May, Philip Stockton, 1891-

Zephaniah Kingsley, son of Zephaniah Kingsley, Sr. and Isabella Johnstone, was of Scottish descent and was born in Bristol, England, on December 4, 1765 as the second of eight children. His parents moved to Charleston, South Carolina in 1773 where he received an extensive education and later became a successful slave trader with both Brazil and the West Indies. He settled in Spanish East Florida in 1803. He bought property at Laurel Grove in northeast Florida, and later, in 1813, took over a plantation on Fort George Island which would become his family's primary residence.

In a slaving trip to Havana, Cuba, in 1806, Kingsley purchased the woman who would become his first wife, Anna Madgigine Jai (Kingsley), who had been captured and put in slavery in the Senegal area of West Africa, then sent to the Americas. During the course of his life, Kingsley had at least two other wives, both of whom had children by him: Flora H. Kingsley, Sarah M. Kingsley. However, Anna would be the principal head of the family; she and her children lived at Fort George Island until 1838 when they went to Haiti, and later returned to Florida in 1846. In addition to the property on Fort George Island, Kingsley accumulated property on the St. Johns River including the present day Duval County areas of St. John's Bluff, San Jose, and Beauclerc.

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