The Officers' Garrison, 1882
State Archives of Florida
 

The structure built by Robert J. Hackley as his home in 1823, on land acquired by his father Richard in a Spanish land grant, was "dispossessed" from Hackley by Col. Brooke in 1824 while Hackley was away at Pensacola and Brooke arrived to build a fort. 

But was the structure in the photo really the house built by Robert Hackley?
Read later about the hurricane of 1848 and the damage it caused to the buildings of Fort Brooke.

The Hackleys were just one of several parties vying in the final battle for the Fort Brooke land when the U.S Government decommissioned Ft. Brooke.

See several more images of Ft. Brooke in the 1870s to 1900s
 

Also in the Library's files are transcripts of several letters and telegrams, most of which are dated in the crucial early weeks of the controversy. They present a personal record of the events and are especially insightful as to the actions of such figures as community leader John T. Lesley and Florida's United States Senator Wilkinson Call.
 

Fort Brooke was established in response to the Treaty of Moultrie Creek--an agreement negotiated between the new American government in Florida and the Seminole tribes in 1823, calling for the removal of the Indians to the southern part of the state. Millions of acres in central Florida from Ocala to Charlotte Harbor were set aside for an Indian reservation.

The Federal government decided to establish a string of forts in various parts of South Florida to police the area and keep the Indians down. A military post was suggested for the Tampa Bay area to "protect" the Seminoles from outside influences, to forestall the introduction of weapons from Cuba, and to serve as a station for the Indians to obtain rations and supplies. Late that year Col. George Mercer Brooke, comfortably situated at Fort Clinch near Pensacola, was ordered to Tampa Bay. 

For hundreds of years earlier, the Seminoles referred to the area by its topography--they called it  cotan' chobî, a contraction of the phrase cotanî chobî--a phrase that meant "the big place where the water meets the land."  In English, we write "Cotanchobee" pronounced "Co-tawn-cho-bee."

ABOUT G. M. BROOKE
George Mercer Brooke was a professional soldier. Born in Virginia in 1785 he was the son of Richard Brooke, a planter and state senator, and Maria Mercer. He entered the army in 1808 as a first lieutenant of infantry, and in the War of 1812 against the British, he rose to the rank of major and won distinction in the sanguinary Battle of Lundy’s Lane. During the war he was brevetted twice. In 1819 he married Lucy Thomas of Duxbury, Massachusetts. In his correspondence he comes through as a man with a high sense of duty and honor. His letters are clear and direct and he avoided the verbosity so common in that day. Also, he seems to have steered clear of the petty quarrels which distracted some officers of high rank.

GADSDEN ARRIVES FIRST, CHOOSES SITE
Col. James Gadsden was sent first to mark the boundaries of the new military reservation. Thus, the landing place of the party was designated "Gadsden Point," the area now occupied by MacDill AFB, and the new fort itself was named to honor Brooke. Gadsden chose a tract on the east bank of the Hillsborough River at the point where it enters Hillsborough Bay, mainly because of the improvements already made there by Robert J. Hackley.  Hackley, who had cleared the land and built a fine home and wharf, was an Englishman whose family had purchased large amounts of land from Spain before 1819.

James Gadsden, aide-de-camp to General Jackson during the Florida campaign of 1818. He played a later role in the history of the Seminoles by negotiating the Treaty of Payne's Landing (1832).


Gadsden is best known mainly for negotiating the Gadsden Purchase (part of Arizona) while serving as ambassador to Mexico in 1853.
Photo of Claribel Jett's painting.
Portrait from State Archives of Florida
Captions from "Rebellion, John Horse and the Black Seminoles."

GEORGE MERCER BROOKE

The photograph is from a painting by Gilbert Stuart (c. 1819).

The photo above is a portrait of George Mercer Brooke (1785-1851)United States Army, which was presented to Gen. Sumter L. Lowry, chairman of the Sesquicentennial, Dinner of the Tampa Historical Society, by Col. George M. Brooke, Jr. 

