Abstract
Florida in the 1860s had two distinct socio-economic realities. Middle Florida, the panhandle area around Tallahassee, was home to large plantations reliant on slave labor, whereas the south Florida frontier was home to small family farms and free-range cattle. There were a few plantations along the St Johns River, but most small farmers owned few slaves and relied on family labor. Most farmers in the southern peninsula operated on a subsistence basis that was made even more difficult due to wartime shortages. Florida refugees who fled to Union lines came largely from this poor, yeoman class. Middle Floridians and city dwellers seem to have been more prone to support the Confederacy. The conflict between these two classes cannot be termed a class struggle, as refugees were not seeking to improve their station in life but simply to survive and ensure the safety of their families. Floridians who supported the Union often did so because the Union offered the opportunity for these men to remain in the state and provide for their families, whereas the Confederacy conscripted adult males, sent them to fight at far removed battlefields and sometimes confiscated their family's means of sustenance.