Lucius Augustus Hardee

Lucius Augustus Tarquinses Hardee (born March 24, 1828 in St. Marys Georgia) was the nephew of Lieutenant General William Joseph Hardee, who served in the Confederate States Army under Robert E. Lee. Lucius fought in the Third Seminole Indian War, while his uncle served in the second. He was the first Commissioned Officer from Florida in the American Civil War; mustered in as Captain in the 3rd Infantry, Company F, known as Duval's Cowboy's. Lucius was Chairman of Florida's Democratic Party when Horace Greeley ran for President in 1872 as the representative of the liberal Republican Party, against the eventually victorious Ulysses S. Grant. The Florida Democratic Party supported Greeley, whose platform included ending Reconstruction. Lucius declined to run for Governor of Florida due to ill health. He raised long staple cotton before the
American Civil War on his plantation home in Duval County, Rural Home, he married Esther Ann Crews Haddock in 1853, also in Duval County, Florida. After the war he grew citrus and other plants on the lands of his rebuilt "Honeymoon Home". Lucius was known by the sobriquet of Colonel Hardee, though official promotion to this rank has not been documented. He was the subject of 5 pages from Harriett Beecher Stowe's book on Florida Life, "Palmetto-Leaves", published in 1872. Mrs. Stowe's visit with Colonel Hardee describes the post-plantation nursery as a thriving business led by the energy and industry of this pioneer horticulturist. Colonel Hardee died of malaria on February 9, 1885 in Duval County, Florida, and is buried in the Old City Cemetery in Jacksonville, Florida.

In the 1901 Jacksonville, Florida fire a portrait of Lucius was saved from the home of his daughter, Mary Elizabeth Hardee Bessent, by his grandson. This painting was handed down to a granddaughter, Mrs. Samuel Charles Candler (Frances Godfrey Candler), also the great niece of Asa Griggs Candler. The painting can be found in an a book published by the National Society Dames of America, Georgia, titled "Early Georgia Portraits 1715-1870", Athens, 1975.

[1860 Duval County Florida Agriculture Census - plantation listed under Esther Hardee - [http://ftp.rootsweb.com/pub/usgenweb/fl/duval/census/1860agri.txt] ]

[Smithsonian American Art Museum - Art Inventories database [http://siris-artinventories.si.edu/ipac20/ipac.jsp?uri=full=3100001~!211228!0#focus] ]