ROBERT R. REID III - Part TWO

Robert R. REID III of Palatka - Part Two

AUGUST EDITION: 12 Central Floridians

Orlando’s Knight in Shining Armor

He arrived on the courthouse steps in time to submit a bid for the purchase of 113 acres of remote Orange County property. The date, January 7, 1867, the first Monday of that month, and on that day Robert R. Reid III acquired, for $900, the “estate of John R. Worthington.” An ‘L’ shaped parcel, it is now prime downtown Orlando real estate.

Florida was then a “military appendage”, a war-torn State subject to the indiscriminate whims of U. S. Provost Marshals and military rule. These post-War years were called the ‘Reconstruction Period’.

A decade earlier, Benjamin F. Caldwell had gifted 4 acres to Orange County for use as a courthouse. John R. Worthington was appointed Orlando’s First Postmaster on the 19^th of September, 1857, but then, three years later, Florida was preparing to secede, preparing to join a Confederacy of Southern States. In 1860, Caldwell’s tiny Village of Orlando was being abandoned. The Post Office closed, and the men rushed off to war.

Caldwell and Worthington died in the War, and so too did Orlando merchants Henry Roberson and George W. Terrell. Sheriff Jonathan C. Stewart died in Virginia. In all, 5,000 Florida soldiers are believed to have perished during the Civil War.

By War’s end Orlando was a Ghost Town, and remained so for more than a decade.

Duplicity triggers turmoil

One Orlando survivor was William A. Patrick, a son of one the area’s first pioneers. The Patrick family relocated to Orange County in the 1840’s, arriving from Georgia with Aaron and Isaac Jernigan. Another survivor was James P. Hughey, who served as Clerk of Court for many years after the War. The Hughey and Patrick homesteads were located south and west of the 4 acre Village of Orlando, although one family, John & Linney Patrick, built their residence adjacent to the village.

Two years prior to the War, John & Linney sold 119 acres to John R. Worthington., but their 1858 sale had an identical legal description as a homestead deed issued to one, “Benjamin F. Caldwell of Talladega”.

John R. Worthington and Benjamin F. Caldwell owned the exact same acreage. To acquire additional land adjacent to his land, Worthington then mortgaged, in 1859, his 119 acres, borrowing the funds from the Palatka firm, Teasdale & Reid. So, after the courthouse auction of 1867, Reid and Caldwell then owned the exact same acreage.

Attorney Robert W. Broome of Lake City arrived at Orlando in 1875, in town for one purpose, the incorporation of Orlando. Along with Broome came Jacob R. Cohen, a neighbor of Robert R. Reid III of Palatka. A merchant too, Cohen bought Village of Orlando lots 8 & 9, but did so after the meeting, closing on his purchase January 24, 1876.

Broome and Cohen both voted in favor of the town of Orlando being incorporated, yet neither man was a resident of the County, let alone the tiny village they were voting to incorporate in 1875. At that time, male landowners made up the electorate.

The two Orlando village lots 8 & 9 had also been sold in 1868. Merchants Doyle & Brantley of Mellonville bought the land that year from the “estate of George Hughey.”

Confused by all these names and lot sales, well then imagine how Orlando’s leaders felt in 1879? Consider this, Caldwell gifted all town lots to Orange County except Lot 10. Lots 1 thru 9, and lots 11 and 12, all belonged to Orange County – not individuals! 

So, why were individuals selling these lots? Why did William A. Patrick begin selling lots in the 1860’s?

A stranger from Alabama founded a tiny village out in the middle of nowhere in 1857. A Lake City Attorney incorporated that little village in 1875. But by 1879, that village was in desperate need of a Knight in shining armor, and so a Palatka merchant came to its rescue. 

Three (3) mysterious forefathers – and not a one was ever a resident of Orlando.

Negotiating a deal

And so we arrive at July 24, 1879, when, in the words of historian William Blackman: “Some question having arisen as to the legality of the existing charter, the Mayor issued a proclamation that the corporation of Orlando is dissolved by the majority vote of the citizens of Orlando.” The town's hero however was already at work. Three months prior to the Town council’s action, Reid III had dispatched Oakland resident and Attorney James G. Speer to Talladega, AL.