During the years Brooke was at the cantonment, his family life was scarred by tragedy. His wife was with him part of the time, but she was plagued by ill health. In January 1824 at the very time Brooke and his troops were clearing away the dense undergrowth on the shores of Hillsborough Bay, Mrs. Brooke, presumably at Pensacola, gave birth to her third child, a boy. A fourth child, John Mercer Brooke, the first resident to be born in Tampa, was born at the cantonment on 18 December 1826. That was a critical time at the post. That very day Brooke had received several desperate letters from Governor Duval describing a new crisis with the Indians, and in response he was fitting for combat two companies of soldiers who had just arrived.

Because of Mrs. Brooke’s failing health, her husband took her to Pensacola in February 1827. He returned to his command, but when she failed to respond to treatment, he obtained sixty days’ leave from General Gaines with permission to apply to the Commanding General for an additional six months. Brooke made the request for the extension on the grounds of his wife’s condition, his own health which was "very much impaired," and the fact that he had "not been on furlough for ten years." Brooke was granted the furlough.

In October the following year, 1828, he sustained his greatest loss. In stark words he related the tragedy. "I have lately been visited by the heaviest calamity which a father and husband can feel. Whilst in Ma. my family was attacked by a most violent bilious fever, which has taken from me two of my beloved children (my daughter and eldest son). My wife’s life was despaired of for some time and in her illness (she) gave birth to a dead son. She is most unhappy and wretched and wishes me to come on."

Brooke was granted another furlough. Of Brooke’s eight children, only two, John Mercer Brooke and William Neverson Brooke, lived to maturity. The latter never married. John Mercer Brooke, the one born at Cantonment Brooke, served with distinction in the United Stales Navy and later in the Confederate Slates Navy of which he was Chief of Ordnance. Lucy Brooke died in 1829 at the age of thirty-five and the old soldier never remarried.

In early 1829, Brooke became a brigadier general and was transferred North, leaving this key outpost that was destined to play a major role in the Seminole Wars.  In 1831 Brooke was promoted to Colonel and transferred north of the Ohio River where he took command of the Fifth Infantry Regiment with headquarters at Fort Mackinac, Michigan Territory. The Fifth Infantry remained in the northwest until the Mexican War. Brooke died in 1851 at San Antonio, Texas, as a brevet major general in command of the Department of Texas.

CONSTRUCTION OF THE FORT

It took many months to secure the needed building supplies, equipment and provisions, and the colonel was in no hurry to face the challenge of the mosquito-ridden wilderness.  Brooke and his five-ship convoy arrived with four companies of militia in late January 1824, and began building the cantonment.  "We found a jungle-like land with giant live oaks spreading enormous limbs as big as tree trunks, hung with pendants of Spanish moss and yellow jassamine," he wrote in his journal.  Brooke spent the first month landing supplies, clearing the “worst undergrowth he had ever seen," and planting gardens.

HACKLEY PROPERTY SEIZED

By March of 1824, the troops had realized what a comfortable house Hackley had erected and taking advantage of his absence on a trip to Pensacola, they seized the house from an agent of Hackley named Rhodes and put it to use as officers’ quarters. It was difficult for Hackley to oppose the claim of the troops for they occupied much of the land he claimed, erecting barracks, parade grounds and store houses.

Hackley was promptly dispossessed of his land by Col. Brooke and was thereafter unsuccessful in attempts to reclaim his plantation, having  lost his rights to it in 1821 with the Transcontinental Treaty, by which Spain ceded East Florida to the United States. (See the story of Levi Coller, Dr. Robert Jackson and Hyde Park.)
 

FORT BROOKE COMPLETED

The fort was finished by September 1824 and stood where Florida Avenue and Eunice streets intersect to the area around Franklin St. and Platt in today's downtown Tampa.  Brooke wrote that the Indians appeared "to be more and more displeased with the limited land of their reservation in the center of the state." A marker near the Platt Street Bridge marks the company's landing.

Part of the reservation was a beautiful place with orange and lime trees planted by Hackley. There were several springs, a winding creek and an Indian mound. Although there were two small springs located near the barracks, the soldiers depended upon a large spring located in present day Ybor City for water supplies. Despite this, there were few soldiers sent to Fort Brooke in the period from 1827-1834 and at one time was virtually abandoned.

