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Zephaniah Kingsley

Zephaniah Kingsley
Born(1765-12-04)December 4, 1765
Bristol, Great Britain
DiedSeptember 14, 1843(1843-09-14) (aged 77)
Atlantic Ocean
CitizenshipGreat Britain (1765–1793), United States (1793–1798),[1]: 34  Denmark (1798–1803),[2]: 67  Spain (1803–1821), United States (1821–1836), Haiti (1836–1843)
Occupation(s)Slave trader, planter
Known forProlific trade of slaves
Notable workA treatise on the patriarchal, or co-operative system of society as it exists in some governments, and colonies in American, and in the United States under the name of slavery, with its necessity and advantages, 1828
TitleMember Florida Territorial Council
SpousesPolygamous[a]
Children11, all from Black mothers
RelativesJames Whistler (grandnephew)
FamilyWhistler's Mother

Zephaniah Kingsley Jr. (December 4, 1765 – September 14, 1843) was a plantation owner, born in England, who moved as a child with his family to South Carolina, and became a planter, slave trader, and merchant. He built four plantations in the Spanish colony of Florida near what is now Jacksonville, Florida. He served on the Florida Territorial Council after Florida was acquired by the United States in 1821. Kingsley Plantation, which he owned and where he lived for 25 years, has been preserved as part of the Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve, run by the United States National Park Service. Finding his large and complicated family progressively more insecure in Florida, he moved them to a vanished plantation, Mayorasgo de Koka, in what was then Haiti but soon became part of the Dominican Republic.

In his will, Kingsley called himself a planter,[3]: 116  but he was in his younger years first and foremost a slave merchant,[4]: 150  and proud to be one:[5] a "very respectful business", in his words.[6]: 58  He owned and captained slave ships, and was actively involved in the Atlantic slave trade. A document of 1802 records his arrival at Havana as First Officer of the Superior with 250 Africans, and another of 1808, 60 slaves to a Spanish land grant.[7]: 15  He was also pro-slavery, but by the standards of the day, he was a liberal slave owner. He has been called "a man ahead of his time."[8]: 1, 50 

He was a relatively lenient slaveholder who respected slave families and allowed his enslaved a freedom not routine: the opportunity to hire themselves out when their work was completed, and eventually purchase their freedom for 50% of their market value.

Kingsley's main business in Spanish Florida was providing a ready supply of well-trained slaves, who were smuggled by or to planters of Georgia and South Carolina. This, plus his "interracial" family, resulted in Kingsley's being deeply invested in the Spanish system of slavery and society. As in the French colonies, certain rights were provided to a class of free people of color, and children of female slaves were allowed to inherit property from their white fathers. "In the Spanish Floridas free people of color...enjoyed tremendously elevated status when compared to virtually any other person of African descent in North America."[9]: 61 

Kingsley casually changed nationalities based on which would most help his slave trading enterprises.[10]: 54 [7]: 15  Born British, in 1793 he took an oath of naturalization to the United States. In 1798 he swore allegiance to Denmark,[1]: 52 [10]: 54  and in 1803 to Spain (Spanish Florida),[11]: 102 [10]: 54  All residents of Spanish Florida who did not leave automatically became American citizens, as is also seen in Kingsley's appointment to the Florida Territorial Legislature in 1822 (in appointing him, President James Monroe called him "one of the most fit and discreet persons in our territory.")[12] At his death his nationality was Haitian, acquired in 1836.

  1. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference Schafer2013 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ Schafer, Daniel L. (2003). Anna Madgigine Jai Kingsley: African princess, Florida slave, plantation slaveowner. Gainesville : University Press of Florida. pp. 67–69. ISBN 978-0-8130-2616-9.
  3. ^ Kingsley, Zephaniah (2000). "Last Will and Testament". In Stowell, Daniel W. (ed.). Balancing Evils Judiciously. The Proslavery Writings of Zephaniah Kingsley. University Press of Florida. pp. 116–121. ISBN 0813017335.
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference May was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve (January 2006) [August 2004]. "Foreword, by Allan F. Burns". Ethnohistorical Study of the Kingsley Plantation Community. National Park Service. p. v-vi, at p. v.
  6. ^ Cite error: The named reference Walker was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ a b Jackson, Antoinette T.; Burns, Allan F. (January 2006) [August 2004]. Ethnohistorical Study of the Kingsley Plantation Community. Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve, National Park Service.
  8. ^ Glover, Faye L. (1970). Zephaniah Kingsley, nonconformist, slave trader, patriarch. M.A. thesis, Atlanta University.
  9. ^ Millett, Nathaniel (2013). The Maroons of Prospect Bluff and Their Quest for Freedom in the Atlantic World. University Press of Florida. ISBN 9780813044545.
  10. ^ a b c Wu, Kathleen Gibbs Johnson (2009). "Manumission of Anna: Another Interpretation". El Escribano. St. Augustine Journal of History: 51–68.
  11. ^ Schafer, Daniel L. (2000), "Zephaniah Kingsley's Laurel Grove Plantation, 1803–1813", in Landers, Jane G. (ed.), Colonial Plantations and Economy in Florida, Gainesville, Florida: University Press of Florida, pp. 98–120, ISBN 0813017726
  12. ^ Collier, Bert (May 11, 1975). "Kingsley was the King of Florida Salve [sic] Trade". Fort Myers News Press. p. 8D.


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