadoes, revealing a fact, since quite lost sight
of, that avocadoes were at that time grow so far
rorth.
This co2d spell was like the freeze in 1805
in our own remembrance, followed by several coid
Winrern ind it wns not untKY the lite fortios
th9t oronre rrowinC in "30011 main Occame wela.
Ontahlished.
The freeze of 1835 was not as scvaru as ons-,
of 1791, when the St, johns River was reported tc
have been frozen out quite a long distance from
Its banks.
Indian troph3es in those days were numerously
reported, costing the United States Government
vast sums of money.
The Dade Massacre on the Withlacoochee River
was fresh in the memory of all, and though after the
capture and imprisonment of Osceola, Indian troubles
slnckened neither life nor property was considered
safe at any distance from white settlements, and.
progress was much delayed by fear of Indian raids.
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Florida had at that time not been admitted to Statehood,
but Duval County, in which Jacksonville was situated, had
just been organized and Burnham occupied the position of first
Sherriff�
He was a man of great corporal strength and it was related
of him that he could hold at arm.'s length two fifty -pound
kegs of lead and raise them over his head three times before
dropping them, and was besides quite an athl.nJIL. Jacksonville
in those days harbored some very unruly characters, notably
one named McGirt, a pugnacious red-headed Irishman who had a
predeliction for fighting and making trouble whenever in his
cups and whose name is forever immortalized in McGirt's Creek,
a few miles south of Jacksonville, where he lived. Mrs.
Burnham was greatly in fear that her husband might suffer
bodily injury, hut he seemed to escape all harm.
in 1841 or 1242 he was elected a me7her of the Territorial,
Legislature, and Dr. Crawford, later Secretary of State and the
father of H. Clay Crawford, the present incumbent of that
exalted office, told me in 1895 that he well remembered serving
in the same Legislature with Captain Burnham more than fifty
years before.
About the year 1842, ConFress passed what was known as
the "Armed Occupation Act," which gave to unN settlers 160
acres of Government land In Florida, anywhere south of Palatka,
providing they could hold It successfully against the Indians
for seven years; an0his was previous to the passing of the
Homestead Act.
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Under the Armed Occupation Act two colonies were fitted
out, one, went to the southern West Coast and one to the East
Coast.
The former settled on the Manatee River near where
Bradentown now is, and of the more prominent men in this
colony was Major Robert Gamble, who I knew thirty-one years
ago in Tallahassee., and who was well in his nineties when
he died, leaving a daughter, still living, Mrs. Howard Gamble.
Major Gamble's home and. ground near Manatee were last
year deeded to the State and provision made for the care of
the same.
The history of the Mqnatee colony is (�'ifficult to trace
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at this day, but after ni)merous �)rushes with thiev.Mg, recalcitran.
Indians, in which the whites were nearly always victorous.
they seemed to h,'.ave held their own and some oil their descendants
still live in ancl Tlear '�,Irad.en.to�,,T.n
The Indian River cl'oior3y, v�,ich more near'aly concerl'�is us
in 'hese memoirs, consisted orip�`rally of about forty heads
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of families from Alabama, Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina.
these
Some of L, - Joined. for their hea"Ith's sake, some for
a, ve,,:,I�C'Iure ,.-Lnd the own
ership of 1,and; and, p-ominent among them
vl�'rlcl took h-is :f`aTnj-i li, u 2. a 11"t o
Y a 0 n e
e, Wrill) W5111,11, ED P'Dod, L)r)� t
F o r t h e i r s t t w o y h e.1 - s
��,y I a -m E,,reat'lly inde"hted
,o a record v-Titten and PLitlished in 10 -he F]Lorida Star in 1887,
th irt-y -nine years a�,-c, by Profes,�or Willtam Hen-.ry Peck, at
that time some fifty-seven years of age, but who as a boy of 14
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came to the indian River in 1843 with his two brothers and his
father, Col. Samuel H. Peck, formerly a banker and cotton
broker of Augusta, Georgia, and afterwards Lieutenant-Colonel
of the Sixth Regiment of Louisana Volunteers who served in
the Mexican War.
Professor Peck, who I well knew at his home at Courtney,
on Merritt's Island, from 1885 to 1890, had adopted a literary
career and had been a writer of stories of considerable note in
the New York Ledger, which at that time filled about the same
position as our weekly Saturday Evening Post. He had formerly
lived in Atlanta but came to Indian River with his wife, son
and two daughters, a most accomplished family, one of whom is
Mrs. E. P. Porcher, still living in Cocoa.
WeI2, thanks to Professor Peck, he draws a lifelike
picture of those times, and in his writings we have the names
and characters Of many Of these settlers under the Armed
Cocupation Act, from 1843 to 1845, when his father left an(,,3
sold his home to Captain Burnham at iukona, by far the most
pretentious house erected up to that time and which he had had
framed in Savannah and brought down on his schooner, the William
Washington, and set up on his claim. All the other settlers
lived In home made hoases, buiat of pine saylinos and walled
and roofed with jalmetto 2eav-s.
I am thus able to tell Something of Rurnham's associates
in these early days --Colonel Peck ants three sons, as before
mentioned, and several slaves; Daniel E. Brown, a fine, tall,
intelligent young man and a noted hunter, who never failed to
ke I ep the camp supplied with Vpnison and other game.
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John Hutchinson and George Gordon, both Carpenters from
Augusta, Georgia. Hutchinson's name is immortalized on all
the old maps showing Hutchinson's Island, and Colonel Peck
is also remembered by Peck's Lake, still so-called at the north
end of Jupiter Narrows and where there was formerly an inlet
into the ocean.
