I'd like to recognize all 15 American colonies on this Independence Day.

[CaptainTruth]

15? Yes, 13 British, plus the 2 Spanish colonies of East Florida & West Florida, which seem to be almost always forgotten in American history, at least in the US.

This is a map of the Spanish territory of La Florida, made in 1584, when the entire southeast US was claimed by Spain, 36 years before the British arrived & 192 years (yes 192 years) before 1776. I'm not sure about y'all, but as an American, I wasn't taught about this in school. Incidentally, Spain established the town of St Augustine in what became the colony of East Florida in 1565, 55 years before the British pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock. The Spanish settlement of St Augustine is the oldest continuously-occupied settlement in the US. I encourage a visit there if you can, it is rich with history. And believe it or not, back in that era Florida was friendly to former slaves, & protected them. There's a LOT of history there to be learned.

[link:|]


This second map shows details of the Spanish colonies of East Florida & West Florida, & how they evolved from 1763 to 1784. East Florida & West Florida were the 14th & 15th American colonies that seem to have been largely forgotten in American history.

[link:|]

[roamer65]

1. We owe Spanish America a lot.

Our currency is based on the Spanish American real. 8 SA reales equaled “one US dollar”. We hard pegged our new dollar to the SA real in 1793 and used their silver coinage as money up until 1857.

During this time frame, the world’s reserve currency was the SA real.

Spain provided a lot of money to fund our war against the British, via SA silver coinage.

[EYESORE 9001]

2. Is that where the phrase 'pieces of eight' comes from?

My memory is a dusty attic, and I’m not motivated to look for myself 🥱

[Glorfindel]

4. Yes. Also "2 bits, 4 bits, 6 bits a dollar..."

as each of the eight pieces was called a "bit."

[roamer65]

5. Yes.

Piece of eight = 8 real Spanish American coin = one US dollar.

Many mints in Spanish America made them as present day Peru, Mexico and Bolivia were rich with silver.

Prominent mints were Mexico City, Lima and Potosi (present day Bolivia).

1/2 real coin was called a “fippenny bit or a picayune”.
1 real was called a “bit or levy”.
2 real was called a “quarter or 2 bits”.
8 real was called a “Spanish milled dollar or just a dollar”.

[HardPort]

3. St Augustine is the oldest continuously-occupied *European* settlement in the US.

Fixed it.

Some Native settlements that were thriving towns long before the European invaders arrived continued and continue to thrive. Acoma Pueblo comes to mind.

[doc03]

6. I've been in St. Augustine three times, I drank from the fountain of youth but it turned

out to be a big hoax. I did not know Florida was the 14th and 15th colonies though. I was in St. Augustine about 6 years or so ago
the day before it was hit by a hurricane. I was on a senior bus trip, we were ordered to evacuate the next morning.
Instead of going up the east coast on I-95 that was backed up for miles, we went inland through Macon and Atlanta. I
heard the old town was flooded real bad. The tour company refunded most of our money.

[ITAL]

7. I suppose one could discuss California and Texas as well

Both had Spanish settlements pre-1776. First Missions in Texas were established in the 1680s. San Diego's Mission was first started in 1769.

[Retrograde]

11. California's first permanent European civilian settlement

as opposed to missions or miltary bases, was San Jose, settled in 1777 (with Los Angeles shortly after). California was the back of beyond until gold was discovered.

New Mexico, OTOH, had active Spanish settlements well before the English decided to starve at Jamestown. A municipal building, the Governor's Palace, built in 1608, is still in use. And as someone else pointed out, New Mexico has Native American towns that have been inhabited continuously since before that.

Then there were the French colonies along the Mississippi/Ohio Valleys and in Canada. France didn't invest much in them, so except for New Orleans they didn't get very large or important, but if you look at a map you see placenames such as Fond du Lac, Eau Claire, Pass Christian, Detroit, Terre Haute, etc - even as far west as Couer d'Alene. Pittsburgh started out as Fort Dusquene, a French outpost. For the most part, the French came to trade rather than settle, but their relations with the Native Americans were more friendly than those of the British settlers, and they often married Native women - Sacajawea's husband was likely of mixed Native/French ancestry. And let's not forget Quebec and Acadia, now Nova Scotia, whose French-descended inhabitants were deported to Louisiana when the British took over.

What bothers me about the way I was taught American history - in New York - was that it it was both Anglo-centric and East Coast centric, focused on British settlers moving from the East Coast across the continent, as if the rest of what is now the US was sort of an empty place where nothing happened until the British arrived. I read a book a few years ago - and forgot the name - that proposed looking at US history as a tapestry instead, with the weft eing the Spanish settlers moving north and the warp being the British moving west, forming a strong fabric in the process. I think we're starting to improve in how we teach US history, but there's still a long way to go.

[pwb]

8. How did they contribute to the Revolutionary War?

Being from one I will stick with the 13 original colonies. The ones with a Stripe and star on the flag.

[Retrograde]

12. So Vermont and Kentucky no longer count?

They used to have both a star and a stripe - I've seen 15-stripe flags - but lost their stripes because the flag was getting too cluttered.

[pwb]

13. You will have to ask Betsy Ross about that one.

What was she thinking? Only the number of stars have changed since well all of our history.

[Retrograde]

16. No, the Star Spangled Banner

the flag that flew over Fort McHenry and has that song written about it, has 15 stars and 15 stripes. It's now in the Smithsonian, often on display. The number of stripes was set at 13 in 1818.

[pwb]

17. Florida and Kentucky were never Original Colonies just

like Maine and Vermont were not. The Florida area allowed the British to land troops there and traded with them. You can't change history. The Spanish were very heavy in the slave trade as well. What is your point in this?

[rampartc]

9. there are many artifacts of west florida

remaining in the southern counties of alabama and mississippi. our (la) 5 florida parishes also retain cultural aspects of spanish occupation. a new state, capitaled at biloxi or mobile, would be surprisingly liberal and predominately catholic (which probably drove the break up of west florida into chunks of the "piney woods" south.)

sam hyde is a historian who writes about west florida in general and "bloody tangipahoa" parish in particular.

https://www.theadvocate.com/baton_rouge/news/communities/livingston_tangipahoa/southeastern-professors-book-looks-at-pistols-and-politics-in-the-florida-parishes/article_016bb8e2-8475-11e8-9e07-af8e9b386be9.html

have you heard the legend of the "singing river?"




















































































0

[Xoan]

10. Don't forget ...

to count the indegenous people.

[Retrograde]

14. Cool map - the Spanish one

Is there a link to a modern interpretation of the map giving some indication of where the settlements are in today's terms, and what the various rivers and tributaries are? I think I can pick out the site of New Orleans/Lake Ponchatrain, but the scale is off - and I don't think rivers behave like they do around the spot labled "Cofle" without human intervention!

[Tommy Carcetti]

15. Not much of a distinction, but compared to the British colonies...

…slavery in Florida was slightly more humane.

Slaves were allowed to marry, own property, and either purchase their freedom or earn it via Catholic baptism.

Granted, it was still slavery and grossly immoral no matter what way you cut it. But slaves in Spanish Florida did have it comparatively better than their British colonial counterparts.