Floridas political history has been shaped by many different people -- the French, English, Spanish, Cuban, African-American, Puerto Rican, Yankees, Southerners and more. While Florida politics are not as Celtic-influenced as, say, those of Boston or New York, there have been a few leaders with Irish roots reigning over the Sunshine State.
One Florida politician in particular -- no, not former U.S. Rep. Andy Ireland -- deserves our attention on St. Patricks Day.
Born in County Dublin in 1834 (sorry but, as a good Irish Catholic boy myself, I will not name the town since it was associated with William III when he
chased James II, the Stuarts and the Wild Geese out of Ireland back in 1690) before moving to the Panhandle in the 1850s, Charles W. Jones was one of the rising stars of Florida politics during the 1870s and won election to the U.S. Senate in 1875 in an early sign of Republican rule in Reconstruction starting to crumble.
Jones won a second term in 1881 and returned to Ireland in 1883. When he returned, Jones was one of the leaders who helped ensure the Irish Catholic vote for Democratic presidential nominee Grover Cleveland in the 1884 election over James G. Blaine. Of course Jones efforts were helped by a prominent Republican calling the Democrats the party of rum, Romanism and rebellion at an event with Blaine -- and the fact that Blaine did not object to the phrase helped ensure the Irish vote would go for Cleveland.
With the Democrats winning a presidential election for the first time since 1856, Jones was expected to use the federal patronage to help party members across the state, especially with projects like the naval base in Pensacola which the senator had supported for years.
Of course, like the fate of almost every Irish political leader from Brian Boru to Michael Collins to Parnell to Wolfe Tone to John Redmond (the sad part is, I can go on and on here), things turned tragic for Jones.
Jones left the Senate in 1885 to go on vacation in Canada and Detroit, and never came back to Washington. There were rumors that Jones, who had lost his wife in 1880, was stalking a prominent young woman and that he had gone insane. Those rumors turned out to be true. Jones would wander the streets of Detroit for a few years, sleeping in hallways and eating at cheap restaurants, convinced that the whole world was conspiring against his attempt to woo the young lady. Even after the lady married and went off to Europe, Jones would send ranting letters to prominent people, making all sorts of accusations.
Eventually, in 1890, his son had him sent off to an asylum. He passed away at the asylum in Michigan in 1897 but his remains are interred at St. Michaels Cemetery in Pensacola, not too far from those of Confederate Naval Secretary Stephen Mallory, the only Floridian in Jefferson Davis Cabinet.
While the Sunshine State has produced more than its share of offbeat political leaders, none of them has as strange and hard a fate as the one Jones suffered. Its a grim and tragic tale, like something out of a John Millington Synge play, more suited for Ireland than Florida -- and therefore fitting for St. Patricks Day.
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Reach Kevin Derby at kderby@sunshinestatenews.com or at (850) 727-0859. Unlike Jones, who was put in an an asylum due to his love for a woman, Kevin will be instiutionalized due to his love for obscure Florida political history.