James Middleton was another, a ship's carpenter from
Georgia, and a Very useful man, but an inveterate practical
joker, much liked by some but bitterly hated by hi I Victims.
James Price, an English sailor withn terrific voice and
a great singer of Chanty's and other nautical songs, the best
oarsman of all gnd whose thunderous singing often disturbed
the still nights as It penetrated for miles. He was a great
puFulist and lost no opportunity to show off his fistiC talents,
and above all indispensable as a sail and mast maker.
Crazy Ned, another sailor, from Sweden, had in his younger
days fallen from a ship's top -mast to the deck and was badly
injured that his right leg was shattered and he had lost some
of his brains, which caused his intellect to be flighty and he
limped in a most -conical manrer and at every step seemed to be
ahout to dive headlonn into the earth. He was of slight figure,
beardless and p1le, and a very irritable, especially whon the
Irrepressikle Middleton was nenr.
Cobbeti, a cobtler from Savannah, and a very poor workman,
was white-haired and red -nosed and coulJ detect the aroma of'
whiskey more than a mile away and If grog was being serven
even a long distance off he would scent it in a minute, drop
his work and come charging through the woods to get his share
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in such haste and with such swift and goatlike leaps and yells
till all hands would rush for their rifles, expecting each
minute to see a band of painted Seminoles, intent on scalping
the whole community.
Among the aristocrats of the Colony was Ossian B. Hart,
afterwards Governor of the State, a talented lawyer and fine
musician who, with his delicate wife, seemed greatly out of
place amid such rough and primitive surroundings.
Two consumptive gentlemen, George Walker and William
Brayton, came for their health, Walker shortly afterward died,
leaving a delicate wife and one son, but Brayton recovered and
became a hale and hearty man, though it was said that he had
but one lung.
Next to Captain Burnham on the South, lived Lector Holbrook,
a very talented physician from Charleston, South Oarolina,
an aned m2n or jowerful buiDd, very bald, an! always hatiess,
�ho brought down his valuable lilrary and acted as physiaian for
the colony for two years, when he, too, died and filled an
unmarked grave close to George Walker's on the beautiful.
Aukona Iluff, overlooking the Indian River.
Next to the south was the old Herman place, still so
known, vhe-e PhAlp hprwan and his son &bout twenty years
, younger, known as Did FLii ond YnunE FV1, so much alike they,
might have been taken for twins.
During the time from 1843 to 1849, where the whole colony
finally disbanded, several of the original settlers lelt, SOME�l
took part in the Mexican War nnd others their places. All
engaged more or less in agriculture pursuits and the pleasures
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of the chase, which 11121 somewhat ""oert"in returns; but the
Country being at that time plentifully supplied with game and
fish of all kinds no one starved, though they often went short
of many things we would now consider necessities and on the
whole conditions of life in those primitive days were no harder,
if as hard, as in these days of highly civilized accessories.
Cooksooves, canned foods, bath tuts, screened doors and
windows, and sewing 7anZines were quite unknown; candles,
liFhtwood krcts and wKale-cil lamps enabled people to read news
papers wher sucY rarities drifted in, and communication with
the outsiVe world, w�ioh in those days consisted of St. Augustine
and Smyrna cn one ncrzK, and Key Zest on the south, was slow
and difficult and accor:11shel aloogesher'by sailing craft of
small size, as she inleis were zoo shallow to permit the
PassaVP Of 7ca7s of :7er fcor cr five feet draft.
The Armet Cc1u;a!!r,n Cclony's land claims, cn :"e indian
River, reanned from To-;or's Eluff near SebaFrLan on the north,
nearly tC Cid Fort iWi7er On Ike scuth on both tanks of the
river; Fori Carron or F=z Fierce heing apparently the Center
cf Activiz7, EvelMSY knew Everybody else, their family history
ant their 7�:elyjnnll, art in cases of need cr sickness ea&
Ore sc nn!:'l -no c- er. �Inc-tiw 7c zneir means that no one
�eriously suf f ered 07 lacned awUlnv, ann " Knock in retrcspect
it would seem :net ness L:d-727ers suffered mAn� hardskiTs and
dangers, life was Pro'Rily quPe as enjoyable and at times
quite as nlseratle9 as in OKAY year of Grace 1926, except for :he
constant dread of maraoUng end hosti:e indians.
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Following the career of the subject of our sketch, it is
reported that Burnham was the first man to raise pineapples on
his claim on the Aukona Bluff, and where thirty-five years
ago I located the site of his home, near what is known as the
Berman place, by an old work -shop in a dense thicket of limes
and native shrubbery, this and the old stone gable end of a
house erected by one of the settlers, Captain Davis, which I
believe still stands in a pine -apple plantation somewhat further
north, are the only relics of six years of life of a colony of
some forty families, so auickly does nature obliterate the work
of man in a semi -tropical clime. The most notable work of
the settlers during their stay was the opening of the inlet at
Gilbert0s Bar in 1844.
Indian River Irlet, though open at that time, did not
Five them the service needed, so they picked a place at Giltert's
3ar, a narrow neck of lint nearly opposite the routh of the
St. Lucie River, separpting the river and the ocean, and all
joined hands to dig a channel through it.
A very considerable amount of fresh water being dammed up
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in the indian River at the time, coming down the St. Lucie
River from the back country in the rainy season, the same
broke throwwh the no -row hor on. which the settlers had worked
the previous dny, in advance of their expecnations and almost
cost them their lives, as during the night when all were Heeping
a strong West wind sprang up and the whole strip of land on
which the workers were camped was washed Into the inlet and.
many narrow escapes from drowning were reported, and they lost
all their tents and tools.
