Chaseville

By far the most prominent river port in Arlington, Reddie (Chaseville) Point was an 800-acre plantation with a large dock, owned by Capt. William Reddy during the 20-year English occupation of Florida (1763-1783). It bordered the Newcastle Plantation to the east (Heath Road) and went nearly as far south as Ft. Caroline Road. Reddy sold it before the Spanish took over in 1784, and it was abandoned when Florida came under Spanish rule but the point retained his name (albeit spelled slightly different, i.e., Reddie vs. Reddy).

In the second Spanish period (1783-1821), Francis Richard was granted 182 acres on the northwest side of the point, and George Atkinson was granted 403 acres of land south of the Richard Grant along the river down about to Ft. Caroline Road. Later Zephaniah Kingsley’s nephew, Charles McNeill and his wife Elizabeth Coffee, a “free colored” person settled at Reddie Point, and raised nine children. South of McNeill in the Atkinson Grant was the Baxter Plantation, Kingsley’s daughter Martha and her husband, Oran Baxter. The 1812 grant to Atkinson shows plantation clearings and houses left over from the English. The 1856 navigation chart of the river shows the same clearings as well as another on the northeast side of the point.

Kingsley B. Gibbs, also Kingsley’s nephew, homesteaded the land next to McNeill on the northeast side of the point and along the bank of Mill Cove in 1852. Chas, McNeill Jr. homesteaded 40 acres on the river adjoining Gibbs in 1866. Going east from McNeill along Mill Cove was William Robinson in 1869, and Moses Levy homesteaded land in Section 34 adjoining Newcastle in 1869. South of Levy, also joining Newcastle land was homesteaded by Brutus Bolton and Cain Bolton, whose names will come up later in this article. In 1883, George Bennett homesteaded the land that now fronts on the north side of Edenfield Road.* A plat was filed in 1— (Record book A-1 page 397) known as Bennett Park with long narrow lots running north and south, and fronting on Edenfield Road, and extending to Mill Cove.

After the Civil War (1861-65) Charles McNeill Sr. returned and attempted to rebuild his burned homestead but he died in 1869 before it was completed. John Sammis, Kingsley’s son-in-law, bought his land through a probate session. With the breakup of the plantations due to the civil war, the community of Chaseville came into being. Chaseville was not a subdivided community but per the “Arlington Story,” published in 1959, at one point it had one store, its own Episcopal Church, a school and the first post office in Arlington, which opened in 1876 with George W. Bailey as Postmaster. Most importantly, it had a steamboat landing, as it was primarily a fishing and farming community. At the height of its development forty families lived there. The Chaseville community was located in both the Richard Grant and the Atkinson Grant, as well as adjoining lands homesteaded.

The Name Chaseville: Per Dr. Dan Schafer, Samuel Chase reportedly opened a shipyard on the point and hired black Union Soldiers who remained after the Civil War as workers, which is the origin of the name. A Chase was shown living at Fort George Island with Kingsley B, Gibbs, and was shown as a ship builder in a late 1800s census. In addition, a 1960 Angus survey shows two parcels fronting on the river having been deeded to John R. Chase and George E Chase. The 1885 state census shows George E. Chase as being white, 45 and from Maine, and lists occupation as Shipyard. The only Samuel Chase we could find in the census was living in Maine and listed as a ship builder. Geo. Chase was living in Duval Co. in 1910, and shown as a marine hardware merchant.

The 1914 quad sheet clearly shows the little community lying on the east bank of the river. The church is shown with a traditional symbol of a building with a cross. The building located on the same road as the church by the river is labeled “store” on a 1916 survey. It probably contained the post office. The school is also shown to the southeast on what may have been the Old Chaseville Road. It was located very near the current location of the Arlington Volunteer Fire Department on Ft. Caroline. Bruce Marley, a past member of the Arlington Volunteer Fire Department, gave his talk at our November meeting. Bruce talked about the old store and post office building remaining from the 1800s in Chaseville and Realtor George Fish’s Chaseville home burning ca. 1950, and his donating the land where the current Arlington Volunteer Fire Department build is out of gratitude for what was saved. He also talked about installing phones in that area for Mr. Copeland (Copeland’s Septic tanks) who lived on a large tract on the north side of Chaseville Road, and a number of black families who lived scattered through the woods between Merrill Road and the river in his territory.

