Slave Uprising

White Floridians knew the demographics of their state all too well. Almost outnumbered by their slaves, whites suddenly feared a total uprising. By the end of January, the Seminole allies had overrun sixteen more plantations. The destruction raised the specter of Santo Domingo, the bloody Haitian revolution of 1805. A panicked militia officer wrote to the U.S. Secretary of War:

"Many [slaves] have escaped to and joined the Indians, and furnished them with much important information, and if strong measures [are] not taken to restrain our slaves, there is but little doubt that we should soon be assailed with a servile as well as Indian war."