Speer had been the Attorney who originally handled the Caldwell gift of land in 1857, so he was the one man best able to resolve that portion of the conflict some 22 years later.

On 21 April, 1879; “Louise Caldwell, the Widow of Benjamin F. Caldwell, deceased,” and her three children, conveyed over to Robert R. Reid all rights the Caldwell family might have had in Orlando property. That conveyance was then recorded at Orange County July 29, 1879 – five (5) days after the Town of Orlando had been dissolved.

William F. Forward handled the next phase in Orlando’s rescue. A son-in-law of Robert R. Reid III, the Putnam County Clerk of Court also happened to be the son of William A. Forward, a former Circuit Judge, whose district back in 1857 included Orange County.

The husband of Reid’s eldest daughter Anna, William Forward negotiated a settlement with Orange County Commissioners. That document, signed May 17, 1879, was then recorded at with the County Clerk – James P. Hughey, on 5 September 1879.

Regarding the puzzling July 1879 dissolution of Orlando, Historian Blackman wrote: “Nevertheless, although the corporation, and with it the Town Council, were defunct, a meeting of the Council was held the following October.”

The simple fact of the matter is, Robert R. Reid III, of Palatka, Florida, had saved the Town of Orlando. But Reid still had one more deal to negotiate, and that was to convey one-third (1/3) of his 120 acres surrounding Orlando to W. A. Patrick. With that deal done, Reid could finally submit his 1880 Plat of Orlando, a plat that included the original 1857 Village of Orlando. The town plat was filed six (6) months before the arrival of the first train to the County Seat at Orlando

This concludes our summer-long celebration of ORLANDO. Rick’s Blog will return here, to this new blog address, September 15^th. You can now receive email notifications of each new Blog posting free of charge simply by subscribing. I invite you to visit my website, www.croninbooks.com, to view books and other fascinating short stories of Central Florida during the 19^th Century.

  CITRUSLAND, AMERICA’S PARADISE

Follow the FIRST ROAD TO ORLANDO on the original Fort Mellon to Fort Gatlin Road, the 28 mile military dirt trail that evolved into a Mellonville to Orlando dirt road. Visit www.croninbooks.com/FIRST-ROAD.html for details and reviews: “Your work was so needed and well done. You figured out questions that have lingered for years.”

Or, if mystery is more your style than history…

THE RUTLAND MULE MATTER is a Novel, a story so fascinating you might not notice at first that you are reading a true story. A son and daughter go in search of their father, a Florida Senator, a soldier who vanished during the Civil War. What the Senator’s kids find, changes everything! Visit www.croninbooks.com/MULE.html for details: “You uncovered about the most interesting story, better than Barber shooting the Sheriff.”

RICK’S BLOG RETURNS SEPTEMBER 15TH

ROBERT R. REID III - PART ONE

ROBERT R. REID III – Part One

A MYSTERY MAN, Really?

Orlando, Florida forefathers could relate to Comedian Rodney Dangerfield’s signature punch line, for much like the comedian, “they don’t get no respect!”

Simply stated, Orlando, the 158 year old county seat, would not exist today had it not been for the efforts of three special individuals: Benjamin F. Caldwell; Robert W. Broome; and Robert R. Reid III. Each man provided an essential role in not only establishing Orlando as a city, but preventing the village from becoming a Ghost Town as well.

The role each forefather played is evidenced by hundreds of Orange County recorded documents, hand written transactions providing us a plethora of information, yet the town of Orlando has yet to appropriately embrace either man as a city founder.

Of all three, Reid was the major contributor in terms of keeping one family’s dream of a place called Orlando alive. There are 130 official documents tracking Reid’s 33 years of involvement, an Orlando founding father relationship that began November 7, 1859, and then continued through to his final transaction, December 16, 1892.

Orange County documents authenticate Robert R. Reid’s identity, his place of residence throughout his entire Orlando relationship, and serves as evidence of the man’s rescue of this puzzling county seat of government. Still, to fully appreciate why the man was even interested in Orlando in the first place, genealogy must be added to the mix.

One must trace the family to discover the history, an intriguing true-life story that is focused on a man named REID, not REED! The distinction between the two spellings is crucial, for there was also an English REED family involved in the early Central Florida story.

