page_title: Zephaniah Kingsley
section_title: Fort George Island
hierarchical_section_title: Zephaniah Kingsley / Fort George Island
caption_attribution_description: English: View of the kitchen (left) and main house used by Zephaniah Kingsley and Anna Madgigine Jai Kingsley
context_page_description: Zephaniah Kingsley Jr., a Quaker born in England who moved as a child with his family to South Carolina, became a planter, slave trader, and merchant who built several plantations in the Spanish colony of Florida in what is now Jacksonville, Florida. He served on the Florida Territorial Council after Florida was acquired by the United States in 1821. Kingsley Plantation, which he owned and where he lived for 25 years, has been preserved as part of the Timucuan Ecological and Historic Preserve, run by the United States National Park Service.
  Kingsley was a relatively lenient slaveholder, who allowed his slaves the opportunity to be hired out and earn their freedom. He took four enslaved African women as common-law wives, practicing polygamy. His first wife, Anna Madgigine Jai Kingsley, was 13 years old when Kingsley purchased her in Havana. He said that he had married her, which he never said of his three other common-law wives. He emancipated Anna Jai when she turned 18, and trusted her with running his plantation when he was away on business. He had a total of nine mixed-race children with his wives.
context_section_description: In 1814, Kingsley and Anna moved to a plantation on Fort George Island at the mouth of the St. Johns River; they lived there for 25 years. Anna and Kingsley's fourth and last child was born on Fort George Island in 1824.
  Kingsley took three younger enslaved women as common-law wives (or concubines) and fathered children with at least two of them, totaling nine children in all. He eventually freed each of the slave women: they were named Flora Kingsley, Sarah Kingsley, who brought her son Micanopy; and Munsilna McGundo, who brought her daughter Fatima. The Kingsley family was, according to historian Daniel Stowell, "complex at best". In his will, the only woman Kingsley named as his wife was Anna. Primary documentation by Kingsley is scarce, but historians consider Flora, Sarah, and Munsila as "lesser wives", or "co-wives" with Anna. Stowell suggests "concubines" is a more accurate description of their status. Kingsley lavished all his children with affection, attention, and luxury. They were educated with the best European teaching he could afford. When he entertained visitors at his Fort George plantation, Anna sat "at the head of the table"; they were "surrounded by healthy and handsome children" in a parlor decorated with portraits of African women.
  The plantation featured a main house and a two-story structure called the "Ma'am Anna House". It had a kitchen on the ground floor and living quarters on the second. Anna lived there with her children, as was the custom among the Wolof people.
  The plantation produced oranges, sea island long-staple cotton, indigo, okra, and other vegetables. Approximately 60 slaves were managed under the task system: each slave had a quota of work to do per day. When they were finished, they were allowed to do what they wished. Some slaves had personal gardens which they were allowed to cultivate, and from which they sold vegetables. 
  Thirty-two cabins were constructed for and by the slaves, made from tabby, which made them durable, insulated, and inexpensive, although labor-intensive. The cabins were located about a quarter of a mile (400 m) from the main house. Slaves were allowed to padlock their cabins and build porches that faced away from the main house. Both of these features were unusual for slave quarters in the antebellum South.
  Kingsley was a lenient slave owner:
  I never interfered with their connubial concerns, nor domestic affairs, but let them regulate these after their own manner. I taught them nothing but what was useful [religion was to Kingsley "not useful"] and what I thought would add to their physical and moral happiness. I encouraged as much as possible dancing, merriment and dress, for which Saturday afternoon and night, and Sunday morning were dedicated; and, after allowance, their time was usually employed in hoeing their corn, and getting a supply of fish for the week. ... They were perfectly honest and obedient, and appeared quite happy, having no fear but that of offending me; and I hardly had occasion to apply other correction then shaming them. If I exceeded this, the punishment was quite light, for they hardly ever failed in doing their work well.
  "A patriarchal feeling of affection is due to every slave from his owner, who should consider the slave as a member of his family."
caption: The kitchen (left) and main house (right) on Fort George Island. Anna Madgigine Jai lived separately with her children in the kitchen house, a practice common among Wolof women.
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