Editing Jefferson County, Florida (section)

==History==
In the mid to late 18th century, a group of Native Americans from [[Chiaha]] chiefdom settled in what is now Jefferson County. This group would eventually become an element of the Mikasuki speaking [[Seminole]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Mahon |first1=John K. |title=History of the Second Seminole War, 1835-1842 |date=2017 |publisher=LibraryPress@UF |location=Gainesville, FL |isbn=978-1-947372-26-9 |page=5 |edition=ePub |url=https://ufdc.ufl.edu/aa00061387/00001}}</ref>

Jefferson County was created in 1827. It was named for [[Thomas Jefferson]], third [[president of the United States]], who had died the year before the county's establishment.<ref>{{cite book|title=Publications of the Florida Historical Society|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WZQ-AAAAYAAJ&pg=RA2-PA32|year=1908|publisher=Florida Historical Society.|page=32}}</ref>

===Forts of Jefferson County===
* Fort Roger Jones (1839), Aucilla (Ocilla Ferry), north of US 90.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.irclibrary.org/genealogy/florida.htm |title=IRC Library:Fort Roger Jones |access-date=August 1, 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130316182515/http://www.irclibrary.org/genealogy/florida.htm |archive-date=March 16, 2013 |url-status=dead }}</ref>
* Fort Noel (1839–1842), south of Lamont on the Aucilla River, {{convert|6|mi|km|spell=in}} northwest of Fort Pleasant in Taylor County. Also known as Fort Number Three (M).
* Camp Carter (1838), near Waukeenah.
* Fort Welaunee (1838), a settlers' fort on the Welaunee Plantation near Wacissa. Fort Gamble (1839–1843) was later established here.
* Fort Aucilla (1843), {{convert|2|mi|km|spell=in}} south-east of Fort Gamble, southwest of Lamont, between the Aucilla and Wacissa Rivers. Also spelled Ocilla.
* Fort Wacissa (1838), a settlers' fort located south of Wacissa on the Wacissa River, west of Cabbage Grove.

===American Civil War and Emancipation===
In the two decades leading up to the American Civil War, cotton was the primary source of income in the county, with about seventeen percent of all Florida cotton being grown in Jefferson County. It was also the county with the second most large plantations (fifty-five plantations with thirty or more slaves) in Florida, behind only Leon County. In 1860, the county had a population of 9,876 with sixty-four percent being black. Following [[End of slavery in the United States|emancipation]], the black population of Jefferson County continued to grow. By 1870 the population had risen to 13,968 with seventy-two percent black. To serve the relatively large black population in the county, the [[Freedmen's Bureau]] established an office in Monticello sometime around early 1866.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Stone |first1=Alva T. |title=Diary of a Freedmen's Bureau Agent: Alfred B. Grunwell in Jefferson County, Florida |journal=The Florida Historical Quarterly |date=Summer 2017 |volume=96 |issue=1 |pages=1–5 |jstor=44955725 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/44955725 |access-date=21 October 2024}}</ref>