East Florida

For twenty years, Britain claimed claimed Florida (1763-1783). The British divided Florida into two provinces. Pensacola was the capital of West Florida (basically, Panhandle). St. Augustine, the capital of Spanish Florida, remained the capital of East Florida (essentially, Peninsular Florida). The British designated the Apalachicola River as the boundary between East Florida and West Florida.

Britain obtained Florida from Spain according to the Treaty of Paris (1763), which ended the Seven Years War, or French and Indian War. The formal transfer occurred in 1764. Britain returned Florida to Spain according to the Treaty of Paris (1783), by which Britain also recognized the independence of the United States of America. The formal transfer of Florida from Britain to Spain occurred in 1784.

The following titles remain informative works on British East Florida.

Kenneth H. Beeson, Jr., Fromajadas and Indigo: The Minorcan Colony in Florida (Charleston, SC: History Press, 2006). This book was Beeson's Master of Arts thesis at the University of Florida (1960).


James W. Covington, The British Meet the Seminoles: Negotiations Between British Authorities in East Florida and the Indians, 1763-68 (Gainesville: University of Florida, 1961)

Patricia C. Griffin, Mullet on the Beach: The Minorcans of Florida, 1768-1788 (Gainesville: University of North Florida Press, 1991)

Joseph Byrne Lockey, East Florida, 1783-1785: A File of Documents Assembled and Many of Them Translated by Joseph Byrne Lackey (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1949)

Charles Loch Mowat, East Florida as a British Province, 1763-1784 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1943)

Daniel L. Schafer, "'...Not So Gay a Town in America as This...:' St. Augustine, 1763-1784," in Jean Parker Waterbury, ed., The Oldest City: St. Augustine, Saga of Survival (St. Augustine: St. Augustine Historical Society, 1983), 91-123

Daniel L. Schafer, "'Yellow Silk Ferret Tied Round Their Wrists:' African Americans in British East Florida, 1763-1784," in David R. Colburn and Jane L. Landers, eds., The African American Heritage of Florida (Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1995), 79-85

James Leitch Wright, Florida in the American Revolution (Gainesville: University Presses of Florida, 1975)