Dade Battlefield Historic State Park, State historic site in Sumter County, Florida, United States

Dade Battlefield Historic State Park is an 80-acre preserve in Sumter County featuring pine flatwoods and oak hammocks that frame the historic battleground. The park includes a visitor center with exhibits and educational displays about the 1835 conflict and those involved in it.

On December 28, 1835, about 130 Seminole warriors and Black Seminole allies led by Chief Micanopy ambushed Major Francis L. Dade and over 100 soldiers on the Fort King Road; Dade and half the left flank died in the first volley, and fighting lasted six hours. Only Privates Joseph Sprague and Ransom Clarke reached Fort Brooke. The battle began the Second Seminole War. In 1836 Major Robert Armstrong built Fort Armstrong here as a supply depot.

The battlefield's name comes from Major Francis L. Dade, whose column was ambushed here on December 28, 1835; the annual reenactment is staged by the Dade Battlefield Society on the weekend after Christmas. A Fort Armstrong marker placed by the Sumter County Historical Society in 1984 recalls the supply depot built at the site in 1836.

The park lies on County Road 603, reachable from Interstate 75 at Exit 314 and from U.S. Route 301. Its 80 acres hold 40 acres of pine flatwoods and a live oak hammock, so expect unpaved ground; the annual battle reenactment falls on the weekend after Christmas.

The annual reenactment is held on the weekend after Christmas, as close to December 28 as possible, and is sponsored by the Dade Battlefield Society. The park itself was assembled in 1921, when Florida bought 80 acres from three local families and a company for $2,000.