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Just whether this inlet served any purpose beyond sweetening
the waters of the Indian River and making it a better fishing
ground, history fails to record, or how long it stayed open,
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but when I came to the Indian River in 1885 it had long been
closed and Indian River Inlet, now closed, was then the only
available entrance from the ocean between New Smyrna and
Jupiter, a distance of about 150 miles.
From what my father-in-law, Captain Henry Wilson, told.me,
the inlet at that day was a good way further south than it now
is, and the present inlet was opened many years later under the
direction of Captain Sewall and has never since closed up as it
is the habit of Indian River ocean inlets to do from time to time.
The colony's history from 145 to 1849 1 gathered partly
from an old diary kept Yy one oc the settlers, very badly
mouse -eaten, however, which came into my possession many years
aFo, and from Ers. Eenry Wilson, my wife's mother, and Captain
Surnham's eldest daughter, and others of the family, telling',
how they lived along quietly for some years and on a very
friendly footing with the Indians, who lived altogether in the
back country and only visited the coast at times to fish and
trvde, nnd Burnham was particularly well thought of by them, as
they 9diired his prowuss In athintlas and his nbility in the
use and construction of fire arms, which he often repaired
for them.
On one occasAon a frierd sent him from the north a,
revolver -rifle, and on showing it tb one of the Chiefs he
became very thoughtful and serious and later remarked, "Bad thing,''
white man kill out all Indians now," evidently realizing the
superJority of such a weapor nver their old flint musPets.
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The Indians were always very short of cooking utensils
in those days and often borrowed such from the Burnham family,
always returning them scrupulously clean and with many thanks.
necessary for the captain to leave home he always called them
around him and made the following speech: "Me go away for one
or two moons, my squaw no likee Indian, no Indian come around
here while me gone."
Mrs. Burnham always said -that as long as her husband was
gone she never saw an Indian, but the day he returned they
would flock to the Burnham home, as many as a hundred, and
engage in, sports of variois kinds, borrow their cooking utensils,
and bring presents of game to eat.
)i�rnhain found difficulty ir. providing properly for his
fandly, and cast�.n,,,,� around for :o,,,rie riew lneans of support, he
purchased a schooner, christened "The Jose-phl',ne" ,and loaded
e ,rr7eat n
her with green turtle, of which ti -e -.re i;Lmbers at
that time in the Indlan. Fiver, ar.,J. c��,-,.re-Lully ti/ ing tineir flippers
loaded his schooner and sailed for Charleston and sold -them
t1here for ex -,Dort -to En,,7�11and at a cood p -rice.
Former],y tur'�Ie 'mad been rou��hly shiPped and handled
nr"1, "`�,Ddk tht�; -nd h-,-;
"o Pla Zl�llro`vlli] (.)verboard., 1�ut
c, ei,`.,,,� on and
maAe 1�`!e woode�,,, pl,`11c
every morninp- had t1he1r, eyes spa,,ned :�nd hi's
cargo always arri.ved in wood sha-De and foun,,J a ready riv�,rket,
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It was while he w,�ts absent on one of tri�ps in
Au�-r U that the indJans Tii'ed a -111-rader naned Barker.
,ust, 1849, U ._� I
who had. a store at Barker's Pluff, cas he had. on several
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occasions cheated them on their trades, and the news rapidly
spread southward through the colony that an Indian uprising
was imminent and a massacre of all the white settlers was
feared. The leader of the coloney, one Major Russel,who was
a brother-in-law of Barker, advised all to leave, though there
was quite a diversity of sentiment among the settlers, andhad
Capt. Burnham been there it is more than probable that the
majority would have stayed on, but as there was only one small
schooner available for communication with the outside world
and thus those left behind would have been marooned, all
decided to leave and hurriedly packed up fand set sail that
afternoon for St. Augustine in the which belonged to and was
commanded ly Captain Pinkham, an English pilot, who had settled
in St. Augustine, married there and later joined the Armed
Occupation Colony and acted as their main means of trans;ort
to and from indian River and St. Augustine, and who had taken
a land claim near the Inlet on what was known as Nigger Cut.
Mrs. Turnham, vith her boys and Eirls, had so little time
to prepare for the journey that they left without their hats,
and during the newt four days which it took them to reach
St. Augustine, having light head winds, ala suffered much from
the hot AuFust sun which ccolded their heads, and from scarcity
of food and water.
Arriving at the Ancient City they were most kindly corec,
for by friends and there accidently met their father, Captain
Burnham, who was'on his return trip fror Charleston and who
put into that port for provisions, and a happy meeting it was.
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He went no further nor did they ever return to their former home
where they spent so many years, and thus the Armed Occupation
Colony on the Indian River finally dissolved in the month of
August, 1849.
Forty years later, in 1889, 1 made a vigorous effort to
re-establish some of these old claims to land occupied by the
Burnham's and others in the neighborhood of Ft. Pierce, but
discovered that when in the fifties the United States Land
Office was removed from St. Augustine to Gainesville, all the
original entries of settlers under the Armed Occupation Act
had been lost, and as by that time many of these claims had
been settled on under the Homestead Act and became very valuable
for p1neapple culture, I orly succeeded in one case in obtaining
a patent from the General Land Office, which was for the heirs
of Captain Pinhham, the owner and captain of the schooner
thich took the colonists away on their departure from Indian
River the last time.
