FL-1024 Whitehouse

Marker text: WHITEHOUSE

Whitehouse Road marks the south boundary of land settled about 1842 by James Gibbons under the Armed Occupation Act. The first Fort Dade Post Office was established there in 1845. In that year, Gibbons' widow, Mary, wed William Kendrick, Captain of the Fort Dade Militia. Their whitewashed, two-story split board home and trading post was the beginning of Dade City. At the end of the Seminole Wars, Sampson, a free Negro serving the Army as Indian Interpreter, fell in love with Rose, a Whitehouse slave, purchased her from Captain Kendrick, and married her. The location of the plantation cemetery is no longer known.

Erected by the Pasco Board of County Commissioners and The Historical Preservation Committee, 1982