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Lake City, Florida: A Sesquicentennial Tribute (2009) H. Morris Williams, Dr. Kevin M. McCarthy

Chapter Six: 1860 - 1869

While Florida in general adapted to the post-Civil War con-
ditions relatively peacefully, incidents did occur. For example, Willliam
Watson Davis in his Civil War and Reconstruction in Florida noted
that pro-Confederacy forces lynched a Union spy near Lake City in
1865. Those Floridians who had supported the Union during the
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war or who had deserted from the Confederate army were subject to
harassment for years after the end of the conflict. Reconstruction,
which lasted from 1865 to 1877, would be very difficult throughout
the South, including Florida.
According to historian Joe M. Richardson in his article,
“Florida Black Codes,” after the Civil War the southern states passed
very discriminatory laws, called “black codes,” that were meant to
intimidate and even physically harm African Americans. Florida’s black
codes, in fact, were “as severe as any passed in the earlier year, and
her legislature remained ‘bigoted, vindictive and shortsighted.’” For
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example, in Lake City in 1866 authorities convicted two African Ameri-
cans of stealing two boxes of goods from a railroad and were fined
$500. When they could not pay the fine, they were sold to the highest
bidder. Later, a white man, convicted of murdering an African Ameri-
can, was fined $225 and sentenced to an imprisonment of one minute.
One key to economic recovery was rebuilding the state’s rail-
roads, which had been badly damaged during the war. For example,
the Florida Atlantic & Gulf Central Railroad Company, whose logo
was on “money” issued by the company in the 1860s (see below),
connected Lake City to Jacksonville. It became the Florida Central
Railroad Company in 1868.

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