[Florida Territory] [Richard Shippey Hackley] Palmer, Aaron Haight

Office of American and Foreign Agency, New-York, January 1831. Public notice is hereby given to all persons whom it may concern, having claims, debts, inheritances, public securities, &c., payable or recoverable in any part of the United States, or British America [...] Being authorised to dispose of a large tract of land lying on the Gulf of Mexico, in East Florida [...].

New York City: January 1831. Two-page printed circular measuring 7 ¾ x 12 ¾ inches, with manuscript note from Aaron H. Palmer. Folded with some small tears, larger tear at seal not intersecting with text. Overall excellent. Item #List3518

Aaron Haight Palmer (1779–1863) was the director of the “American and Foreign Agency for Claims”—essentially a high-end collections agency—and later Consul General of the Republic of Ecuador. He was extremely well-connected, and his activities included a tour of Europe and Asia to gather information about commerce there for the Rothschilds.[1]

Offered here is an 1831 circular from Palmer’s Agency, signed by Palmer and sent to A. Lang Esq. in Selkirk, Scotland. The circular advertises the sale of “a large tract of land lying on the Gulf of Mexico, in East Florida”, which “is owned in sole propriety by Richard S. Hackley, Esq., an American citizen.” Hackley (1770–1843), a merchant and later US Consul in Spain, had been deeded twelve million acres of land around present-day Tampa by the Duke of Alagon in 1819—who himself had been granted the land by Ferdinand VII in 1817. The circular extols the virtues of the land for sale, especially Tampa as “a favorable site for the foundations of a great maritime city” and Chatham Bay’s “proximity to the West India markets”. At the time, Florida was in the midst of the Seminole Wars; the Treaty of Payne’s Landing would soon demand that all Indigenous people in Florida leave for Indian Territory. It is not clear what came of Palmer’s attempt to sell Hackley’s land; the latter’s heirs’ claims to his estate were settled in 1908 when the US Supreme Court decided that the Kingdom of Spain had annulled the grant prior to the Adams-Onís Treaty giving Florida to the US.

We find one copy of the circular on OCLC. Of interest to historians of the settlement of Florida.

[1] Jessica Lepler, “‘There is no need for anyone to go to America’: commercial correspondence and nineteenth-century globalisation,” Rothschild Archive, https://www.rothschildarchive.org/materials/no_need_to_go_to_america.pdf, accessed February 12, 2026.

Price: $1,000.00