Meanwhile, outside the reservation, early settlers came and established a tiny village that later became the metropolis of Tampa.  The settlers had close ties with the garrison, providing the soldiers with fresh vegetables and fruit until their gardens produced, and Cuban fishermen such as Maximo Hernandez provided fish and succulent turtle steaks.

General view of Fort Brooke and parade grounds 1845, by Juliet Lay Axtell

Thanks to the artistic talents of Juliet Lay Axtell, one of the Army Chaplain Axtell's daughters, who at the age of 12 sketched this view of Fort Brooke.  At the time, the garrison consisted of 20 whitewashed buildings with Col. Wm. G. Belknap in command. The large building at the left of the flagpole was the commanding officer's headquarters. The small buildings to the right at a distance were the soldiers' quarters.  The line of buildings from the Adjutant's office to the Indian mound was known as "Bachelor's Row" because the buildings were occupied by unmarried officers of the post.  The mound with the Chinese pavilion on its crest and encircled by a fence appears to the right of the large oak tree.  The Captain's quarters and the post chapel are at the right.  The flagpole and cannons mark the parade grounds where the mounting of the guards were held every morning and the site of many grand parades.

Image and info from "Tampa Town, 1825 - 1886: A Cracker Village With A Latin Accent" by Tony Pizzo, 1968

View of Fort Brooke sketched by an Army officer during the 2nd Seminole War
Fort Brooke pencil sketch and caption from How Tampa Lost the Fort Brooke Military Reservation
by Jeffrey Lewis,  Ex Libris 5 Summer 1982

THE HURRICANE OF SEPT 25, 1848

At right, the old structure seen so often in articles about Fort Brooke, described as the officer's quarters which was originally built by Robert Hackley as his home.

DID HACKLEY'S HOME SURVIVE THE HURRICANE?

A letter from Maj. R.D.S. Wade notes:  "Very severe storm from the SE, destroyed all the wharves and most of the public buildings at the fort.  Storm began about 0800 from the SE and raged until 1600 when winds veered to the S and SW until weakening around 2000.  The storm was most intense between 1300 and 1500.  Flooding was exceptionally great, no lives were lost at Ft. Brooke."  Observations from the post surgeon at Ft. Brooke wrote:  "Tide rose 15 feet above low water, water rose very fast between 1000 and 1400.  Barometer fell from 1020 mb at 0900 on the 24th and 1013 mb at 2100, to 954 mb prior to 1500 on the 25th.  By 1500 on the 25th, barometer rose to 967 mb and winds were from the South." 

In James McKay I, the Scottish Chief of Tampa Bay, " Sunland Tribune: Vol. 8 , Article 2, Tony Pizzo wrote:

During the fierce storm and tidal wave of 1848, which destroyed or washed away most of Fort Brooke and the village, the McKay house was swept up the river by the flood, and all of the Gadsden Point peninsula was inundated to a depth of about seven feet. McKay had cattle on the peninsula, and all were drowned.

In "Tampa Town, 1824–1886: the Cracker Village with a Latin Accent," (1968) Tony Pizzo wrote:

The warehouses, horse sheds, officers’ quarters, barracks, wharf and hospital were destroyed or heavily damaged as were virtually all of the buildings. After the high winds had died, the standing buildings were repaired and other buildings including the wharf, barracks and officers’ quarters were rebuilt.  The military authorities issued tents for the homeless.

In "Some Observations Concerning the History of Fort Brooke and Tampa," Sunland Tribune: Vol. 22 , Article 6 at USF Library's Scholar Commons. James W. Covington wrote:

Virtually all of the buildings of the fort were destroyed in September, 1848, when a terrible hurricane hit hard at the warehouses, horse sheds, officers’ quarters, barracks, wharf and hospital destroying or heavily damaging virtually all of the buildings. After the high winds had died, the standing buildings were repaired and other buildings including the wharf, barracks and officers’ quarters were rebuilt, but Fort Brooke had been greatly reduced in size both in extent of land and number of buildings by the storm and actions by Congress.