Thus, so far as obtaining titles to the land promised,
the years of hardships they had gone through availed them
nothing.
One incident of their departure is worthy of note. Major
Lussell, the leaher nf Lhe refuqnes, was, like his brother-in-law
Barter, heartily dislihad by the indinns, ard �urt as they
were leaving and Russell standing on the boat's deck some
indians came up and took a parting shot at him, wounding him
slightly in the arm with small shot.
After getting out to sea and after nightfall, Russell's
arm commenced to pain him and he went down into the dark cabin
to look for a bottle of salve to put on it, but in the d2rk
ov w1almVp Yp vot hn1d of a hottlo of ink and emptled that ori
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hip arm. In the morning by daylight he noticed that his arm
had turned black and felt certain that mortification had set
in, though several on the boat knew why his arm was black,
but not liking him they remained silent.
During the rest of the trip he was much worried and promptly
on arrival at St. Augustine he hunted up his friend, Doctor
Peck, and insisted that he amputate his arm to prevent mortification
spreading to his whole body, and though the doctor told him.
it would heal and there was no danger he insisted upon an
operation and for the balance of his days walked around with
only one arm, firally dying as an old man in Orlando about
forty-five years ago.
He had two sons livirgh/n the Indian River in my time,
both dead, who might have been relied on not to have supported
the XV111th Amendment.
About the time of the breaklnF up of the Indian River
Colcry, 1849, Colonel Mar2hall conmencet a plantation at
Dunlawton, owned when I came to Florida, by Charlie Dougherty,
a Picturesque East Tennesseean, a member of the Florida
Lezislature and afterwards Speaker of the House, and who
ister fOr two or three terms9 represented his district in the
United StWes Congress.
Dunlawton plant9tion is Muoted a fet m1les tack of
Port Orange, the first station below Daytona and here Colonel,
Larshall conmenced to grow suFar cone, on 1knds formerly
drained ly Doutor Andrew Turnb&!, who during the British.
ownership of Florida from 1763 to 1783, had reclaimed large
tracts of rich pverflpwed lands lying back of Ormond, Daytona
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and New Smyrna, but whose venture had partially failed, when
petty jealousies during the Revolutionary War had divided the
people of Florida into factions, some favoring the Colonies
and some favoring England, and which great project was ruined
and finally given up, when Spain in 1783 regained possession
of Florida by giving England the Bahama Islands and taking
Florida in return.
At that time all the English settlers left, and Florida,
which in the twenty years of England's ownership had grown
greatly in wealth and importance and had in two decides developed
more than in two hundred and fifty years under Spain, again
reverted to chaos,,untill the territory was later purchased
in 1818 by the United States from Spain. Miss Carita Doggett
has written most entertaininily and truthfully of this twenty
years of EnElish Colonial life in Florida, in a book pullished
some four years ago by the Drew Cc; called "Andrew Turnbull and
The New Smyrna Settlement.''
Well --it was on one of the old Turnbull plantations that
Colonel Marshall ventured in sugar cane, and Burnham being a
Ecod mechanic was -made engineer and manager of the same and
set up what was at that time the last word in su"ar-making
machinery. Bcllers, envires, rolls and evaporating pans, etc.,
oome of which still stand to -day almost as he left them seventy-
six years ago, and which are often erroneously poInted out as
Cid Spanish relics.
Colonel Marshall and Furnham and their families lived
here with a lot of slaves until 1853 and were fairly successful,
when by the influence of Captain Douglas Dummitt, Collector
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of the port of New Smyrna, and Paul Arnau, the Collector of the
port of St. Augustineq Burnham received the appointment of
lighthouse he retained till his death thirty-three years later.
The lighthouse had been built on the Cape
j six years previously, in 1847, a good substantial
brick tower with a revolving light, and the first
keepers were William Carpenter and John Scobie, the
latter a relative of Captain Dummitt, and both
of these men are buried near to each other in the
Protestant cemetery just outside of the city gates
in St. Augustine.
Burnham and his family thus moved to Cape Canaveral in 1853
with one son, Mills; George having previously died in boyhood,
and four daughters, a fifth one being born there later.
His eldest daughter Frances aided him at the first as
assistant lightkeeper, but later he had other assistants,
notably two old men, Rose and Kruger, both of whom were living
forty years ago and who outlived Burnham, finally passing
away at Titusville about 1892, close to ninety years old.
At different times he had one or more negroes, one of
whom had been in slavery to the Indians in the interior and had
run away, and who could talk little but the Indian language
and who never learnt English. About the center of the Grove
was an old Indian mound, a burying place, and the road from
Burnham's house to that of his son-in-law, Wilson, passed close
by it, It is related that nothing would induae this old slave
to Pass this mound, so he made a seperate path fcr himself to
walk on, so as to avoid it.
Sometime in the forties the Indians destroyed the lighthouse
at Cape Florida, 190 miles further south, and killed all but
one of the keepers, and as it was thought they might make an
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attempt on the Canaveral tower, the government sent two soldiers
and a sergeant to guard it, and one of these was Henry Wilson,
of -whom more later.
It was later decided that there was no danger from this
source, so the men were disbanded and Wilson took his discharge
from the U. S. Army and became assistant to Burnham, and on
March 30th, 1856, was married to Burnham's eldest daughter,
Frances, in Trinity Episcopal church, in St. Augustine, as is
shown recorded on the parish register.
