Last week we began studying one of the early settlers of Suwannee County, Thomas Dexter. We complete that study today.

Thomas Dexter, like many early settlers, was involved with a variety of government positions and businesses. Dexter was listed as a merchant in Lake City in 1850, where he had a clerk by the name of John Adams working for him. The next year, Dexter was the best bidder in 1851 for Postal Delivery Route 3505 from Jacksonville to Alligator (now Lake City) twice a week. His bid of $1,371 for a 2-horse coach or $1,796 for a 4-horse coach was accepted by the Postal Service on April 14, 1851. It is unknown how long he ran the route. What is known is that Dexter was postmaster of Mineral Springs again between July 15, 1854, and May 31, 1855, when the post office there closed.

On July 17, 1855, Dexter was appointed first postmaster of St. Helena, a community whose exact location is now lost. Odds are it was the same as Helena, a community shown on maps of the late 1870s and early 1880s as being between Houston and Suwannee Springs south of the Pine Grove community. Dexter served as postmaster at St. Helena until at least June 30, 1861. On May 10, 1855, Dexter is listed in Jacksonville’s The Florida Republican as the Mineral Springs agent for Sea Island cotton gins. Dexter is also listed as an agent in the November 29, 1856, edition of Jacksonville’s The Florida News.

By the creation of Suwannee County in December 1858, Dexter was a wealthy and influential merchant. His plantation was located on White Springs Road and included the location of the University of Florida’s IFAS Suwannee Valley Agricultural Extension Center; the nearby lake is actually named Dexter Lake. The Dexter plantation was really a small community in and of itself, providing everything the Dexter family needed. Beyond that, Dexter’s mansion had the latest furniture, purchased from abroad.

As we review history, we find that not everything is pleasant. The blight of slavery, which affected all races and colors for thousands of years, lasted in the United States until the end of the Civil War in 1865. History records numerous great figures as being slave owners, including 12 American presidents (the last being Union general Ulysses S. Grant). Thomas Dexter was one of the many Americans who owned slaves during his lifetime. In Suwannee County’s first Federal census in 1860, Thomas Dexter was listed as the largest slave owner in the County, with 53 slaves.

During the 1930s, the Federal Government spread throughout the nation to record the histories of former slaves, and Claude Augustus Wilson was one of them. Claude was born on the plantation of Thomas Dexter, and although still a child when the Civil War ended, he was able to give details about his life on the Dexter plantation. These details included the death of Thomas Dexter, which occurred on October 21, 1862, as a result of a cotton gin fire.

“A History of Columbia County,” written by Edward F. Keuchel, discusses part of the Slave Narratives: “Claude Augustus Wilson was another Columbia countian who was born a slave. Wilson was born in 1857 on the plantation of Tom Dexter near Alligator. Dexter was a merchant as well as a large slave owner. Wilson regarded his master as a kindly man and thought Dexter’s alleged Yankee ancestry responsible. On the other hand the master’s wife Mary Ann Dexter was a southerner and said to be just the opposite. Although Wilson was only eight years old when the slaves were freed he remembers the Dexter plantation as being a large operation where the slaves worked under a driver from dawn to dusk. Wilson worked in the fields as a boy while his mother and sister worked in the Dexter mansion. Wilson stated that his mother was rebellious and harassed the ‘Missus’ until she was allowed to work in the fields so she could ‘be near her man’…Wilson recalled that Tom Dexter died from injuries caused from a gin house fire. This was during the Civil War period, and the slaves were apprehensive over the thought of the hated mistress being in charge of the plantation. When peace came Mrs. Dexter informed the slaves that they could stay on the plantation if they so desired and keep half of what they raised. None stayed.”

Claude Wilson discussed the death of Thomas Dexter in even greater detail in a portion of the Slave Narratives that Edward Keuchel did not quote. “His master did not go to war but remained on the plantation. One day at noon during the war the gin house was seen to be afire, one of the slaves rushed in and found the master badly burned and writhing in pain. He was taken from the building and given first aid, but his body being burned in oil and so badly burned it burst open, thus ended the life of the kindly master of Claude.”

Thomas Dexter was buried in a location that has been lost to time (well, at least to my knowledge). It is possible that he was buried upon his own plantation. His wife Mary Ann died in 1893. Dexter’s descendants continued to live in Suwannee County after his death, influencing the community through the mid-1900s and beyond.

Eric Musgrove can be reached at ericm@suwgov.org or 386-362-0564.