Anna Kingsley - Laurel Grove

Laurel Grove

After a brief stop in St. Augustine, 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. 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 (20,000 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).