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The Pickett Family

John Seymour Pickett, II b. 1774, Virginia, occupation Seminole War Veteran, m. (1) Rebecca Collier, m. (2) 22-Mar-1798, Maria (Mary) A. B. Pons, b. 26-JUL-1791, St. Johns County, St. Augustine, Fl, (daughter of Juan Pons and Juana Catherine Andreu). John died 1847 or 1848, Pickettville, Duval Co., Fl, buried: Plummer Cemetery, Duval County. Seymour and his bride, Rebecca, came by ship from Charleston, SC to Savannah, GA where they boarded the ship of Capt. George Murray. He was heading a colony to settle in Florida, as the Spanish Government encouraged settlers to come in and develop the land and to help control the Indians. Just off the coast of St. Augustine, they encountered a tropical storm and the ship was washed up on the bar and wrecked. Some of the passengers were lost. Among the lost was Rebecca, wife of John Seymour. He did manage to save his small daughter, Mary Rebecca. As Captain Murray's ship was wrecked in service to the Spanish government, he and his colonists were granted land in 1803 in what is now New Smyrna.

In 1804 Pickett bought Hoquin's Plantation from Reuben Hogan, a Revolutionary soldier. The 1814 East Florida Spanish Census lists Seymour (Seymound) Pickett and his wife Rebecca Maria as residents of the Town of Fernandina on Amelia Island.

Pickett married his second wife in Nassau County, FL. She was Maria Pons, from St. Augustine. Her parents were Juan and Juana C. Andrew Pons, natives of Minorca, and they lived in St. Augustine. Pickett and his wife lived in Smyrna, now known as New Smyrna. They lived in that colony for five years, but were forced to flee with the other settlers to St. Augustine, as the Indians had burned the settlement to the ground. They moved to Sibbald's Tract in Duval County, six miles north of the little settlement that would later become Jacksonville in 1822. During the War of 1812-1813, Pickett suffered heavy personal and estate losses and petitioned a claim to the government for reimbursement. The countryside was burned and pillaged, little was left outside the gates of St. Augustine.

Seymour Pickett was one of the first signers for Florida to become a territory of the United States. After Florida became a territory in 1821, Pickett petitioned the government for and was granted the 640 acres on Sibbald's Tract in Duval Co.,that he had settled. It was called Lains Branch and is now part of Lane Avenue in Jacksonville. There is a bridge there now called Pickett's bridge, bounded on the north by Trout River (now at Dinsmore). He settled the area of Lane Avenue and Old Kings Road and it became known as Pickettville. In 1821, he was given the right to keep his Duval and Nassau County lands. Pickett Road, south of Callahan is part of that land grant, also.

I. Mary Rebecca Pickett (daughter of John Seymour Pickett, II and Rebecca Collier) m. Thomas Bellows.

II. John Seymour Pickett III (son of John Seymour Pickett, II and Maria (Mary)A. B. Pons) b. 1810, Pickettville, Duval County, Fl, occupation Seminole War Veteran 1836, m. 14-Jul-1834, in Duval County, Fl, Amanda E. Flinn, b. 1820, Duval Co., Fl, (daughter of Charles E. Flinn and Catherine Dover ?). John died 30-JAN-1889, Pickettville, Duval Co., Fl, buried: Westview Cemetery, Duval County, Fl. John Seymour Pickett III served in the Civil War for about a year.

III. Mary Ana Pickett (daughter of John Seymour Pickett, II and Maria (Mary)A. B. Pons) b. 1811.

IV. Stephen Pickett (son of John Seymour Pickett, II and Maria (Mary)A. B. Pons) b. 1815.

V. James A. Pickett (son of John Seymour Pickett, II and Maria (Mary)A. B. Pons) b. 1819.

VI. Cornelia Ann Louisa Pickett (daughter of John Seymour Pickett, II and Maria (Mary)A. B. Pons) b. 1823.

VII. Francis Pickett (son of John Seymour Pickett, II and Maria (Mary)A. B. Pons) b. 1828.

VIII. Ferdinand Pickett (son of John Seymour Pickett, II and Maria (Mary)A. B. Pons) b. 1833.

Jean Mizell, daughter of Helen B. Hodges
Jean Mizell