At this time neighbors were few and far between. Burnham
and his son-in-law, Wilson, selected a small hammock on the
bank of the Banana River four and a half miles from the light-
house on the Cape, in which were a number of sour orange trees,
probably planted many years before, either by the Indians or
wandering Spaniards, and by budding them with buds from a
natural sweet tree they accidentally found Frowing in the
Happy -go -Lucky Hammock about 15 miles to the north, and with
some buds from Capt. Dummitts qrove, and later from seed from
an orange they found washed up on the beach, they soon had a
fine bearing Oronge grove of about 15 acres, bearing fruit of
the finest quality; probably owing to the mild and equable
climate, protected from the c0d west winds in winter by a
broad expanse of three miles of river, and shortly before,,
his death Burnham remarked that in thirty yearE he had never
seen the thermometer over 85 nor below 00, though in January,
1886, just before hi 1 heath, It froze all the fruit on the
Indian River and sQwhat chilled Canaveral, though it didn't
0
IM
W
hurt the fruit or trees there; indeed at the time of the big
W95, nine years later, 'though it froze the fruit
and somewhat damaged the Canaveral groves it did not destroy
the trees as in other Tarts of the State further west and south.
I I
� � � � I i i I � � � � � � i �� � � � � i � i � �! I � , 11
11 my I
that of the Indian River, but it is more delicate and requires
more care in packing and shipping as the skin is very thin.
In the Early days this fruit was never wrapped, but
packed carefully in barrels, boated to New Smyrna and shipped
by schooners to New York, arriving usually in as good shape
as it now does and at half the expense of shipping.
It might not be out of plac(-, here to give the origin
of the name Baruia, River, other-v-ise ],=wn as the East Channel
of Indian River from the southe.-most point of' Merritts Island
to its northern end ai�out 42 miles.
Early in the forties, during the tire of their stay near
Fort Pierce, Capt. Burnham. took his son Geor,-,e and made a kind
of a voyage of discovery along the upper Indian. River which
they had riever before seen., having come down to Ft. Pierce by
sr,,-il boat (-,,n. the-out,,:,�ide.
Wher they arrived at t.he point of Mel-ritts island about
to E,,-iu Gri]]](-,, now standl.,s�,, they salled up the
, ].ast Cliannel lnste,,�d of 0"', Il'�j,r 3Dr0pe:rL,, and
1 21,1 C4 �
some ten miles up came to another sha,rp point O.ff 131nd the
as the first one, and sailing to the north,�,Jc,-�st i,.,,,stead c," the
rortheast they ran into a blind. pocket and christened. it
Newfound Harbor, when -they retraced their course and seeing two
Lsl.and.s they named. one George's Dsland and on.e Buck Point,
HE
which names still stand on the Coast charts to -day. One
named for his son and the other because they saw a deer feeding
on it.
They then continued on north some twenty-five miles to
the head of the river, passing several hammocks on the east
side till near the north end they saw some bananas growing
on the banks, where Desoto grove now is, and christened it the
Banana River.
George died when about fourteen years of age
and this is the only part of the record that mentions
him. It would be interesting to know the origin
of those banana plants, as Burnham's visit was
prior to the settlement of Desoto by Carpenter
and Scobie, the first lighthouse keepers, who
cultivated a small tract of this land during their
occupancy of the lighthouse.
Well --to resume our narrative: Burnham and his son-in-law
Wilson continual t" work and improve tneir orange grove, and
pineapples, the Captain living at the Lighthouse Tith his
family and Wllscn on the river bAnk with his, distanced about
four and a half miles apnrt.
Once in a great while they had visitors; notably in 1857
a somewhat eccentric English Baronet, Sir Tatton Sykes, from
Yorkshire, came with a larEe retinue and zhe latest improved
firearms ani capped in the neighhorhood and shot vast juantitles
of game, most of which was wasteo.
It is reported that in those days flaminFoes, wild turkeys
and parrots were quite plentiful on Herrint's island, the lonz
extinct nhite buzzard was compqratively common, a king among
birds, the tail feathers of which were formerly worn as a sign
of royalty in the head dresses of the Muscogee Indians.
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On one occasion Sir Tatton Sykes saw an alligator of such
enormous size that he drove it into a small creek and placed
his boats all around it, but Qo2ahL they kept watch for more
than a week they never saw it again.
Their nearest point of supplies these days was the Town
of Enterprise on Lake Monroe, opposite to where Sanford, old
Fort Melton, now stands, and to reach it they had to go by
sailboat to Sand Point, where Titusville was later built,
thence the journey was over an inferior road throuEh prairies,
swamps and pine forests 42 miles, whi3h took from 15 to 24 hours
according to conditions. I
Burnham later hod the pleasure of taking this
trip on the railroad in two hours, which was finished
from Enterprise to Titusville about three months
previous to his death.
Regular but slow communication existed through
the fifties by a small stenmer on the St. Johns
River as far as Palatka Unalt on all old maps
Pilatka) ant Jacksonville; and Palatka was an import-
ant point, then as now, and the center of supplies
for miles around.
From Burnham's first settlement at Canaveral up to the
time of the Civil War and I believe also after the surrender,
they had to travel to St. Augustine every quarter, to be
paid off, always in gold, and this was theLr route:
From Canaveral throuFh the Banana Creek roanding the
head of Merritt's Island tn the head of the indlan River to
,the Haulover, a narrow snrlp of land diviling the Indian
River from the Mosquito Lagoon through whiN a small canal
had been cut by Doctor Hawes, a brother-in-law of Col.
