The St. Augustine expedition of 1702 had, then, its true setting in the international contest for the region of the Gulf and the Mississippi, a fact which was clearly understood in Louisiana and even in France. Moore's vociferous enemies in Carolina, who stoutly opposed the campaign, later villified it as a miserable plundering and slave-catching adventure. To be sure, the affair and its sequel, the Apalache campaign, were not untouched by scandal. Perhaps it was true that the governor and his officers were wont to dine thereafter off the church plate of St. Augustine, and that Spanish Indians labored on Moore's plantations. Moore was ambitious, needy, the head of a large family, but he was also a typical Anglo-American expansionist. 12 [Note 12: For hostile criticism of the Florida campaigns see John Ash, The Present State of Affairs in Carolina (1706?), p. 30, reprinted in Salley (ed.) Narratives~ p. 272; and Colleton county representation, in Rivers, Sketch~ Appendix, p. 456.] So late as August 22 the assembly refused to authorize the governor to proclaim the war. 13 [Note 13: JCHA, August 22, 1702.]