By: HISTORY.com Editors

The U.S. acquires Spanish Florida

Published: February 09, 2010Last Updated: May 28, 2025

Spanish minister Do Luis de Onis and U.S. Secretary of State John Quincy Adams sign the Florida Purchase Treaty, in which Spain agrees to cede the remainder of its province of Florida to the United States.

Spanish colonization of the Florida peninsula began at St. Augustine in 1565. By the 17th century, the Spanish began coming under attack from Native Americans defending their ancestral homelands and English colonists encroaching from the north. Spain’s last-minute entry into the French and Indian War on the side of France cost it Florida, which the British acquired through the first Treaty of Paris in 1763. After 20 years of British rule, however, Florida was returned to Spain as part of the second Treaty of Paris, which ended the American Revolution in 1783.

How St. Augustine Became the First Permanent European Settlement in America

St. Augustine, Florida was founded by Spanish explorers long before Jamestown and the Plymouth Colony.

By: Patrick J. Kiger

Spain’s hold on Florida proved tenuous in the years after American independence, and numerous boundary disputes developed with the United States. In 1819, after years of negotiations, Secretary of State John Quincy Adams achieved a diplomatic coup with the signing of the Florida Purchase Treaty, which officially put Florida into U.S. hands at no cost beyond the U.S. assumption of some $5 million of claims by U.S. citizens against Spain. Formal U.S. occupation began in 1821, and General Andrew Jackson, the hero of the War of 1812, was appointed military governor. Florida was organized as a U.S. territory in 1822 and was admitted into the Union as a slave state in 1845.

Timeline

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1732

George Washington is born

On February 22, 1732, George Washington is born in Westmoreland County, Virginia, the first of six children of Augustine and Mary Ball Washington. (Augustine had three additional children from his first marriage.) An initially loyal British subject, Washington eventually led the Continental Army in the American Revolution and became the new nation’s first president. He […]

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1777

Archibald Bulloch dies under mysterious circumstances

On February 22, 1777, Revolutionary War leader and Georgia’s first Provisional Governor Archibald Bulloch dies under mysterious circumstances just hours after Georgia’s Council of Safety grants him the powers of a dictator in expectation of a British invasion. Bulloch was born in Charleston, South Carolina, in 1730 to a Scottish father, James, and his Puritan […]

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1847

Battle of Buena Vista begins

During the Mexican-American War, Mexican General Santa Anna surrounds the outnumbered forces of U.S. General Zachary Taylor at the Angostura Pass in Mexico and demands an immediate surrender. Taylor refuses, allegedly replying, “Tell him to go to hell.” Early the next morning, Santa Anna dispatches some 15,000 troops to move against the 5,000 Americans. Thus […]

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1851

San Francisco vigilantes take the law into their own hands

An angry mob in San Francisco’s business district ”tries” two Australian suspects in the robbery and assault of C. J. Jansen. When the makeshift jury deadlocked, the suspects were returned to law enforcement officials. It was one of the most prominent vigilante moments of the California Gold Rush period. Jansen was working at his store at […]

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1917

Mussolini wounded by mortar bomb

On February 22, 1917, Sergeant Benito Mussolini is wounded by the accidental explosion of a mortar bomb on the Isonzo section of the Italian Front in World War I. Born in Predappio, Italy, in 1883, the son of a blacksmith and a teacher, Mussolini was well-read, largely self-educated and had worked as a schoolteacher and […]

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1942

President Roosevelt to MacArthur: Get out of the Philippines

President Franklin D. Roosevelt orders Gen. Douglas MacArthur out of the Philippines, as the American defense of the islands collapses. The Philippines had been part of the American commonwealth since it was ceded by Spain at the close of the Spanish-American War. When the Japanese invaded China in 1937 and signed the Tripartite Pact with […]

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1946

George Kennan sends “long telegram” to State Department

George Kennan, the American charge d’affaires in Moscow, sends an 8,000-word telegram to the Department of State detailing his views on the Soviet Union, and U.S. policy toward the communist state. Kennan’s analysis provided one of the most influential underpinnings for America’s Cold War policy of containment and became a foundational document of 20th-century U.S. […]

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1959

Lee Petty wins first Daytona 500

On February 22, 1959, Lee Petty defeats Johnny Beauchamp in a photo finish at the just-opened Daytona International Speedway in Florida to win the first-ever Daytona 500. The race was so close that Beauchamp was initially named the winner by William France, the owner of the track and head of the National Association for Stock […]

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1967

Suharto takes full power in Indonesia

On February 22, 1967, Indonesian President Sukarno surrenders all executive authority to military dictator General Haji Mohammad Suharto, remaining president in title only. In 1965, Suharto, a senior army officer, narrowly saved Sukarno from a communist coup. In the aftermath, he moved to replace Sukarno and launched a purge of Indonesian communists that resulted in […]

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1969

Barbara Jo Rubin becomes first female jockey to win a U.S. thoroughbred race

On February 22, 1969, 19-year-old Barbara Jo Rubin becomes the first female jockey to win a race at an American thoroughbred track when she rides Cohesion to a victory by a neck over Reely Beeg in the ninth race at Charles Town, West Virginia. That she raced at all was a testament to Rubin’s ability […]

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1978

Navstar 1, the world’s first operational GPS satellite, launches

The U.S. Air Force launches Navstar 1, the world’s first operational GPS satellite, from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. GPS begins as a military technology, but expands to transform industries from aviation to communications. Global Positioning System (GPS) technology is an indispensible part of 21st century life, powering everything from rideshare apps to fitness […]

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1980

U.S. hockey team beats the Soviets in the “Miracle on Ice”

In one of the most dramatic upsets in Olympic history, the underdog U.S. hockey team defeats the Soviets at the XIII Olympic Winter Games in Lake Placid, New York

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1983

“Moose Murders” opens—and closes—on Broadway

The notorious play “Moose Murders” bombs on Broadway, opening and closing at New York’s Eugene O’Neill Theater on the same night. In doing so, its name becomes synonymous for an abysmal theatrical flop. An aging movie star, Texas oil money and a man-eating moose failed to save the show, which tied the Broadway record for […]

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2006

Gang commits largest robbery in British history

In the early morning hours of February 22, 2006, a gang of at least six men, some of them armed, steal £53 million from the Securitas bank depot in Kent, Great Britain. It was the largest such theft in British history. The plot was well planned. On the evening before, two men, dressed as police […]

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2014

‘El Chapo,’ the world’s most-wanted drug kingpin, is captured in Mexico

On February 22, 2014, one of the world’s most-wanted criminals, Joaquin “El Chapo” (“Shorty”) Guzmán Loera, head of the Sinaloa cartel, the world’s biggest drug trafficking organization, is captured and arrested in a joint U.S.-Mexican operation in Mazatlán, Mexico, after outrunning law enforcement for more than a decade. Guzmán had been the target of an international […]

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