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censuses showed Florida was full of infieles
Source: Situado and Sabana #82
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At the time of the Arcos census [1675], St. Catherines Island, with its 9 soldiers on detachment from the presidio, marked the northern border, Satuache having abandoned its exposed position on the frontier some time beforehand. Santa Catalina and its subject pueblos, all now on the same island, could muster only 140 adults and children. Two leagues and a bar away from Santa Catalina was San Joseph de Sapala, which had, counting infieles, some 50 inhabitants. Six leagues on, passing the bars of Aspo and Asao, was Santo Domingo de Asao, with around 30 inhabitants. Their doctrinero was Juan de Uzeda, who would later play an important part in the provincial conflicts analyzed in Chapter 14. Two leagues from Asao was San Simon, a town of 40 infieles. Ocotonico, one league from that, had a population of perhaps 120, probably also infieles. Neither San Simon nor Ocotonico had a doctrinero. Guadalquini, one and a half leagues from Ocotonico, contained maybe 40 persons. Their doctrinero was Pedro de Luna, who would similarly figure in the conflicts that took place in St. Augustine, recounted in Chapter 17. Six leagues and two bars (Guadalquini and Ballenas) from Guadalquini was San Felipe, with 36 people, some of whom were infieles. In 1675 San Felipe was the only pueblo left on Cumberland Island. Three leagues from San Felipe, across the bar of San Pedro, census-taker Arcos reached the "island of Mocama" (Amelia Island), which had four small pueblos. The northernmost, unnamed, contained some 60 infiel Yamasees. One league away was the pueblo of the cacique of Ocotoque, with 40 infieles. La Tama, two leagues from Ocotoque, had 50 infieles. Santa Maria, half a league from La Tama, was the southernmost pueblo, with around 40 infieles. Three leagues away, across the bar of Santa Maria, stood the old ferry town of San Juan del Puerto, with 30 people. The total population of Guale-Mocamo Province was only 676, including an unknown number of Yamasees. Captain Juan Fernandez de Florencia made a census of Apalache and Timucua provinces in the same year as Arcos's census of Guale-Mocamo. Florencia's census-made to a lesser level of accuracy, to the nearest hundred instead of the nearest ten-showed 8720 inhabitants in the 11 pueblos of Apalache and 1370 in the 10 pueblos of Timucua, of whom 940 lived in the district of Yustaga just across the Apalache border (Boyd, 1948: 184-188), making an estimated provincial population of 10,766. Of this total, the Province of Apalache represented 81 percent of the total, Timucua 13 percent, and Guale-Mocamo a mere 6 percent. If the population of Yustaga is added to that of Apalache, it becomes strikingly apparent that the population of central Florida had not ceased to decline in the 20 years since the mid-century rebellions and epidemics. Without Yustaga, Timucua, still the largest province geographically, held only 4 percent of the Christian native population: a bare 430 people in a handful of isolated settlements to service the transportation network and to work on the cattle ranches that were starting to spread across the lonely lake country. (Bushnell SS)
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