Pearl Randolph, Field Worker
John A. Simms, Editor
Jacksonville, Florida
August 18, 1936

FRANK BERRY


Frank Berry, living at 1614 west Twenty-Second street, Jacksonville,
Florida, claims to be a grandson of Osceola, last fighting chief of the
Seminole tribe. Born in 1858 of a mother who was part of the human
chattel belonging to one of the Hearnses of Alachua County in Florida,
he served variously during his life as a State and Federal Government
contractor, United States Marshal (1881), Registration Inspector (1879).

Being only eight years of age when the Emancipation Proclamation was
issued, he remembers little of his life as a slave. The master was kind
in an impersonal way but made no provision for his freedmen as did many
other Southerners--usually in the form of land grants--although he gave
them their freedom as soon as the proclamation was issued. Berry learned
from his elders that their master was a noted duelist and owned several
fine pistols some of which have very bloody histories.

It was during the hectic days that followed the Civil War that Berry
served in the afore-mentioned offices. He held his marshalship under a
Judge King of Jacksonville, Florida. As State and Federal Government
Contractor he built many public structures, a few of which are still in
use, among them the jetties at Mayport, Florida which he helped to build
and a jail at High Springs, Florida.