Marshall, of Dunlawton. Plant9tion, which allowed the passage
of small boats and which was a Food distance south of the
.present large canal cut in IF87-8 by the Florida Coast Line
Canal Co.
No
Up for many miles through the Lagoon was a tedious trip
especially in head winds over shallow bottoms, with no real
channel, thencup the�Hillsboro and Halifax Rivers past New
Smyrna and where Ormond and Daytona now flourish, through the
I
Tomoka basin and up Smith's Creek to its head, where they took
a wagon as far as the south end of the Matanzas River to the
old Dupont Plantation and'from, there by a crooked channel on
boats to St. Augustine. ,
This slow and painful journey took about three weeks to
go and return and can now be done by rail and auto in two days,
and thus some three months of the year was used up in making
these trips to get paid off and obtain provisions, etc. After
their pay had been converted into necessities and sundry liquid
refreshments, considered indispensable in those pre-Volstead
days, there wasn't much cash brought home; indeed it is said
that both Burnham and Wilsonoften came home about penniless
from these excursions.
In 1859 an event took place, so startling to
the whole south and so full of portents, that it
really seems to have made a greater impression on
the minds of the Southern people then the first
shot fired on Fort Sumter, which really opened
hostilities.
This was John Brown's Raid on Harper's Ferry,
and in later years whenever I was asking information
as to past events from my mother-in-law and the
prohable dateo when they oocurred, she always
replied it was so lonF befor,, or so long after,
John Brown's Raid on Harper's Perry.
Well! in 1861 hostilities really commenced and it very
materially affected the fortunes of this little isolated
family at Canaveral.
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In the first place the Secretary of the Confederate Navy,
Mr. Mallory, of Pensacola, ordered all the lighthouses on the
southern coas.ts discontinued, and word to that effect was
transmitted to Burnham through Captain Dummitt, then Collector
of the Port of New Smyrna.
R. I ra WSW. rt is M M M M un wt.
carefully the lamps, clockwork and mechanism and p4ed it in
wooden cases and carried them over to his Orange grove and
buried them where they would be safe.
After the surrender, in 1865, he turned this all over
to the Government officials in good order and was highly
commended for his faithful care of Government property, but
it was never repl-�cerll in the tower as just previous to the
outbreak of the war the Gover=ent appropriated �;�4'500,000 -for
,,� new li�zht Find the. sqame was ��iccordingly commenced in 1966
a,nrl completed in. 1E368 ancl fitt,ed out with the latest, at that
time made in Fra�nce and which had been exhibited at
the Paris Exhibition of' 1867 and which today, after nearly
sixty years of service, is in perfect condition, the only
chan,E-e being in a more b.rilliant lip a -a new method of
;ht froT
c,�I-ke-rosene. Previous to the war wThale oil was used.
e.xcli..�sive-',y.
For ,�.,,everal Years pre,�,,i(.-)us to �,,urnhamls (D-_,atih, 'L,he ,�ea
had been gradually encroachin,7 on the till o, -.!e ni_,7,ht_ In
April� 1886, it cqTne withAn SeVenty feet of the base of the
tower and later Congress ��.i,pproprriated $300,000 for its
removal in -Land about one and a half miles, where it now stands
and whi3h took about 18 morths to do in 1.892-3.
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Going back to the outbreak of the War in 1861, after the
light was extinguished, Burnham's son Mills and Henry Wilson,
his son-in-law, joined the confederate army and left for
Gainesville to take their places in what was known as the
Home Guard. Wilson being the father of a family was assured
that he would not be sent out of the State, but he was soon
transferred to Tallahassee, and from there to Virginia and
served in the Confederate Army almost to the close of the war.
Thus Capt. Burnham found himself alone on his orange
grove with a wife, five daughters, an old white man and a darky,
and for nearly four years they lived alone in this isolated
spot, entirely dependent on their own resources for a livelihood.
Their nearest neighbor, Issiah Hall, who with his wife
had shortly before come there from Georgia and settled on
Merritts Island, still known as the Hall Hammock, where Sidney
Chase now owns a fine Frove, moved away to Key West and Mrs.
Hall died there in 1923 at the advanced age of 102 years.
Next to the north, some twenty miles away, lived Capt.
Dummitt, on a narrow but fertile strip of land between the
Indian River and Mosquitoe Lagoon, where he had settled some
twenty years previously and built up a fine Orange grove,
probably the QrFt mnn In Florlia to plant out a 7rove of any
size as a commercial proposition.
At points further north along the La-oon and Halifax
Rivers a few settlers came and went, but no record exists of
them till we come to New Smyrna, where several families lived
in the fifties and Sixties, notably the Sheldons on the west
8
lava
side and the Pacettis, near the Mosquitoe Inlet, which in those
days was quite a port of entry for vessels of light draft to
and from New York, Charleston and Savannah.
A very considerable industry, both before and after the
war, was the cutting of live oak knees for the U. S. Navy from
the live oak forest near by, and a contractor by the name of
Swift came down each winter with a large gang of men for this
purpose from the north, and business was Kry brisk. The timbers
after being cut were piled under hugh banks of mud and sand
in order to season slowly, and at the time the Civil War broke
out the Government had very large stocks there, several hundred
thousand dollars worth, which some of the sympathizers with the
Southern cause deemed it their duty to destroy and burn, much to
the d1nust of Dummitt, Barnham and Wilson, who never ceased to
condemn it as an outrage, and uncalled for, even in time of war.
From New Smyrna on North to St. Augustine and
Jacksonville were occassionn1 plantations on which
cotton and supQr were successfully grown with slave
labor but which have long since so grown up that the
untrained eye would say it was primeval forest, and.
but a few sions remain of former great activities.
