When General Taylor assumed the command of the army, there was a feeling of deep disgust prevalent among the regular troops at the practice of seizing and enslaving the Exiles.
We have already noticed the fact, that the citizens of Florida supposed the war to have been commenced principally to enable them to get possession of negroes whom they might enslave. Indeed, they appear not to have regarded it as material, that the claimant should have previously owned the negro. If they once obtained control of his person, he was hurried into the interior of Georgia, Alabama, or South Carolina, where he was sold and held as a slave. And the Florida volunteers, while nominally in service, appear to have been far more anxious to catch negroes than to meet the enemy in battle.
This feeling was so general among the people and troops of Florida, that General Call, Governor of the Territory, recommended to the Secretary of War that military expeditions should be fitted out for the purpose of going into the Indian Country, in order to capture negroes, who, when captured, _should be sold, and the avails of such sales applied to defray the expenses of the war_.
It is easy to see that this feeling would lead the regular troops to entertain great contempt for the volunteers of Florida; and a corresponding feeling of hostility would arise on the part of such volunteers toward the regular troops.
These feelings operated upon President Jackson in ordering the withdrawal of General Scott; and General Jessup sought to appease this hostility by obeying the dictates of the slave power. Indeed, whatever appears like a violation of pledged faith, or bears the evidence of treachery on the part of General Jessup, may probably with great justice be attributed to the popular sentiment of the Territory. He had assiduously captured, and delivered over to bondage, hundreds of persons whom he had most solemnly covenanted to "_protect in their persons and property_."
General Taylor discarded this entire policy. His first efforts were to make the Indians and Exiles understand that he sought their emigration to the Western Country, for the advancement of their own interest and happiness. Owing to these circumstances there was scarcely any blood shed in Florida while he had command. The army was no longer employed to hunt and to chase down women and children, who had been reared in freedom among the hommocks and everglades of that Territory.