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Deltona's Misplaced History: The Lost Community of Saulsville

Updated: Jul 1


Front view of the George Sauls home — Saulsville, Florida 1910s. (State Archives of Florida)
Front view of the George Sauls home — Saulsville, Florida 1910s. (State Archives of Florida)

The Forgotten Frontier of Saulsville

Tucked between Courtland and Howland boulevards on the edge of Deltona lies a quiet street named George Sauls Street. Few passersby give it much thought. But rewind more than 150 years, and this stretch of road once thundered with stagecoach wheels and held the secrets of a Confederate escape.

The road honors George Sauls, one of Volusia County’s earliest settlers. He and his wife, Adeline, built a homestead in what was once known as Saulsville — a once-celebrated frontier community now faded from local memory.


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George Sauls - Find a Grave Memorial 33274567


Building a Life from Pine and Grit

Born in 1821 in Nassau County, Florida, George Sauls petitioned for 350 acres in Spanish East Florida near Funk’s Savannah, just a mile above the old public road to Georgia. With Adeline, he built a four-room house from hand-hewn pine logs, fastened with carved wooden pegs — no nails. A central breezeway led to a kitchen, outhouse, and well, and each room had its own fireplace. By the end of the Civil War, the Sauls home had grown to include a dining room, a pantry, two kitchens (for summer and winter), and a second story to accommodate their ten children — nine daughters and one son.


The Sauls family lived simply but richly — raising livestock, growing their own food, and making their own clothing. The west room of their home hosted religious services for itinerant preachers of any faith. They also valued education. Although George had only four days of formal schooling, he and friend Hezekiah Osteen split the cost of hiring a tutor for their children six months a year. Sauls would later donate $50 to help build Chaudoin Hall at Stetson University, stating, “I am for progress and wish to make a sacrifice for such.”

Saulsville grew into a key stagecoach stop and community hub, anchored by the Sauls and Osteen families.

John C. Breckinridge — Find A Grave # 132
John C. Breckinridge — Find A Grave # 132

A Hidden Role in the Confederacy

Unknown even to his children, George Sauls served as a secret agent for the Confederacy. Appointed by the governor, he was tasked with safeguarding families of Confederate soldiers and accounting for shipments of cattle, cotton, and tobacco sent to Lake Harney. Friends recalled his mysterious nighttime absences and whispered of an oath sworn in blood, though George himself never discussed his commission. His family wouldn't learn of his wartime role until 1933.


His most consequential act came in May 1865, as the Confederacy crumbled. John C. Breckinridge — former U.S. vice president and the Confederacy’s final secretary of war — arrived in Florida, fleeing federal troops. After reaching the St. Johns River at Lake George, Breckinridge secured a salvaged lifeboat, originally from the Union gunboat Columbine, captured during the Battle of Horse Landing.


From Holden’s Landing above Lake Monroe, two of Breckinridge’s men traveled inland to Saulsville, where they recruited George Sauls to haul the boat to the Atlantic. Breckinridge later wrote it was “the only wagon to be had in that desolate country.”


Sauls transported the boat, provisions, and ammunition by ox wagon to the Indian River at Carlisle’s Landing near present-day Titusville. Accounts vary on the payment: one says he demanded to see the $5 upfront, another that he charged extra when his oxen suffered through the fly-ridden two-day trek. Either way, Breckinridge was unimpressed, calling Sauls “very ignorant, but keener and more provident in all points of contract than any Yankee I ever saw.”


Dowries and Silver Spoons

On each daughter’s wedding day, George offered a choice: a $1,000 dowry or an orange grove. Unable to watch them go, he’d slip away into the woods during each ceremony. But one granddaughter, Ruth Sauls — daughter of his only son, John — refused to marry until he returned. She accepted the same dowry but asked instead for the family’s prized Yankee silver spoons.

Those spoons had an unusual origin. During the war, a Union colonel took provisions from the Sauls home. When he offered payment, George declined. The colonel was directed to the well on the west side of the house. Later, George found 60 silver dollars tucked between the logs near the well. He sent them to Richmond to be melted into teaspoons.

A Legacy Lost and Nearly Forgotten


As railroads brought growth to Volusia, Saulsville vanished. George Sauls died at 89, remembered in local papers as “a kindly, hardworking, thrifty, hospitable man, as honest as the Sunshine and as true as steel.”



Sauls Home after the fire 1972
Sauls Home after the fire 1972

The house and its surrounding land — once 15,000 acres — eventually fell into the hands of the Deltona Corporation. The home was gifted to the Volusia County Fair Association, with plans to move it to the fairgrounds as a museum. But on New Year’s Day, 1972, fire consumed the abandoned house. Authorities blamed vagrants or local teens for the blaze.

In 1976, over 100 people — including Sauls descendants and county officials — gathered at the site. A plaque was installed on a coquina rock, and the street was renamed George Sauls Street to preserve the memory.


Misplaced History

That might have been the end of the story — but in 1981, Deltona Corporation sold the land bearing the historical marker. The new buyer later sold it to a developer who built a house on the site. When curious visitors continued approaching to read the plaque, the homeowner complained. The plaque was quietly removed and put into storage.


Only after the Sauls family raised concerns was the marker relocated to Osteen Cemetery, near George and Adeline’s graves. However, for years, the plaque still referenced the original house site — confusing visitors who thought the Sauls home once stood atop the cemetery.


In 2006, the Volusia County Council updated the text to better reflect its current location. It now reads:

“The pioneer families of this cemetery put down roots on the Florida frontier — a place considered ‘desolate’ at the time. In the 1850’s, George and Adeline Sauls settled two miles west of here on a stage road. They constructed a large log home and raised 10 children; farmed and kept livestock; served travelers: and joined Osteens, Carpenters, and other neighbors in the Saulsville community to organize a church, hire a school teacher, and frame a society. In 1884, Sauls family members denoted this burial ground, along with an African American graveyard to the west. When his long life passed, George Sauls was remembered as ‘a leading spirit’ in his special section of Volusia County.”— Volusia County Council, 2006

Still, the revised plaque gives no indication that it was moved. Without a marker, the original homestead site risks being lost forever beneath the foundations of modern Deltona.



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Sauls House site plaque, Osteen Cemetery - Photo: Robin Mimna



Sources include:

Fearington, Blanche. “Rich In History, Sauls House Stands Aging and Alone.” Orlando Sentinel, Orlando 27, Dec. 1972

“Osteen History,” notes retyped in 1999 — Enterprise Museum

A.J. Hanna’s: Flight Into Oblivion, 1938. Johnson Publishing Co.

Ronald Williamson: The Daytona Beach News Journal, “Pair set out to replace historical site marker” Oct. 21th, 2006

Sauls Family-Early Setters of Volusia County Florida (n.d.):n.page. Roots & Branches Genealogical Society of West Volusia County. Roots & Branches Genealogical Society of West Volusia County. Web.

The Volusian, “George Sauls, one of the earliest settlers in the Osteen area,” May 1990

https://theclio.com/entry/51152








 
 
 

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