In 1738, the Spanish established Gracia Real de Santa de Theresa de Mose. Fort Mose is the first legal settlement of free people of African descent in the New World. Runaway slaves and Indian tribes allied with the Spanish and joined the Fort Mose Militia to defend Spanish Florida from the British forces and their new found freedom.
The Fort Mose militia, led by Captain Francisco Memendea played a major role in defeating the British invasion of Florida in 1740, which was the first major defeat of British troops in North America - not during the American Revolution but at the Bloody Battle of Fort Mose just north of St. Augustine. And, the original Underground Railroad ran south to Spanish Florida.
