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A History of Columbia County Florida (1996) Edward F. Keuchel 116/340

A History of Columbia County, Florida
Jacksonville was in operation, but its facilities at Jacksonville
had suffered extensive damage, and the rolling stock was in
need of repair. The junction at Baldwin was in shambles. At
the war’s end the Florida Atlantic and Gulf Central was headed
by Silas L. Niblack and Ferdinand McLeod of Columbia County. It
was unable to meet its obligations and was sold on March 4, 1868,
to William E. Jackson and Associates for $111,000. Under the new
owners the railroad was incorporated as the Florida Central
Railroad Company. The Pensacola and Georgia operating between
Lake City and Quincy was in poor repair but running. It showed a
modest profit during the period 1865-1868, and in August, 1868,
was combined with the Florida Central. The state’s third railroad,
the Florida Railroad connecting Fernandina with Cedar Key, was
in the poorest condition of all since the Confederate government
had removed about twenty-five miles of its track during the war
for use in other parts of the Confederacy.3
Some signs of economic recovery were quick in coming. A boat
load of lumber left Jacksonville for Rio de Janeiro less than two
months after General McCook arrived in Tallahassee. By the
summer of 1865 trade was becoming active throughout East and
Middle Florida, and Lake City, Ocala, Cedar Key, Tampa, and
Jacksonville all appeared to be on the verge of a growth period.4
Silas L. Niblack, Columbia County attorney and Florida Atlantic
and Gulf Central Railroad president, wrote to his friend and busi­
ness associate David Yulee in August of 1865 that cotton was
starting to bring a good price and there were general “good signs
of prosperity” in East and Middle Florida.5 In 1867 Lake City was
connected with Cuba by way of telegraph lines to Key West and a

3Jerrell H. Shofner, Nor Is It Over Yet: Florida in the Era of Reconstruction,
1865-1877 (Gainesville, 1974), pp. 113-14.
4 Ibid., pp. 30, 114.
6S. L. Niblack to D. L. Yulee, August 18, 1865, as cited in Richardson, The
Negro in the Reconstruction of Florida, p. 6.
114

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