In "The Greatest Gale Ever Known - Tampa and the Hurricane of 1848," The Sunland Tribune Volume XXIV 1998 at the USF Digital Collections, Canter Brown Jr. wrote:

Major Wade and other officials assessed the scene at Fort Brooke "[The] storm … destroyed all the wharves and most of the public buildings at this post," the commanding officer informed superiors. "The commissary and quartermaster storehouses with all their contents were swept away, and a few damaged provisions, etc., only can be recovered." He went on to note that "the officers' quarters (except headquarters) are destroyed or very badly damaged, and the barracks are beyond repair." Even the hospital, where many soldiers and civilians eventually had gathered, suffered damage. "The roof ... was completely carried away, the doors broken," described assistant surgeon B. P. Curry, "the windows destroyed and the property otherwise lost or materially injured, with the exceptions of the medicines, and stores, which received but little damage."

In History of Hillsborough County, Florida, Narrative and Biographical, 1928, Ernest L. Robinson wrote:

In the garrison they found that the little church on the beach, the soldiers' quarters near by, C. B. Allen's boarding house, the Indian agent's office and the Ferris property had been wrecked, and all other buildings in that locality more or less damaged. North of Whiting street, the block house and the Turman and Ashley residences had been swept away. The roof of W. S. Spencer's house was blown off.

It appears that Hackley's house didn't survive the hurricane, or at least was damaged badly enough to require practically rebuilt in its entirety. So the house seen in the photo of the "Officers' Quarters" was, for the most part, built in 1848.

Read more about this hurricane in the feature about James T. Magbee here at TampaPix.

Thirty-five citizens of Manatee (Bradenton) sent a letter to the Secretary of War pointing out that the people of Tampa did not want the fort because they wanted the land for a town site. The Manatee people listed the good points of a Manatee River location including a nine foot deep water channel.  Somehow, however, their request was denied but the Fort Brooke area was reduced in size and influence.

When the people of Tampa did get most of the military reservation for a town site, the military saw little hope for further use for the base. By August, 1850, Major David Twiggs wrote that the post of Fort Brooke was to be broken up and the chaplain transferred to Camp Twiggs, Miss.  Yet, the post remained opened used as headquarters for the Indian emigration agent (Thomas P. Kennedy) during the 1850s and played a fairly important role in the last Seminole War 1855-1858.

TAMPA WANTS THE LAND FOR A PARK

It was at this time, 1883, that efforts were begun to procure the land in the name of Tampa.  Prominent Tampa citizen John T. Lesley, who was a fighter in the Seminole and Civil wars, sheriff, mayor, cattle rancher and later, a member of the state constitutional convention of 1885, sought the aid and advice of Senator Wilkinson Call, who agreed to investigate a workable plan. Fearful that the land would be obtained by speculators within the Land Office itself, Call in turn discussed the situation with the Secretary of the Interior, John W. Noble. Acting on the Secretary's suggestions, he had made preparations to secure the reservation by mid-March, 1883.

JOHN T. LESLEY AND TAMPA'S PLAN

Since the town itself could not homestead the land, a plan was devised wherein men residing near the Gainesville land office would file an application for homestead and make the accompanying cash entry payment. At the same time, one from Tampa would file a claim of preemption--the right of an actual settler to purchase land before others. Call wrote that this scheme would serve to "secure both ends."

Accordingly, Dr. Edmund S. Carew and J. A. Carlisle of Gainesville were selected by the Senator. On March 19, 1883, Carew filed for homestead on the entire tract and Carlisle made the cash entry. On the same day, Call telegraphed Lesley to proceed with the preemption. The cash payments of Carew and Carlisle were not accepted until late on March 22, when a plat of the land was received from the General Land Office in Washington. They had been advised by Senator Call of when the plat had been sent and so were prepared to make the payments within five minutes of its arrival in Gainesville. They were also instructed by Call to use his funds to pay the $421.00 entry money and homestead application fee. Call relayed this information to Lesley, who immediately paid the Gainesville men's draft on the Senator's account.

