Meanwhile an adventurer by the name of McGregor had, with a band of freebooters, taken possession of Amelia Island, which lies off the coast of Florida, just below the mouth of the St. Mary's River, and had, in the name of the Governments of Buenos Ayres and Venezuela, proclaimed the independence of Florida against Spain. They made the island an entrepôt for the smuggling of slaves into the United States, a storehouse for the results of their robberies, and head-quarters generally for piratical expeditions.
[Sidenote: General Gaines sent to Amelia Island.]
By a secret act of the year 1811, the Congress of the United States had declared its unwillingness to have Florida, or any part of it, pass from the hands of Spain into those of any other power, and had authorized the President to prevent it. Acting upon this authority, the President instructed General Gaines to go to Amelia Island and take possession of it.
[Sidenote: General Jackson placed in command in Florida. His orders.]
About ten days later, December 26th, 1817, the President assigned General Jackson to the command of the { 31} troops acting against the Indians. The day before the issue of the order to General Jackson, the War Department had received the news of the Indian attack upon Lieutenant Scott's boat while ascending the Appalachicola with supplies for the United States troops at Fort Scott. The cold-blooded massacre of almost the entire crew of the boat apparently moved the War Department to more energetic measures. The order to General Jackson, besides investing him with the command, empowered him to call on the Governors of the adjacent Commonwealths for such military forces as he might deem necessary, with those already in the field, to overcome the Indians, and informed him that General Gaines had been instructed "to penetrate from Amelia Island, through Florida, to the Seminole towns, if his force would justify his engaging in offensive operations." "With this view," the order to Jackson continues, "you may be prepared to concentrate your forces, and to adopt the necessary measures to terminate a conflict which it has ever been the desire of the President to avoid, but which is now made necessary by their settled hostilities."