On May 12th, 1835 in Madison County Florida, John Thomas Lesley was born. He was the eldest of the three children of Leroy and Indiana Lesley, who were both raised in South Carolina and made way to Florida. The Lesley family lived on a planation not…

There are many areas throughout the United States that bear the names of Confederate generals and leaders of the Civil War. Used as a tribute to the memorialization of the Confederacy and the “Lost Cause,” these symbols litter the American…

The history of the Confederate monument residing at the Courthouse of Hillsborough County in Tampa, FL, began as early as 1903. That year, Azeele Carruthers, President of the Tampa Chapter of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, No. 113,…

Fort Brooke was active during the American Civil War and was attacked on two different occasions by Northern forces during the war, the Battle of Fort Brooke (and Battle of Ballast Point) and the fort’s eventual capture on May 6th, 1864 by the Union…

Of all the states in the Confederacy, Florida was one of the least touched by direct conflict throughout the war. Florida was mostly blockaded due to its long coastline and proximity to trade routes to the Caribbean. Early in the war, many in…

In the final week of August 2009, the 124-foot hull of the Scottish Chief was found by researchers and divers from the Florida Aquarium north of the Jane Street Shipyard, located on the Hillsborough River near Lowry Park Zoo. This hidden historic…

That past came together in December 2012 when Tampa bronze sculptor Steven Dickey and the Historical Monument Trail Committee installed six bronze busts of Tampa trailblazers along the two-mile stretch of the downtown Riverwalk, including a…