During the war planting was badly upset or entirely
ceased, as all ablebodied men were needed in the fighting
lines, and eipecially demoralized after the "Proclamation
of Emancipation" of the slaves.
At Sand Point, now Titusville, an industry
flourished In the mahim of salt, which was evaporated
from tne salt water in the Indiqn River, in large
evaporating pans, whinh were still in evidence forty-
one years ago when I first visited that town, which
was founded by Col. Titus In 1861 or 69.
Going back to the isolated life lived by the Burnham's
during the four-year struggle, Mrs. Wilson often told me that
they lived better then than ever before or since, as they had,
nothing to do but live. Game was there in great plenty,
-Burnham also owned some long-haired West Indian sheep which
is
gave them occasional mutton for a change. Venison and bear
meat could be obtained at short notice, the river fairly teemed
with fish of many kinds and for nearly six months each year
the waters were covered with every kind of duck and waterfowl.
Besides many kinds of vegetables Burnham grew enough corn
for his own use and sold some to Dummitt for his stock, made
his own syrup and sugar, at which he was an expert, raised
his own tobacco and two years after he died I unearthed an old
leadpipe still in which he made his own rum. It seems that
just previous to the outbreak of the war he had bought several
bolts of bedticking at -Enterprise and this they made into
necessary clothes,'though still by handsewing, as no sewing
machines were invented at that time, and the only real hardship
was, that the girls had to wear men's brogan shoes, as even
with no visitors it seemed to hurt their vanity to so appear.
With very little nows from the outside world, except by
the grapevine telegraph, no radios, phonoFraphs, movies or
musical instruments and with but little literture, we wonder
how they passed their leisure hours.
Near the close of the war one great event stirred their
usual complacency. A small schooner was wrecked in the ?iFht just
below the Cape named the "RedwAnF," and two sailors drowned,
but the captain and his wife and three men Fot safely ashore
almost naked and the woman had on only a suAt of sailor'.,:;
oilshins to protect her from the elements.
They walked to the lighthouse and found it quite deserted,
as a band of freebooters hid not long previously gone there and
wrecked what little property the Burnhams had left in the
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dwellings, and amongst other depredations had destroyed a fine
four -post mahogany bedstead and manufactured it into a saw-
horse, on which to cut their firewood, and several specimens of
rare fish the captain had preserved in alcohol they broke the
containers and drank the spirits. These pirates had later,-,
as shown by their tracks, started across the trail leading to
the river, but a mile or two down the road they found a Wrecked
wagon broken to pieces by a runaway horse the captain had been
trying to drive, and thinking some YankKes might be in hiding
had retraced their steps and went again to sea. The crew of the
Redwing also found the trail and wearily plodded along for some
miles till about exhausted, and not knowing where it might
lead them they had about docidei to turn back to the seacoast,
which would have_afelLt certain death to them, when they heard a
cbck crow and concluded that where domestic fowls were, there
most be settlers, so they pushed on and shortly emerged into the
clearing at the Burnham Grove and were most heartily welcomed
by the family, fed and made comfortable, and after staying a
few days were carried by Burnham to Sand Point, from there to
Enterprise and later reached their home port, New York, safely.
Had this occurred in our day that crowing rooster would
have bpen decorated with the Carnepie Medal for life saving;
as It was, he either died or Od son or later dutlful3y took
his plane in the soup pot, his virtues quite unsuanE.
If the geese who saved the Capitclat Rome and the cock that
crowed when Peter denied his Lord were given a place in history,
I do think this bird's timely song should not go unrecorded as
he undoubtedly saved five human lives.
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Not long afterwards Henry Wilson put in an appearance
unexpectedly, having been allowed a fourlough in Virginia from
the Confederate Army, and who had walked most of the way home.
Occasionally Ve got a lift along the road, but from St. Mary's
trestle across the St. Mary's River, which separates Georgia
from Florida, just north of Fernandina, he walked the whole
distance home to Canaveral, over 175 miles by the route he came,
arriving there ragged, half starved but in fairly good health,
with nothing to show for four Y ears' hard fighting but an old
gold watch of English make which he had picked up on one of the
battlefields and which he highly prized to the end of his life.
Such a reunion with his family may be better imagined than
described, and as the war ended before the expiration of his
furlough he never returned, nor did he ever leave Canaveral again
except for a short journey occasionalay to Titusville, as long
as he lAved.
Mills, Eurrham's son, who enlisted at the same time with
Wilson, was destined never to return, and died of sickness in
Chattanooga, Tenn., where in 1901 1 found his name enTraved on
a monument to-Eether with many other confederate soldiers,
who died in that city about that time. I obtaired a photograph
of it and it was hiphly pI.IyA by his sisters.
After the surrender a new chapter oppred for the Indian
River Country. Many who had left at the outbreak of hosti3ities
returned, notably Doctor Whitfle3d and his brother, Peter,
to find their orIgInal claims taken by others, and after
considerable correspondence with the Government they were
permitted to take up other lands instead, and the Uctor
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settled on the highest point of Merrittts Island, where he had
a fine grove and called it Fairyland, as from his porches a
view of both the Indian and the Banana Rivers was obtained and
the ocean lying far beyond to the east. Many who had lost all
but their energy in the war, came from Middle Florida, the
Chanceys, and others; the hardees, the Stewarts, the Sanders
and the Sharpes from Georgia. Some from Alabama, and the Sams
and LaRoche families from South Carolina, all of whom soon
made their mark, building up nice orange groves both on Merrittts
Islnnd and on the mainland, and the rich hammock lands, with
rocky subsoils, from City Point south below Rockledge for
twenty-five miles, proved excellent for orange growing, to
which they mainly devoted themselves, also raising corn and
vegetahles and this with gave and fish enabled them to live
comfortably till their groves became self-supporting, and later,
wealthy northern people drifted in and purchased ;art of their
homesteads, which enabled them to obtain all the comforts that
money could buy.
