Affects on East Florida
East Florida was bordered by the Apalachicol river, the Gulf of Meixoco, and the Atlantic Ocean, with St. Augustin as its capital. James Grant was the first appointed governor of the colony. The land was sparsely populated and most of the Spanish had left. Under Grant's governorship Florida kept good relations with the Indians, eventually signing the Treaty of Fort Picolata which set boundaries between the two peoples. Also during his time in East Florida, Grant was very supportive of settlers and he had a good ability for recruiting them. Compared to West Florida's granting of 380,000 acres, East Florida granted around 2,856,000 acres. Those who entered Florida were mostly Europeans or Southern planters, viewing it as a region extending the Atlantic coastal plain. Grant also promoted the cultivation of cotton and indigo and tried to institute major farming developments to support a growth in poulation. One of his recruits, Dr. Andrew Turnbull, traveled to the southern coast of Turkey with a land grant of 60,000 acres and recruited around 900 settlers of Greek, Italian, and Minorcan descent. In North America this new Turnball colony caused trouble from the start because the English population considered the Catholic Minorcans and Italians to be potential allies of the Spanish in Cuba. Turnball's colony also did not have enough food and shelter. Many of these Europeans fled and the colony collapsed.
In Spanish East Florida, the expansion of the British into the colony because of the French and Indian War caused two things. The first being the large migration of settlers into the area partly due to James Grant. The second being the introduction of many Europeans in the area and the short conflict created between them and the British.
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