Clifford Herrick, a 23-year-old store clerk from Michigan, was apparently the man selected by Lesley and his associates to fulfill their "end" of Senator Call's plan. He filed for preemption on March 26, alleging in his required statement that he made settlement and began improvements on the land five days earlier. The third man to claim the Fort Brooke land was old Louis Bell, who asserted his settlement rights by filing for preemption on March 30. Call termed his claim to the entire tract a "Land Office trick," and was sure that he would "not be allowed to claim more than the single lot he has asked for repeatedly."

JOHN THOMAS LESLEY

There were few aspects in the life of the young community of Tampa that Capt. John Thomas Lesley (1835-1913) did not touch in some significant way.  At the age of 25, Lesley had already become one of Tampa’s leading citizens. 

Born in Madison County, Florida, John Lesley moved to Tampa with his family in 1848. During the Third Seminole War, Lesley joined the Florida militia as a private but quickly was promoted to lieutenant. At the outbreak of the War Between the States, he formed a company of Tampa men and was elected its captain. In October 1862, Lesley was commissioned a major in the Confederate Army. At the end of the war, Lesley returned to Tampa where he worked to establish his financial and social position. During the next several years, Lesley served as sheriff for two years and built a sawmill that supplied much of the lumber used to re-build the town. He later became a cattle rancher and state legislator.

At the end of 1865, Tampa resembled a ghost town. The majority of residents had left the city during the war; the economic condition was dismal and there was no municipal government. The election of Edward Clarke as mayor on October 25, 1866 was unable to substantially improve conditions. Clarke’s administration was confronted with an empty treasury, yellow fever epidemics and frequent unrest in the city. The situation worsened with arrival of federal troops and administrators to impose the Reconstruction policies established by the U.S. Congress. Deeply resented by the population, soldiers and federal civil authorities were subjected to frequent harassment. In response, both federal military and civil authorities used their position to make life even more miserable for the resident population.

The antagonism between federal authorities and Tampa residents was the foundation for John Lesley’s mayoral campaign in early 1869. He campaigned on a single platform that Tampa’s charter should be revoked by the state legislature due to the City’s destitute financial condition. The majority of residents agreed and Lesley was elected mayor on March 1, 1869. While a city clerk, treasurer and a city council was elected, the Lesley Administration did little more than wait until the state legislature revoked Tampa’s Charter due to an inactive government. On October 4, 1869, the state legislature responded as expected and revoked the City’s charter. When the news reached Tampa, Lesley and other City officials resigned their positions. The Hillsborough County government appropriated all City properties and assumed responsibility for providing educational and other principal services to Tampa’s residents. Tampa’s status as a non-chartered city continued until August 1873 when residents voted to re-incorporate the city.

After resigning, Lesley returned to his business ventures. In 1872, he sold his lumber mill to raise cattle for the lucrative Cuban market and accumulated a fortune. Lesley was also one of the founders of the First National Bank and the Tampa Electric Company which, in 1887, installed the first electric traffic lights in Tampa. In 1876, Lesley was elected to the state Legislature and was re-elected in 1882 and 1886. He later campaigned and won a seat in the state senate and was one of the members of the constitutional convention that drafted the present state constitution.

In a life that spanned 78 years, Lesley saw Tampa grow from an outpost on the edge of the frontier to a bustling community on the verge of becoming a major Florida city.  He has been described by Donald J. Ivey as "Tampa's Pioneer Renaissance Man", in an excellent attempt at the only biography of Lesley that's ever been written.

John Thomas Lesley - 12th Mayor of Tampa
City of Tampa City Clerks, Previous Tampa Mayors

Ivey, Donald J. (2018) "John T. Lesley: Tampa's Pioneer Renaissance Man," Sunland Tribune: Vol. 21, Article 3.

Neither Carew nor Carlisle used his own money in the process, but rather that of Senator Call, and indirectly that of John T. Lesley.  Furthermore, Carew paid only the $20.00 register and receiver's fee, while Carlisle paid the crucial $421.00 entry money.

