On receipt of the intelligence of the Dade massacre in Savannah, a company of Georgia volunteers at once embarked for Picolata.  A meeting of the Richmond Blues and Richmond Hussars, of Augusta, was called for the purpose of rendering aid.  The city council appropriated the necessary funds to supply arms and ammunition.  The ladies of Augusta volunteered to make the uniforms, and in less than a week these volunteers were on their way to Picolata.  These companies were composed of the elite of the city.  Supplies of all kinds were sent by Mayor Joseph Beard to Fort Drane and the posts on the St. John’s, which were poorly equipped with ordnance and quartermaster’s stores.  He also sent a six-pounder cannon with necessary equipments of grape, canister, and round shot, ten thousand rounds of musket ball and buckshot cartridges, and a general supply of needful articles.  Further supplies were drawn on their arrival at Picolata.

This action of Quartermaster Beard was most fortunate, as it was found that the military posts, by the neglect of the War Department or its subalterns, had been reduced to such an extremity that in case of attack they must necessarily have been shorn of the means of defense, and would have fallen into the hands of the enemy.  Nothing but the timely arrival of supplies saved these posts from destruction.

There were no means of transportation at Picolata, and the quartermaster procured horses at Jacksonville for the purpose of forwarding one of the six-pounders to Fort Drane.  Four of the horses on arrival were found unfit for service, but, fortunately, General John M. Hernandez was able to furnish ten chicken carts, and the quartermaster was authorized to make impressments for transportation.  The Richmond Blues, one hundred and twelve strong, with the Camden and Glynn mounted volunteers, numbering twenty-seven, and the Darien Infantry of about thirty, under command of Captains Robertson, R. Floyd, and Thomas S. Bryant respectively, took up line of march as an escort to the two six-pounders, ordnance stores, twenty-five wagons and carts laden with provisions, and passed through the heart of the enemy’s country, arriving on February 15th, without obstruction, at the garrison of Fort Drane.

Supplies under the same escort were at once forwarded to Fort King.  Subsequently the following-named companies of Georgia volunteers arrived in Florida:  The Hancock Blues, Captain A.S.  Brown; State Fencibles, Captain J.A.  Merriwether; Macon Volunteers, Captain Isaac Seymour; Morgan Guards, Captain N.G.  Foster; Monroe Musketeers, Captain John Cureton; Washington Cavalry, Captain C.J.  Malone; Baldwin Cavalry, Captain W.F.  Scott.  Major Ross, with several companies of mounted men from Georgia, arrived later, but owing to the advanced season, much to their disappointment, did not enter the field.

Going back to January 15th, General Edmund Pendleton Gaines, who was on a tour of inspection through the Western Department, first heard of the troubles in Florida, and at once called on the Governor of Louisiana and requested him to hold in readiness a body of volunteers for service in subduing the Seminole Indians.