The Order of Friars Minor Capuchin is a religious order of Franciscan friars within the Catholic Church, one of three "First Orders" that reformed from the Franciscan Friars Minor Observant, the other being the Conventuals (OFMConv). Franciscans reformed as Capuchins in 1525 with the purpose of regaining the original Habit (Tunic) of St. Francis of Assisi and also for returning to a stricter observance of the rule established by Francis of Assisi in 1209.
St. Augustine is a city in and the county seat of St. Johns County on the Atlantic coast of northeastern Florida. Founded in 1565 by Spanish explorers, it is the oldest continuously inhabited European-established settlement in what is now the contiguous United States.
A friar is a member of one of the mendicant orders founded in the twelfth or thirteenth century; the term distinguishes the mendicants' itinerant apostolic character, exercised broadly under the jurisdiction of a superior general, from the older monastic orders' allegiance to a single monastery formalized by their vow of stability. A friar may be in holy orders or be a brother. The most significant orders of friars are the Dominicans, Franciscans, Augustinians, and Carmelites.
George Biassou was an early leader of the 1791 slave rising in Saint-Domingue that began the Haitian Revolution. With Jean-François and Jeannot, he was prophesied by the vodou priest, Dutty Boukman, to lead the revolution.
Spanish Florida was the first major European land claim and attempted settlement in North America during the European Age of Discovery. La Florida formed part of the Captaincy General of Cuba, the Viceroyalty of New Spain, and the Spanish Empire during Spanish colonization of the Americas. While its boundaries were never clearly or formally defined, the territory was initially much larger than the present-day state of Florida, extending over much of what is now the southeastern United States, including all of present-day Florida plus portions of Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Louisiana. Spain's claim to this vast area was based on several wide-ranging expeditions mounted during the 16th century. A number of missions, settlements, and small forts existed in the 16th and to a lesser extent in the 17th century; they were eventually abandoned due to pressure from the expanding English and French colonial settlements, the collapse of the native populations, and the general difficulty in becoming agriculturally or economically self-sufficient. By the 18th century, Spain's control over La Florida did not extend much beyond a handful of forts near St. Augustine, St. Marks, and Pensacola, all within the boundaries of present-day Florida.
Fort Mose, originally known as Gracia Real de Santa Teresa de Mose, and later as Fort Mose, or alternatively, Fort Moosa or Fort Mossa, is a former Spanish fort in St. Augustine, Florida. In 1738, the governor of Spanish Florida, Manuel de Montiano, had the fort established as a free black settlement, the first to be legally sanctioned in what would become the territory of the United States. It was designated a US National Historic Landmark on October 12, 1994.
The Spanish missions in Georgia comprised a series of religious outposts established by Spanish Catholics in order to spread the Christian doctrine among the Guale and various Timucua peoples in southeastern Georgia.
Santa Fe de Toloca was a Spanish mission that existed near the Santa Fe River in the northwestern part of what is now Alachua County, Florida, United States during the 17th century. It became an important place on the camino real connecting St. Augustine with Apalachee Province, which was centered on the site of present-day Tallahassee, Florida. The site that the Santa Fe de Toloca mission occupied in the first half of the 17th century was partially excavated in the 1980s.
Francisco Pareja was a Franciscan missionary in Spanish Florida, where he was primarily assigned to San Juan del Puerto. The Spaniard became a spokesman for the Franciscan community to the Spanish and colonial governments, was a leader among the missionaries, and served as custodio for the community in Florida. After the Franciscan organization was promoted to a provincia (province), Pareja was elected by his fellow missionaries as provincial in 1616.
Vicente Manuel de Céspedes (1721?-1794), also known as Vicente Manuel de Zéspedes, was a Spanish colonel and field marshal in the Spanish Royal Army who served as governor of Santiago de Cuba (1781-1782) and the Spanish province of East Florida (1784-1790).
Mission Nombre de Dios is a Catholic mission founded in 1565 in St. Augustine, Florida, on the west side of Matanzas Bay. It is part of the Diocese of St. Augustine and is likely the oldest extant mission in the continental United States. The National Shrine of Our Lady of La Leche, the oldest shrine in that region, is located on the mission grounds.
St. Francis Barracks is a historic structure constructed of coquina stone located on Marine Street in St. Augustine, Florida, named in honor of St. Francis of Assisi. The barracks were constructed between 1724 and 1755 by friars of the Order of St. Francis, to replace a series of wooden buildings which had been destroyed by the ravages of the tropical climate in La Florida and by fire, both accidental fires and occasional intentional ones, such as when the city was razed by the English in 1702.
Luis Benedit y Horruytiner was a Spanish colonial administrator who held office as governor of Spanish Florida, and viceroy of Sardinia. He was the uncle of Pedro Benedit Horruytiner, who succeeded him as governor of La Florida.
Melchor Feliú (?-1766) was the last governor in the First Spanish Period of Florida's history, governing from March 20, 1762 to July 27, 1763. Feliú oversaw the cession of Florida to Great Britain by the Treaty of Paris on July 21, 1763 and the subsequent immigration of most of the province's Spanish and African inhabitants to Cuba. Some of the Native Americans living in the Spanish Catholic missions also moved away from Florida at this time.
Félix Varela y Morales was a Cuban Catholic priest and independence leader who is regarded as a notable figure in the Catholic Church in both his native Cuba and the United States, where he also served.
The Saint Augustine Blues, also known as the Independent Blues, were a militia unit that fought for the Confederacy during the American Civil War. After serving in the local community, the unit was eventually organized into the Third Florida Infantry where it fought in several engagements including the campaigns of the Army of Tennessee.
Enrique White was an Irish-born Spanish soldier who served as Governor of West Florida and of East Florida.
Juanillo was a chief of the Native American Tolomato people in the Guale chiefdom, in what is now Georgia. In September 1597, Juanillo led the so-called Gualean Revolt, or Juanillo's Revolt, against the cultural oppression of the indigenous population in Florida by the Spanish authorities and the Franciscan missionaries. This was the first and longest-lasting Guale rebellion in La Florida, and ended with the execution of Juanillo by a group of Native American allies of the Spanish, led by Chief Asao.
Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe de Tolomato was a Spanish Catholic mission founded in 1595 in what is now the state of Georgia, located north of the lands of the southernmost Native American Guale chiefdom, Asao-Talaxe. According to historian John Tate Lanning, it was located originally at Pease Creek in McIntosh County, in an area later called "The Thicket" or "Mansfield Place", five miles northeast of Darien. Between the 17th and 18th centuries, the mission was re-established in several places. It was first destroyed in 1597 during the Native American uprising known as Juanillo's Revolt, and rebuilt in 1605 at the Native American village, Espogache. In the mid-1620s a new Tolomato mission was built at Guana near the capital of Florida, St. Augustine. After the destruction of the Guana mission in 1702 by James Moore, the Governor of Carolina, and Colonel Robert Daniels, another mission was established in Guale.
Juan José Eligio de la Puente y Regidor (1724–1781) was a Spanish Floridian (Floridano) who held various public offices in St. Augustine, Florida and in Havana, Cuba, during the 18th century. He served as chief officer of the Real Contaduría for Spanish Florida, and as principal auditor for the Tribunal de Cuentas in Havana, offices that managed the colonial governments' accounts and expenditures. Puente was a member of St. Augustine's 18th century elite Criollo community, and had a role in many events of that period in the history of Florida. He acquired considerable wealth, became a royal treasury official in Cuba, and influenced Spanish foreign policy in North America.
