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Lake City, Florida: A Sesquicentennial Tribute (2009) H. Morris Williams, Dr. Kevin M. McCarthy
Chapter Six: 1860 - 1869
The decade of the 1860s was to be one of the most traumatic
in the history of Lake City and Florida and the South. It began with
high hopes as officials planned for a railroad from Jacksonville to Lake
City. When the final one thousand tons of iron arrived from England in
January 1860 for the building of that railroad, preparations were made
for completing the line and for celebrating that completion.
In March 1860 some eight hundred Jacksonville citizens went
on the new rail line to Lake City to enjoy a free barbecue, many
speeches, and promises of how the railroad would bring prosperity
to both towns. The Civil War, of course, would delay that prosperity.
After the election of Abraham Lincoln as U.S. President in November
1860, the southern states put into motion the movement of secession.
Florida delegates to their secession convention voted in January 1861
to secede from the Union.
The two members of the Secession Convention from Columbia
County were Green H. Hunter (top row, arrow) and
Arthur J.T. Wright (3rd row from the top, arrow).
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