First Person Testimony| Theater with a Mission

Extracts from diaries, letters, newspaper stories, and novels by Territorial Tallahassee’s residents, immigrants, and visitors – eyewitnesses to social activities.

Invitation to Explore

This project is sponsored in part by the Department of State, Division of Historical Resources and the State of Florida.

FIRST-PERSON TESTIMONY

Sources about Social Life in Territorial Tallahassee 1824-1845

Archer, Mary. Mary Archer Recipe Book. 1852.

https://www.floridamemory.com/find?keywords=mary+archer+tea+cake

Reproduced by permission of the Tallahassee Historical Society
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Brown, Lizzie. Memoirs of Frances Elizabeth Brown Douglass. 1893.
https://www.floridamemory.com/items/show/346018?id=20

Reproduced by permission of the Florida Historical Society
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Floridian and Advocate, Tallahassee, November 16, 1830. Appendix 6 Ball to Colonel Murat and Lady

Long, Ellen Call, 1825-1905. Florida Breezes; or, Florida, New and Old by Ellen Call Long, 1883. 1883. State Archives of Florida, Florida Memory. <Long, Ellen Call. Florida Breezes; or, Florida, New and Old. 1883. Gainesville, University of Florida Press, 1962.>, accessed 7 August 2025.

Reproduced by permission of the Florida Memory State Library and Archives
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Painted portrait of Prince Achille Murat - Tallahassee, Florida. 1870 (circa). State Archives of Florida, Florida Memory.<https://www.floridamemory.com/items/show/44112>, accessed 5
July 2025.

Reproduced by permission of the Florida Memory State Library and Archives of Florida
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Painted portrait of Princess Catherine Willis Gray Murat - Tallahassee, Florida. 1870 (circa). State Archives of Florida, Florida Memory
<https://www.floridamemory.com/items/show/24860>, accessed 5 July 2025.

Reproduced by permission of the Florida Memory State Library and Archives of Florida
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Shafer, Daniel R. The Secrets of Life, Unveiled Baltimore 1877, p.231-234

Reproduced by permission of Daniel R. Shafer
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Shaw, Bryant. Bryant Shaw’s Commentary on Gumbo & Okra Stew Recipe

Reproduced by permission of Bryant Shaw
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Simmons, William Hayne. “Journal of Dr. W. H. Simmons, Commissioner to Locate the Seat of Government of the Territory of Florida,” Florida Historical Quarterly, volume 1, number 1,1908, pp. 28-36.

Reproduced by permission of the Florida Historical Society
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Ted Saylor Photography. Nea-Math-La, a Seminole chief. 1836. State Archives of Florida, Florida Memory <https://www.floridamemory.com/items/show/24006>, accessed 5 July 2025.