Naturally all these post-war settlers looked largely to
a pioneer of Burnham's experience for advice and instruction,
as vo orange Frowinz, etc. A visit to the Lighthouse was
always long looked forward to and long remembered, as Burnham's
hospitality knew no hounds and he liked to have visitors,
whether from the North or South, but he never encouraged anybody
Aettle in his neighborhood, though practically all the lands
,at that time were open to homestead, as he ranged hogs and
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horses the whole length of the peninsula and was really monarch
of all the land he could see from the top of the Lighthouse,
He bred a good line of Florida ponies and had at the head
of his stud for some years a very handsome white stallion and
his colts brought him in a fair income without any expenses.
He never owned or cared for cattle, but his hogs, in acorn
and palmetto berry season, made fine meat and salted and smoked
this for future use, as in those iceless days this was the only
means of preserving foods. Once a year the Lighthouse steamer
"Fern" came down with a year's supply of oil and other provisions
and her coming was talked of weeks in advance; the Captain,
named Wright, usually brought his wife and they were great
friends of the Burnham family.
In the middle seventies a stranger is reported to have
spent
some time
as Burnham's guest,
who was commonly supposed
to be
Boss Bill
Tweed, at that time
under indictment for misuse
of New
York's Civic
funds, and who
later escaped to Spain, from
which
country he
was extradited and
finally died in Ludlow
Street
Jail at the
age of 55. Burnham
would$ however, never
either
affirm or
deny the Identity
of his guest.
The Freat outstanding event in the lives of Capt. and Mrs.
Burnham took place on the einhth and ninth of September, 1885,
being the anniversary of their Golden wedding and his birthday,
his last on earth.
For two days they entertained a great party of friends
and relatives. On that occossion he recited the salient points
of his long life in Florida for 48 years, and the same was reported
by Barton Smith, who was present, in his newspaper published at
that time at Cocoa, "The Indian River Sun.''
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About the end of March, 1886, he returned from a trip to
Titusville badly infected with a virulent form of measles which
was raging th.ere at that time, and after a short illness, on
Sunday the seventeenth day of April, he breathed his last, and
thus passed from human gaie a devoted father, a staunch friend, an
honored pioneer and one of Naturets gentlemen.
At the time of his death his superior officer and long-time
friend, Capt. P. B. Lamberton, of the U. S. Navy, was present as
Lighthouse Inspector, and he strongly urged them to bury him on
the Lighthouse Reservation, where his grave would always be
cared for, but Mrs. Burnham wished him to be interred in the
Orange Grove that hnd been their home for so long, so the
following day a mournful little procession wended their way
across the trail he W so often traveled for 33 years, and
meeting there numerous relatives and friends, his earthly
remains were committed to the dust and the beautiful burial
service of the Episcopal Church prayer -book was impressively
read by Capt. Lamberton. In less than two years he was followed
by his devoted wife, and there they sleep under spreading
live oaks, with oVer members of the family who have since
passed away, awaiting the ca2l of a Great and Glorious
Resurrection. In IR92 his descendants placed in the west
front of St. Gabriel's EpiscopQ Church Ln Titusville, three
stained glass windows, one to the memory of zhe Captain, one
to his wife, and one to his son Mills, who died in the service
of his country.
Capt. Burnham's descendants at this time number slightly
over one hundred; and two of the sixth generation, great,
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great, great -grand -children are living in Miami and all are
living in Florida.
He was a member of the Protestant Espicopal Church and of
the Masonic fraternity and was affiliated with old St. John's
Lodge of St. Augustine for many years. My personal acquaintance
with him was of short duration, but I never met anyone whb had
known him, that didn't allude to their acquaintance with him with
pride; and his name all along the East Coast was a synonym
for honest and upright dealing.
In conclusion; a retrospect of the years of Capt. Burnhamis
sojurn in this State furnishes much food for thought, as the
dawn of a new day., But very few of the labor-saving contrivances
without which we could hardly live to -day, were invented or
thouFht of, even matches had not quite displaced the old flint
and steel. One wonders what the inside of a grocery store
looked like, in days when there were no canned goods.
Only in the latter days of his life were they acquainted
with cooking stoves, kerosene lamps or breech -loading firearms.
Electricity in its numerous forms and uses was an unknown element.
They had no proteGting screens on doors and windows, thougb,
they slept under mosquitoe nets.
While the e2ectric telepraph and telephones were known in
cities, no such contrivances had penetrated to the indian River
till after my time of arrival, while the present day wonder, -.i
in transportation by auto, aeroplanes, even steam cars and steam
boats were then only guessed at in South Florida, nor did it seem
to Occur to the minds of people in those days, that all these
conveniences might some day become a part of their daily lives.
W
For the first thirty yer.-,rs of Burnham's stay
in Florida everything was just about the sarne as
when Ponce de Leon landed. In our ability to travel
idly, a man,of fifty now can see more than one
rapi
of1three hundred and fifty years could in Burnham's
day, and. the end is not yet. Even in the realms
of speculation we are unable to visualize the
future conquests of science.