His first envisioned city failed!

Historians have long known of Robert R. Reid, although the man’s interest in Orlando of Orange County never really made much sense. One fable, for example, claims residents had requested Mr. Reid, a total stranger, to resolve a land dispute. In return, as the fable goes, he was rewarded by receiving a portion of the land that had been in dispute.

There was indeed a complicated land dispute, and Robert R. Reid was in fact the man who resolved that dispute, but Reid was by no means a stranger to Orlando.

The ‘dispute’ reached a boiling point in July, 1879. On the 3^rd of that month, according to historian and Rollins Professor William F. Blackman, the Orlando Town Council voted to discontinue all existing streets with the exception of four located in the “original four acre Town of Orlando”. The action appeared, said Blackman, to delete every Orlando street with the exception of: Main, Central, Court and Oak Street.

Meeting again July 24, 1879, the Town Council then determined Orlando’s charter to be invalid. After the meeting, Mayor Charles H. Munger issued a proclamation stating the Town of Orlando had been “dissolved by a majority vote of its citizens”.

Minutes of the meeting did not say why the town was dissolved. Nor did Blackman give a reason for the Town Council’s action, only that by October of 1879, Orlando appears to have been reinstated, mysteriously rescued by a stranger from Palatka, a fellow by the name of Robert R. Reid III. (I have added the title III for clarification.)

A Putnam County merchant, Orlando had not been the man’s first attempt at founding a new town. 28 years earlier, in 1851, Robert R. Reid III had purchased, for $5,000, a site along St. John River, land upon which he planned to plat the city of Palatka. Reid however went bust, and later formed a partnership with his brother-in-law, a general merchandise firm known as Teasdale and Reid.

No stranger to CitrusLAND!

Robert R. Reid recorded a plat of Orlando in 1880, a town site 80 acres in size and surrounding the original village of Orlando, the 4 acre site donated to Orange County in 1857 by Benjamin F. Caldwell. Simultaneous to recording his 1880 plat, Reid also conveyed 40 acres to William A. Patrick, the son of John & Lenny Patrick.

Orlando’s ‘dispute’ was all about land ownership. A hand drawn sketch, attached to the 1880 agreement between Reid and Patrick, shows the Patrick family residence as being adjacent to the original 4 acre Village of Orlando. A second Patrick parcel is shown to be located on the north boundary of the original village.

1880 sketch from Reid Agreement with Patrick

Patrick’s residence today, according to the 1880 sketch, would occupy the southeast corner of Central and Orange Avenues, while the Orange County History Center now sits on Patrick’s second parcel. This land however was owned by Robert R. Reid, or so he thought, because land records showed a deed issued to Benjamin F. Caldwell.

Smack dab in the middle of this land ownership fiasco sat the tiny Village of Orlando, and a solution was desperately needed if the Orange County Seat was ever to survive! On August 14th, Robert R. Reid III – Part II will walk you through the man’s 1880 Rescue of Orlando.

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ABOUT TEASDALE & REID

“Our Company was divided into two detachments, one located to the right, up the river on a bluff, under the command of our Captain, J. J. Dickison. The other, in which I was, was under First Lieutenant Mc Cardle and located in a ditch down the river, back of Teasdale & Reid’s wharf and warehouse.” Source: Memoirs of James M. Dancy of his service during the Civil War. Genealogy note: James M. Dancy was the son of Francis L. & Florida F. (REID) Dancy. Florida F. Reid was the sister of Palatka’s Robert R. Reid III. Robert and Florida were children of Florida’s Territorial Governor, Robert R. Reid II.

About this Blog’s Author

FIRST ROAD TO ORLANDO details the history of the original Fort Mellon to Fort Gatlin, a 28 mile dirt trail that evolved into the Mellonville to Orlando Road, simply visit www.croninbooks.com/FIRST-ROAD.html for details, AND;

THE RUTLAND MULE MATTER is a Novel based upon true-life historical figures, the story of a son and daughter searching for their father, a Florida Senator, a soldier who vanished during the Civil War. What the man’s siblings find, changes everything! Visit www.croninbooks.com/MULE.html for details.