With the meeting of the Underground Railroad Conference in St.
Augustine in a few days, our attention turns to those who ran in
the hope of freedom and to those who helped them. From the 1680s
until the Spanish turned over Florida to the British in 1763,
enslaved blacks ran to Spanish Florida from British colonies,
especially from South Carolina. A Spanish royal decree in 1693
had encouraged the runaways by offering the possibility of
freedom. Much of what we know of the individuals who made it to
St. Augustine is provided by the records of St. Augustine’s
Catholic parish. The parish records include information on
blacks of the African “nations” of Caravali, Congo, Guinea,
Mina, as well as others from Jamaica, Mexico, Brazil, Curacao,
New York and New England. Many runaways who arrived in St.
Augustine were baptized and were given freedom or provided with
the possibility of freedom after a period of service. But
sometimes, the runaways were returned to Carolina, especially
when tensions between the British an