A partial answer to this question of why Carew established his home on the land may be found in the testimony of Lesley at an 1889 hearing called by order of the Secretary of the Interior. Lesley claimed that an agreement was reached with Carew on the advice of members of the town council and other prominent citizens. It was decided that after six months the reservation would be divided into six parts. The town of Tampa was to make its selection first, with that lot to be used as a public park. The other sections would then be divided among William B. Henderson, John A. Henderson, Stephen M. Sparkman, John T. Lesley, and Dr. Carew.

According to Lesley, he was astonished when Carew later rejected the terms of their oral agreement. The doctor said that he was the only man who had any rights to the land and he intended to hold it.

It is not clear when this understanding was reached. The report of the hearing officers indicated that it was prior to the March 22 homestead. Yet, the agreement was made between Lesley and Carew, who had no contact or correspondence before that date. If Carew was a party to this arrangement before March 22, or if he originally thought he was homesteading for Senator Call (as Lesley once claimed he had admitted), his homestead application would have involved perjury. By law, an affidavit was signed by each applicant wherein he swore that he was neither acting as an agent for, nor "in collusion with any person, corporation or syndicate to give them the benefit of the land entered."

At the hearing, officers concluded that at the time of his filing, Carew was acting as an agent of Senator Call. He did not file in good faith for the purpose of making the land his home, but rather under an agreement to donate some of the land to the town of Tampa and hold the remainder jointly with several other persons.   Meanwhile, others who wanted the land erected tents and shacks on desired tracts, but soon businessmen purchased lots driving out the intruders, tearing down the ruined buildings and erecting buildings that served as bases for the many firms that were moving to Tampa.

OFFICERS QUARTERS FORT BROOKE - Maj Gen ANDREW JACKSON (1st Provisional Governor of Florida) (7th President of the United States) First Recommended This Area As A Military Site In 1818 (established 1824) During the 1st Seminole Indian War Brig Gen ZACHARY TAYLOR (12th President of the United States) Commanded From Here, 1838-1840 the U.S. Army in 2nd Seminole Indian War.

Photo by Roy Winkelman, Jan. 7, 2006

   Photo Sources:

For pencil sketch scans of old Fort Brooke and display of cannon at Plant Park.

Tampa Town, 1824-1886
Cracker Village With A Latin Accent by Tony Pizzo

FamilySearch.org (for census images)

State Archives of Florida

Tampa Bay Magazine

Tampa Public Library Burgert Bros. digital photo collection, HCPLC.org

University of South Florida Library Digital Photo Collection

 

History Sources:
 

Brooke, Col. George Mercer, Jr. (1974)  Professor of History Virginia Military Institute, Lexington, Va Early Days At Fort Brooke, Sunland Tribune, Vol. I No. 1, (Tampa, July 1974) at USF Library's Scholar Commons

City of Tampa Past Mayors, John Thomas Lesley, 12th Mayor of Tampa

Covington, James W. (1980) "The Hackley Grant, The Fort Brooke Military Reservation and Tampa," Sunland Tribune: Vol. 6 , Article 2 at USF Library's Scholar Commons .

Covington, James W. (2018) "Some Observations Concerning the History of Fort Brooke and Tampa," Sunland Tribune: Vol. 22 , Article 6 at USF Library's Scholar Commons.

Exploring Florida, Old Fort Brooke Parking Structure Memorial  Florida Center for Instructional Technology, Exploring Florida: Social Studies Resources for  Students and Teachers (Tampa, FL: University of South Florida, 2009)

Ivey, Donald J. (2018) "John T. Lesley: Tampa's Pioneer Renaissance Man," Sunland Tribune: Vol. 21 , Article 3 at USF Library's Scholar Commons.

LaGodna, Martin M. (1975) "Some Petitions Relating Tampa Families and the Disposal of Fort Brooke Lands, 1882-1883," Sunland Tribune: Vol. 2 , Article 5.  at USF Library's Scholar Commons

Lewis, Jeffrey (1982) "How Tampa Lost the Fort Brooke Military Reservation"
USF Library Digital Collections Ex Libris 5, Summer 1982.

Young, June Hurley (1982) "He Built a Fort in the Wilderness," Sunland Tribune: Vol. 8 , Article 11 at USF Library's Scholar Commons.