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Jeff Milton
Jefferson Davis Milton (November 7, 1861 – May 7, 1947) was an American lawman in the Old West and a son of Confederate Governor of Florida John Milton. He was the first officer appointed to the U.S. Immigration Service Border Patrol in 1924.
Milton was born on November 7, 1861, and was reared on the "Sylvania" estate, near Marianna, Florida. Jeff Milton was descended from an American "founding family,” with a preponderance of evidence pointing to a descent from Richard Milton (son of Thomas, and, thus, a nephew to the poet Milton), who was a passenger on the ship, Supply, sister ship to the Mayflower, that landed at Berkeley, Virginia, on 29 January 1620/21. Other ancestors were listed on the earliest passenger lists for the Jamestown Settlement. His great-great-grandfather, John Milton, was an officer in the American Revolution, the first Secretary of State of Georgia, and received electoral college votes in the first U.S. presidential election of 1789. His nephew was a U.S. Senator from Florida, William Hall Milton (1864-1942). After a colorful career throughout the South, his father John Milton (1807-1865) was elected the fifth governor of Florida.
Jeff Milton was three years old on Sunday, April 7, 1865, when the American Civil War ended at Appomattox. At about that time, his father, John Milton, died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound and was buried in the Episcopal cemetery at Marianna. A New York Times article attributed Governor Milton’s sudden death to despondency over the course of the Civil War which ended in his suicide. This conflicted with local reporting from Florida. The West Florida News reported it as a hunting accident. Recent works have investigated the event with some scholars concluding that the death was from an accident as Milton prepared for hunting. Regardless, the traumatic event signaled a different future than had been anticipated for young Jeff.
Reconstruction had a particularly corrosive effect on the surviving former first family of Florida. At age 15 or 16 Jeff Milton considered his prospects and joined his sister in Texas where he worked in her husband's mercantile stores and later as a cowboy. “On July 27, 1880, he appeared at the Texas Rangers headquarters in Austin, armed with a couple of letters of recommendation from prominent citizens. By adding three years to his real age, he became the requisite 21 and was sworn in as a Ranger private.”
After serving with the Rangers for four years, he moved through west Texas and into New Mexico, where he became a Deputy US Marshal in 1884.
For a time in the 1880s Milton worked under Sheriff John Slaughter in Cochise County, Arizona, during which time the two were involved in several manhunts and shootouts with outlaws. One of their most well-known accomplishments was their pursuit of the Jack Taylor Gang in late 1886 to the middle of 1887. Milton and Slaughter trailed the gang to the home of Flora Cardenas in Mexico. The bandits had been tipped off that the American lawmen were after them and left before Slaughter and Milton could reach the Cardenas' home.
Returning to Arizona, the two lawmen followed the outlaws' trail to Willcox, then to Contention City, where they found gang member Manuel Robles and one of the others asleep. When Slaughter shouted at them to put their hands up a gun battle ensued. Manuel's brother, Guadalupe Robles, joined in but was quickly killed. As Manuel Robles and Nieves Deron ran one of their bullets hit Slaughter's ear. Slaughter's next bullet killed Deron, but Manuel Robles escaped. Jack Taylor was soon arrested in Sonora. Robles, along with Geronimo Miranda, were killed by Mexican police in the Sierra Madre mountain area.
Milton joined the U.S. Customs Service in 1887 and was appointed a Customs Mounted Inspector headquartered in Tucson, in the Customs Collection District of El Paso. Milton spent two years with Customs, riding the line from Nogales westward to the Colorado River. As a political appointee, Milton found himself out of a job in 1889, when a new political party took over the reins of federal power.
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Jeff Milton
Jefferson Davis Milton (November 7, 1861 – May 7, 1947) was an American lawman in the Old West and a son of Confederate Governor of Florida John Milton. He was the first officer appointed to the U.S. Immigration Service Border Patrol in 1924.
Milton was born on November 7, 1861, and was reared on the "Sylvania" estate, near Marianna, Florida. Jeff Milton was descended from an American "founding family,” with a preponderance of evidence pointing to a descent from Richard Milton (son of Thomas, and, thus, a nephew to the poet Milton), who was a passenger on the ship, Supply, sister ship to the Mayflower, that landed at Berkeley, Virginia, on 29 January 1620/21. Other ancestors were listed on the earliest passenger lists for the Jamestown Settlement. His great-great-grandfather, John Milton, was an officer in the American Revolution, the first Secretary of State of Georgia, and received electoral college votes in the first U.S. presidential election of 1789. His nephew was a U.S. Senator from Florida, William Hall Milton (1864-1942). After a colorful career throughout the South, his father John Milton (1807-1865) was elected the fifth governor of Florida.
Jeff Milton was three years old on Sunday, April 7, 1865, when the American Civil War ended at Appomattox. At about that time, his father, John Milton, died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound and was buried in the Episcopal cemetery at Marianna. A New York Times article attributed Governor Milton’s sudden death to despondency over the course of the Civil War which ended in his suicide. This conflicted with local reporting from Florida. The West Florida News reported it as a hunting accident. Recent works have investigated the event with some scholars concluding that the death was from an accident as Milton prepared for hunting. Regardless, the traumatic event signaled a different future than had been anticipated for young Jeff.
Reconstruction had a particularly corrosive effect on the surviving former first family of Florida. At age 15 or 16 Jeff Milton considered his prospects and joined his sister in Texas where he worked in her husband's mercantile stores and later as a cowboy. “On July 27, 1880, he appeared at the Texas Rangers headquarters in Austin, armed with a couple of letters of recommendation from prominent citizens. By adding three years to his real age, he became the requisite 21 and was sworn in as a Ranger private.”
After serving with the Rangers for four years, he moved through west Texas and into New Mexico, where he became a Deputy US Marshal in 1884.
For a time in the 1880s Milton worked under Sheriff John Slaughter in Cochise County, Arizona, during which time the two were involved in several manhunts and shootouts with outlaws. One of their most well-known accomplishments was their pursuit of the Jack Taylor Gang in late 1886 to the middle of 1887. Milton and Slaughter trailed the gang to the home of Flora Cardenas in Mexico. The bandits had been tipped off that the American lawmen were after them and left before Slaughter and Milton could reach the Cardenas' home.
Returning to Arizona, the two lawmen followed the outlaws' trail to Willcox, then to Contention City, where they found gang member Manuel Robles and one of the others asleep. When Slaughter shouted at them to put their hands up a gun battle ensued. Manuel's brother, Guadalupe Robles, joined in but was quickly killed. As Manuel Robles and Nieves Deron ran one of their bullets hit Slaughter's ear. Slaughter's next bullet killed Deron, but Manuel Robles escaped. Jack Taylor was soon arrested in Sonora. Robles, along with Geronimo Miranda, were killed by Mexican police in the Sierra Madre mountain area.
Milton joined the U.S. Customs Service in 1887 and was appointed a Customs Mounted Inspector headquartered in Tucson, in the Customs Collection District of El Paso. Milton spent two years with Customs, riding the line from Nogales westward to the Colorado River. As a political appointee, Milton found himself out of a job in 1889, when a new political party took over the reins of federal power.