Edited by Spessard Stone from an article by Nathan H. DeCoster from The Fort Myers Press of September 12, 1885. DeCoster (1837-1912), a native of Maine, was a Union officer, who settled in Charlotte Harbor.
Charlotte Harbor, Fla.
August 26, 1885
Editor, Fort Myers Press
Dear Sir:
I presume a brief mention of my twenty-two years sojourn in South Florida will be of interest to your northern readers, especially as I came from the extreme north having first seen the light in the northern portion of Maine, near the Canada line, where I lived for twenty-two years, when the tide of war drifted me upon the Gulf Coast of Florida-the opposite extreme.
I will first venture the assertion that comparatively few of our northern people have anything like a correct conception of our climate. They doubtless think that a place so far near the tropics must be very hot, and will doubtless be much surprised when told we never have so hot a day by several degrees as they have in New England.
I have kept a thermometer in my office for several years and have never seen it above 97 degrees in summer, nor below 30 in winter.
On the 15th day of December, 1863, I left New York for Florida. The weather was very cold. With the heaviest flannels and overcoats I could hardly keep warm. In less than five days we landed in Key West in the midst of birds and flowers.
The change in that brief period of time was so truly wonderful as to almost delude me with the idea that I was in fairy land, and I at once made up my mind that I would never spend another winter in the regions of snow and ice.
It is said by many that South Florida is a great sanitarium and that most invalids will receive more benefit by coming and basking in the rays of our genial sun than by taking the most patent drugs, and most truly was this so in my case.
Two years campaign in the army of the Potomac, together with wounds, chills and fever, typhoid fever, and pneumonia, had, I thought, well nigh ruined my once strong constitution. The doctor of the hospital, after a three months trial of his skill, told me he could do nothing for me and that I had better resign and go home to my friends, as, in his opinion, it would be a long time before I would be fit for service, if I ever was again.
But on ascertaining my regiment was in Florida, he advised me to join it saying that the climate might benefit me, and so it did. When I arrived in Key West, I could not walk fifty yards without resting. But I soon began to get better.
The balmy breezes and genial climate did for me what physic had failed to do, and I was soon on duty again and, with the exception of one brief spell of sickness, was on duty until the close of the war, where I was mustered out in Florida, where I have ever since remained, with the exception of about two months when I revisited my native state-dear old Maine.
In Feb. 1865 (1866?), I bought a small schooner, hired four colored men, took horses, farming utensils, etc. and came to this place where I settled on the lovely waters of Charlotte Harbor, at that time several miles from any human being, and the first year cleared, fenced and planted land sufficient to raise over two thousand bushels of sweet potatoes, besides a sufficient quantity of garden vegetables for family use.
I planted out a nursery of tropical trees, consisting of oranges, lemons, limes, grapefruit, mangoes, coconuts, sapodillas, sugar-apples, most of which are doing well.
Upon our trees can now be seen as large and as fine coconuts as can be found anywhere in their native home.
Our guava trees, of which we have thousands, are now bending under their weight of delicious fruit, just beginning to ripen.
Our grapefruit, lemon, lime, citron, and orange are also bearing fruit, though I do not think the latter do quite as well as they would farther back from salt water, but most of the strictly tropical fruits do better on the bay as water protection prevents their being injured by frost.
We have twenty-seven kinds of tropical and semitropical fruits growing here, which can be seen and will speak for themselves. We are of the opinion that most, if not all, kinds of fruit grown in the tropics will succeed here with proper treatment.
What can be done as yet we do not know, as comparatively little attention has been paid to horticulture in this section. Stock raising has been the great absorbing business and has retarded very much all kinds of agricultural pursuits.
The soil of Florida is varied. Much of it is sandy, while a portion of it is very rich. Our hammocks and saw-grass ponds are very rich, and some of it is inexhaustible, and will, produce immense crops of sugar cane, rice, and all other kinds of vegetables, and there is not a day in the year when some kinds cannot be planted.
Even our light sandy soils, when slightly fertilized, grow paying crops of sweet potatoes, arrowroot, cassava, beans, peas, some corn, and as fine pumpkins, squashes and watermelons as ever grew.
I have never seen a lovelier sheet of water than the bay of Charlotte Harbor.
We would not say there has not been political prejudice in the past, nor that it is entirely free from it at the present time, but we do say that life and property is just as safe as any portion of the United States.
The fact of our having lived here for twenty years, and that we came here just at the close of the war, had been an officer in a colored regiment, and always an outspoken Republican ought to convince any one of the truth of the above assertion.
The people are hospitable and generous to a fault, always ready and willing to entertain strangers and give them the best they have.
There are, it is true, some large stock raisers who do not favor immigration. They are now making money so fast and easy that they ask for nothing better. They want no settlers nor railroad to take up the range.
We cannot blame them. It is self-interest that to a greater or less extent actuates us all, but they will soon fall into line in the march of improvement and soon feel thankful for railroads and society.
In conclusion, we would say to the citizens of the north, if you are tired of contenting with the fierce winds and drifting snows of your rugged clime for nearly six months of the year, we extend to you a warm welcome and can offer you a home in our genial clime, where you can truly sit under your own vine and fig tree, with none to molest nor make afraid, and gather in the golden harvest of oranges and other tropical fruits.
Come to this sunny land where the mocking bird lulls you to sleep every night and wakes you every morning with its sweetest song.
This article was published in The Herald-Advocate (Wauchula, Fla.) of May 3, 2001.
May 03, 2001 & October 17, 2001 & midi = Grieg, "Morning."