“Orlando didn’t even have a real name.
It was out in the middle of nowhere, without so much as a creek to give it a
harbor.”
Orlando Sentinel,
December 26, 1943
Where along this trail would YOU have built Orange County’s 1857 courthouse?
Students and scholars of
Orlando history alike know of Benjamin F. Caldwell and James G. Speer, but what
about Thomas H. HARRIS, Jr.? He too had ties to the founding of 1857 Orlando,
and yet the important role he played has long been overlooked.
James G. Speer signed the
October 5, 1857 deed gifting land from Benjamin F. Caldwell for the site of Orange
County’s Courthouse. Two other signatures however also appear on the document.
John R. Worthington, mentioned earlier in this series as Orlando’s first
postmaster, witnessed the signature of James G. Speer. Also appearing on the
deed is the signature of Thomas H. Harris, Jr., affixing his name as the “Justice of the Peace.”
Harris and Worthington therefore
were both in close proximity to the newl village of Orlando on October 5, 1857.
Appointed postmaster September 19, 1857, and owner of Worthington’s boarding
house at Orlando, one might expect John Worthington would be available to serve
as a witness, but, and it’s an important but, Worthington was not in Florida one
year earlier, as Aaron Jernigan was forming Orange County’s 1856 Militia.
Thomas H. Harris, Jr. however
was listed on Jernigan’s March 10, 1856 militia roster. So too was John Moffett
Harris, the son of Thomas H. Harris, Jr.
Five days after Jernigan
organized his militia, as we learned from research of historian and retired UCF
Professor Paul W. Wehr, Benjamin F. Caldwell, on March 15, 1856, purchased 119
acres in Orange County that included the site donated in October 1857 for a
courthouse. So, of four known individuals associated with the founding of
Orlando: Caldwell, Speer, Worthington and Harris, only two are known to have
been in 1856 Orange County – Speer and Harris!
Thomas H. Harris, Jr.
appears again in an odd Orange County deed recorded November 23, 1857. In that
document, “John Patrick” gave one
acre to “Captain A. Jernigan, Thos. H.
Harris and Henry Hodges, a committee appointed by the subscribers to a free
church to be built at Orlando.” Stated as being in the Southeast Quarter of
Section 26, the deed is a bit odd because, as established in earlier
installments, the Patrick’s had sold this land to John R. Worthington earlier
that year. Also, Benjamin F. Caldwell thought he owned the very same parcel. (Multiple
owners of the exact same land - the main ingredient in the intriguing story of
Orlando’s mysterious founding!)
Thomas H. Harris, Jr. and
John Moffett Harris are relevant to the founding of Orlando for a variety of
reasons, but especially so because of their pre-Civil War ties to Cobb County,
Georgia, and their post-Civil War ties to Isaphoenia C. Speer on Florida’s Gulf
Coast. Born at South Carolina, Thomas Harris died January 7, 1884 at Pinellas
County, Florida. His gravesite can be viewed in the ‘Anona Pioneer Section’ of
Serenity Gardens Memorial Park at Largo, Florida.
A settlement of Anona
appeared on an 1888 Hillsborough County map. The county of Pinellas was not
formed until 1911, and prior to that year Largo and Dunedin were in
Hillsborough. John M. Harris homesteaded on Clearwater Harbor, in the vicinity
of the Anona Ghost Town, north of where his father was buried in 1884. A little
further north on Clearwater Harbor was homesteader Josiah R. Wise, the very
Wise man who witnessed James G. Speer’s signature, at Hillsborough County, on an
1868 deed recorded at Orange County. The deed was voided in 1869, but it serves
to place our James G. Speer in the vicinity of Thomas H. Harris, Jr soon after
the War.
Josiah R. Wise married
Catherine Speer, daughter of James G. Speer, and relocated soon after to central
Florida with his wife and father in law. Josiah R. & Catherine Wise became
post-Civil War residents of Oakland of West Orange County.
As Civil War broke out in
the South, the families of Harris and Speer departed Orange County. Both settled
as neighbors on Clearwater Harbor. But who followed who?
Isaphoenia C. Speer died
at Hillsborough County in 1867, we know this from the Probate Court. Widower
James G. Speer returned to Orange County, but Thomas H. Harris, Jr., after arriving
in central Florida circa 1855 from Georgia, remained on the Gulf Coast. One
might think, therefore, that the Speer’s had followed Harris to Hillsborough
County during the War.
Although Thomas Harris,
Jr. came to Florida from Georgia, he had been born at Abbeville, South Carolina
in 1811. His father died at Abbeville in 1826, and one of two administrators of
the man’s estate happened to be William
Harris Caldwell, father of “Benjamin F. Caldwell of Talladega,” and the stepfather
of Isaphoenia C. (Ellington) Speer.
Above:
1826 Will of Thomas H. Harris, Sr. naming William H. Caldwell Administrator
Again, the plot, as they
say, thickens! Before Orange County’s population topped 1,200 persons, three
natives of Abbeville, South Carolina became involved in creating a county seat
of Orlando. Thomas Harris, Jr., Benjamin F. Caldwell, and Isaphoenia C. (Ellington)
Speer were also related.
“Coming from Cobb County, north of Atlanta, GA,” we learn from a
biography of an early Orange County pioneer published in 1915 describing his
arrival on: “a glorious Christmas Day 1855, they first located at Ft. Reid
and a year later moved to the neighborhood of Orlando.” One might at first think the pioneer was Thomas H. Harris, Jr., but the
biography was in fact telling of the arrival of William Benjamin Hull. And this will be a great place to pick back
up next Friday.
Next
Friday, May 31, 2019: William Benjamin Hull
“First
Road to Orlando” is a history of the old Fort Mellon to Fort Gatlin Road and of
how a tiny village in the middle of a remote wilderness became the Orange
County seat of government.
My
Orlando Founding Families Series delves deeper into the courageous people who
found their way down a lonely dusty forts trail – and became the first families
to settle Orlando.
Central Florida History by Richard Lee Cronin
FOR MORE ON CENTRAL
FLORIDA HISTORY
First Road to Orlando:
The Fort Mellon to Fort Gatlin Road
And beyond TRAIL’S
END;
Beyond Gatlin: A
History of South Orange County
Visit my Amazon Author Page above for a complete listing of my award-winning
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