Person:Don Eslava (1)

Don Miguel was a Spanish grandee. He emigrated from San Sebastian, Spain, to Mexico City in the mid 1700s. He was a slaveholder and was known for being quite a taskmanster. There are court records where he was actually sued by one of his slaves, a young girl whom he purportedly mistreated. Her mother subsequently bought her freedom. Hypolite Eslava, Don Miguel's wife, left him on charges of abuse and sued for divorce. She had rare courage for that time. Miguel was the King of Spain's storekeeper at Natchez from 1782 - 1784 and was "Garde Almacen," Treassurer and Tax Assessor for the City of Mobile, Alabama. In the book "Colonial Mobile" by Peter Hamilton, there is a map of Spanish Land Grants showing a huge tract of the southern most section of the city of Mobile as the Eslava Mill tract. There is also a street in the city of Mobile named for the Eslava settlers.