John Carroll was known as Carroll. He resided most of his life in and around Stuart, Florida and is buried at All Saints Cemetery, Jensen Beach, Fl. He was an attorney and wrote at least one book on legal matters which is in the Library of Congress. Inglis Stuart's book has his name as John Carol Dunscombe.
Carroll Dunscombe entered the pineapple growing arena just as the early growers were on the brink of giving up because of the exceptionally cold winter of 1909-1910, Cuban competition, and the Florida East Coast Railway's rising rates for shipping Florida fruit. He planted extensively and was the area's largest grower ever, shipping from more than 400 acres. In addition to pineapples, Carroll grew and shipped mangoes. His payroll carried the little town of Stuart through the summer months from 1915 to 1924. In 1925, Carroll was caught up in the Florida land boom, plowed his pineapples under and went into real estate. Many of his mango trees still stand in St. Lucie Estates as living testimony to his fruit-shipping days.
As the bottom fell out of real estate, Carroll studied law, becoming a member of the Florida Bar in 1932. In the 1950's he and Janet gave up their big home on the river and moved into a small house elsewhere in St. Lucie Estates. Carroll continued to practice a unique style of law, typing his own documents which were often impossible to decipher, antagonizing both judges and his fellow lawyers (Thurlow, Sandra Henderson. Stuart on the St. Lucie : a pictorial history. [Stuart, Florida] : Sewall's Point Co., 2001, pg. 79-80).
Carroll and Janet were instrumental in the establishment of the first hospital in Stuart, the St. Lucie Sanitarium (Ziemba, Caroline Pomeroy. Martin County, our heritage a historiography. -- Stuart, Fl. : Stuart Heritage, c1997].
Carroll's reminiscences of a nursery which was part of his St. Lucie Estates development: "Gardeners were trimming the coconut trees around the Royal Poinciana Hotel and the Breakers. I told the foreman of the gang if he was going to destroy the nuts I would pay him for all the nuts with milk in them, to which he agreed. As I recall, I bought two small truck loads. The hotel company wanted to know what right I had to take those nuts. I explained that they were going to be destroyed so I paid for them, and so it was satisfied. The trouble here is in the past few years the nuts are all dry. However, about half have milk now. It used to be when frozen coconut replaced the dry meat, trucks would come from Miami to Stuart to gather the local nuts but they want nuts with milk." [Hutchinson, Janet. History of Martin County. -- Stuart, Fl. : Historical Society of Martin County, c1975.] Cause of death prostate cancer.