"Anglo-Spanish Hostility in Early South Carolina, 1670–1748" Topic

"Rival claims to the land of South Carolina sparked hostility between England and Spain that shaped the first seventy-eight years of the colony's existence. While officials in Charleston considered the inhabitants of La Florida to be jealous rivals, Spanish officials in St. Augustine saw Carolinians as habitual trespassers. To improve our understanding of that formative era, we need to consider both sides of the territorial dispute that endured from 1670 to 1748. Spain held a better claim to the contested territory, but stubborn British colonists eventually forced their Spanish neighbors from the mainland of North America.

In last week's program, we traced the origins of Spanish claims to a broad swath of North America. From 1513 to 1670, the Spanish crown claimed all of the land from the Florida Keys to Chesapeake Bay as a broad territory called La Florida. In 1663, King Charles II of England granted the northern half of that same territory to the Lords Proprietors of Carolina, and then enlarged the grant in 1665 to include the Florida capital of St. Augustine. Spain was outraged by this usurpation, but the two nations settled a compromise in the summer of 1670. Three months after a small group of English settlers established Charles Towne on the Ashley River, the Treaty of Madrid required Spain to acknowledge all those lands in America "which the king of Great Britain and his subjects do at present hold and possess."…#

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Armand

There was a lot of skirmishing in the land that is today Georgia. In the late seventeenth and early eighteenth century it was a no-man's land between the Spanish, the English and later the British, and various native groups. Enslaved Africans who managed to escape from Carolina plantations were granted freedom by Spain provided they converted to Catholicism and promised allegiance to the King. Thus, the African settlement of Fort Mose was born. Black militiamen defended this outpost on to the north of Saint Augustine for many years. This history allows for many skirmish scenarios with a different flavor from the usual French and Indian war on the Northeast of North America.

"stubborn British colonists eventually forced their Spanish neighbors from the mainland of North America"

Um….-

Can we unpack that?

There is a site called Otterson's Fort in Union county, SC on a small river put there to protect against the Spanish! At least that is the legend.

Thanks

Armand