Chaseville Cemeteries: As a result, George Robinson (retired surveyor) who was at our meeting, paid me a visit the next day and in conversation told me about a cemetery he had run across doing a survey of a home at the end of Toproyal Lane in the Rive St John Subdivision Unit 2. This was one that old time resident, Cecil Aderhold, had tried to find to show me in 2002, and one that one of our members, Walter Jones, had looked for to find the original gravesites of some of his ancestors, the Jones and the Benneweis* families. I notified Walter and he was anxious to see it but George went back in the wooded area the next day and only found depressions, which appear to be from the relocation of some or all of the family to the Evergreen Cemetery on Main Street in 1946. Walter sent me a list of the graves. It also turns out that one of our past speakers, Emily Ruth Haines Surowiec also has ties to that cemetery as her Grandmother Ruth (who ran Haines Groceries), was the granddaughter of Mary Benneweis. Emily knew from her grandmother’s notes of the connection to Chaseville but not of the cemetery. There was a cemetery near Jacksonville University known as the Chaseville Road Baptist Church Cemetery* that was thought at one time to be the burial plot for the Benneweis. There is another cemetery, which is shown on the 1949 quad sheet and is listed in several publications as the Chaseville Cemetery.* It reportedly was for black families that were moved by the developer of Fort Caroline Club Estates. It was located between Heidi and Kaden Drives on land that was homesteaded by Brutus Bolton and Cain Bolton, who was shown in the area at the age of 70 in the 1900 census.

Chaseville Road: Chaseville Road was significant enough to have the first north/south road running through Arlington named Chaseville Road. It originally ran from Atlantic Boulevard crossing Strawberry Creek across the old milldam; that portion became known as Arlington Road by petition in 1912 calling it the “old” Chaseville Road. When a bridge was placed across the Arlington River ca. 1913, its connection between Atlantic Boulevard to Chaseville (Reddie) Point became the (new) Chaseville Road until it became University Boulevard In 1959.

Chaseville Indian Mounds: In a publication in 1895 by Clarence Bloomfield Moore entitled “Certain Indian Mounds of Duval County,” he identifies mounds from the ocean along the St. Johns River in Arlington:

For Horseshoe Landing (at the NW. corner of Newcastle Grant): He identifies a mound on the land of J. Parsons, and then describes a mound to the south on the land of a black man named Brutus.
For Reddie Point: He identifies two low mounds on the property of Dr. Anita Tyng about a quarter mile in from the landing and says that the territory has reportedly been in use for years as a cotton field and was basically leveled. He identifies finds of pottery and remains.
Mound at Daniels Landing: This mound is about a quarter mile north of the landing, and has long been under cultivation. It has been dug through, and has fragments of shell and human remains.
Low Mounds at Alicia: These mounds are on the property of John G. Driggs, Esq.
Mound A: 3.5′ height by 45′ in diameter 2/3 demolished by us. Contains human remains.
Mound B: height 18″ (originally 4′ shell carried off to nearby orange grove) diameter 86′; discovery of many art relics recorded. Two remaining mounds near Alicia were not investigated; one had been used for burial in recent years.
Denton Mound (about ½ mile east of Chaseville, lands of James. L. Denton of Jamaica, NY): A ridge 77′ long and 40′ across. A vessel of excellent condition and very artistic was found 3′ from the surface.
Harrington Mound: the lands of Mr. I. Harrington was the site of a mound that had been entirely leveled and carried to an existing field. Digging revealed a noble barbed lance head 5” in length of reddish chert lying with a shell chisel at the depth of 2′.
Bennevis mound: A few yards from the Harrington Mound on the lands of Mary Bennevis (also spelled Binnewies, Bennevis, Benneweis, Bennewis, Benniweis, and Binneweis),* 1′ in height and 20′ across, 1.5′ down was a collection of human remains.

These names and locations of the mounds give clues to the early settlers and landowners.

From the 1880 census we have some of the names of Chaseville residence,

Benniweis, Henry H. W. M. 50 farmer England Wife Mary, W. 44 Florida. 5 children.
Daniels, H. 0. W. M 39 carpenter Wales, wife Hester J. W. 36 Wales. 3 children
Somers, Samuel S. W. M. 66 storekeeper New Jersey wife Sarah W. 30 Florida 4 childr. (may be Floral Bluff)
McNeil, Charles (Jr.) W. M. 35 Farming S.C. wife E. F. W. 28 Fla. 2 Children
Bailey, George W. W. M. 51 storekeeper (postmaster) wife Ellen 49 S. C. Note that on the 1916 Angus survey it shows an 1.5 acre parcel marked Bailey, by the Episcopal Church.

What happened to Chaseville? My guess is that as the use of the river for transportation was taken over by the automobile, people moved to spots more accessible by car; I read in my grandmother’s diary from 1923, she had to deliver milk by buggy “all the way to Chaseville.” I learned from the Internet that the Episcopal Church was bought by Mrs. Gavogan (hotel owner) of Mayport, and barged there in 1920s where it was set up and used for some years. It later was torn down but the floor was left for a skating rink, and was of such quality it lasted for years in the weather.

Lions Club Park: God bless the Lions Club for saving this area. As you drive in on Richard Denby Gatlin Road (named in honor of a fireman killed in duty) you enter the park at the site of the Episcopal Church, which would have been to your left. The road leading to the ramp is in about the same location as the one leading to the 1870s dock and store/post office.

Thanks: We are fortunate to have the City’s permission to place our historic markers for the McNeill Plantation and for the Chaseville Community on the location they really occupied, and also for the Baxter Plantation at Blue Cypress Park.

We also want to thank Dean Privett and associates for maps and information.