WPA

Monroe County was created on July 3, 1823, by an Act of the Legislative Council of the Territory of Florida. It was named in honor of James Monroe, President of the United States at the time the county was established. Key West was chosen as the county seat.

Created from?

Monroe County is unique in that it is constituted largely of islands. Nowhere else in the entire United States is there such a province of tropical singularity as the extreme southern tip of the Florida peninsula. On the west coast are the Ten Thousand Islands, and from the mainland more than a hundred miles into the Gulf of Mexico stretches the long line of Florida Keys. Connecting these islands with the peninsula is a railway line one hundred and eleven miles long which was built at tremendous cost and is regarded as one of the outstanding engineering feats of the United States. The Overseas Highway is a hard-surfaced road across the keys [sic] which now affords the pleasures of motor travel under very unusual conditions for thousands of motorists each year. There are two gaps in the highway which are spanned by ferries maintaining regular schedules.

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The early history of Monroe county begins with Ponce de Leon's first visit to Florida. He coasted south and sailed around the keys as far as the islands which he named Tortugas, before he made his way up the west coast to what is now Charlotte Harbor. The low lying Florida Keys he called Los Martieres, because to him the rocky islands had the appearance of twisted and suffering souls. No settlement was made at the time of Ponce de Leon's first visit. From then until the cession of the Floridas to the United States, the islands or keys [sic] were resorted to only by Indians, piratical crews, and fishermen (many of them from St. Augustine) who were engaged in supplying the market of Havana. Pirates found a paradise in the Florida Keys, with their commodious harbors encircled by shoals and reefs, apparently made to order for the lucrative practice of looting. Key West, or Cayo Hueso as it was called, situated at the entrance to the Gulf, fronting on a natrual, sheltered, deep-water harbor, had many advantages and gained an unenviable reputation as a pirates' nest during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

The earliest recorded history of Key West is to be found in a grant of the island of Cayo [Hueso] on August 26, 1815, by Don Juan de Estrada, then Spanish Governor of Florida, to Juan Pablo Salas. Salas sold the island for $2,000 to John W. Simonton in 1821, about the time of the cession of Florida to the United States. Later, parts of the island were bought by John Warner, United States consul, John Mountain, commercial agent for the United States at Havana, John Whitehead, and John W. C. Fleming. The interests of Warner and Mountain were soon transferred to Pordon C. Green, who became a permanent resident of the island. Several families from South Carolina and other States, and from

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St. Augustine who came shortly after, were hospitably received by the proprietors, and building lots were given them within that part of the island intended to be laid out for the city of Key West. 

In 1822, Lieutenant M. C. Perry, hoisted the United States flag over the island, thereby proclaiming its sovereignty over this and the neighboring islands included in Monroe county. During the same year, Commodore David Porter, set up a naval base at Key West. With shallow draft vessels Porter industriously and efficiently set about exterminating the pirate nuisance.

Thompson's Island

Then came the class of settlers called "wreckers". Ships sailed from ports all over the world to be wrecked on the Florida Reef; they were salvaged by the early "conchs", those men from the Bahama Islands who saw Key West as a profitable place for their wrecking trade. In 1825, on Key West, was sold $233,000 worth of salvaged property - silverware, wines, laces, and silks.

Naval defense authorities early recognized the strategic importance of Key West. Commodore Porter used it as a base of operations when he drove the pirates from the Caribbean; the Government looked upon it as a logical port of entry and established there a customs house; coast and harbor were surveyed, and by 1823 a regularly constituted naval depot existed on the island. In 1828 the city of Key West was incorporated, and within the city limits lived most of Monroe county's 500 inhabitants.

Population increased, scattered mainly along the Gulf shore of the keys. The centrally located Matecumbe Keys became wrecking headquarters. Plater, an important early settlement, sprang up on Key Largo, along the ocean front north of present Tavernier. On Knight Key a peculiar industry was established: the beche de mar, a sort of sea slug, was salted down (with Key Veccas salt) and exported as a delicacy to the Orient.

In December 1835, Major Dade, commandant of the Key West Army Post, left the keys and on a march from Tampa to Fort King was ambuscaded and massacred by Indians with his entire command. During the long bloody warfare that followed, key [sic] settlers were constantly on the alert to prevent surprise attacks. About 1839 Tea Table Key was made a base of operations for Navy cooperation with Army maneuvers[.] In 1840 Indian Key boasted a population of twenty families. That year 300 Indians wiped out the peaceful little settlement, with the exception of a few individuals who found precarious concealment. Heroic Dr. Henry Perrine saved his family by rushing them into a cellar; he stayed above to hide the opening and died fighting.

In 1828 Congress passed the bill establishing a Territorial or Federal Court at Key West under the title, "Superior Court of the Southern Judical District of the Territory of Florida".

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Its jurisdiction extended over that part of "the territory which lies souh of a line from Indian River on the east and Charlotte Harbor on the west, including the latter harbor." This was the first governing body to have jurisdiction over Monroe County. Judge James Webb of Georgia was commissioned first Judge of the Superior Court in 1828. When Florida was admitted to the Union in 1845, this court was succeeded by the United States Court for the Southern Disctict of Florida. After statehood, justice was administered by a Circuit and a Probate Court. Monroe County was in the Southern Circuit, and the first judge was William Marvin. In 1868 the first County Court was established and James W. Locke was appointed judge.

Before the survey of Key West and before the town was chartered, there was erected on Jackson Square a building known as the county courthouse which was altered and improved by the United States government in 1830. Jackson Square is the property of the city of Key West. No deed or grant to this square was ever made, but in the division of the land among the original agrarian? proprietors, it was treated as common or public property, and the city holds Jackson Square in trust, as it holds the streets, for public purposes. In 1889 the wooden courthouse, where court had been held, where Christians of all denominations had worshipped, where marriage ceremonies had been performed, and funeral services held, was torn down to make way for the commodious brick courthouse which now stands on the square.

The original boundaries of Monroe County were, to quote from the Legislative Acts of the Territory of Florida: "all that part of the Territory aforesaid being south of a line commencing at Boca Gasparilla, the mouth of Charlotte Harbor on the Gulf of Mexico, and extending up the northern margin of said Charlotte Harbor to the mouth of Charlotte River; thence up the northern margin of said river to Lake Macaco, (Mayoco), Spiritu Santo Lagoon; thence along the northern margin of said lake to its most eastern limits; thence in a direct line to the head waters of Potomac River, (Hillsborough); thence down said river to its entrance into the ocean, together with all the keys [sic] and islands of The Cape of Florida." [sic] citation? In 1836, Dade county was created from the west part of the county. In 1859, the boundaries of Monroe county were again changed and a portion of the county on the mainland was cut off to form a part of Manatee county. In 1866, another change was made which gave back to Monroe county all the islands from Old Roads Key to Bahia Honda which had been taken by the act of 1836. In 1887, Lee county was created from the northern part of the county.

The present boundaries of Monroe county are: Collier County on the north, Dade county on the east, the Gulf of Mexico and part of the Ten Thousand Islands on the west, Florida Bay on the south. The county boundaries include all that long line of islands, called keys [sic], stretching from the mainland at the southeat corner of Dade County to westernmost Loggerhead Key, a hundred and fifty miles southwest, into the Gulf of Mexico.

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The area of Monroe county is 692,973 acres, and the population is 13,315. The population increases by thousands during the fishing season with the annual arrival of sportsmen. The climate is considered by many as ideal. No frost has ever been seen on the islands.

The Seminole Indian Reservation is located in the southern part of the mainland, and here a few Seminoles live under the same conditions as those which prevailed when the country was discovered four hundred years ago.