Combat· Patriot War
Smith's Alachua Expedition
A punitive strike into the heart of Seminole country.
After months of ambushes and raids on American supply lines, Lieutenant Colonel Thomas A. Smith led an expedition of Army regulars, Tennessee volunteers, and a Marine detachment under Lieutenant Alexander Sevier into the Alachua region. Over several days the force burned the principal Seminole settlements, Payne's Town and Bowlegs' Town, destroying houses, stores, and crops in retaliation for the resistance that had stalled the Patriot War. The expedition succeeded as a raid: it laid waste to the towns and drove off the inhabitants. It did not break Seminole power or salvage the larger campaign, which by then had lost its political backing in Washington. No Marine casualties are recorded for the action. Within months the whole American effort in East Florida was wound up, and the troops withdrew across the border into Georgia.
Record no. 210