The following year he was promoted to colonel by King Charles IV of Spain, and made commandant of the Third Battalion Cuban Regiment garrisoned at the Castillo de San Marcos in St. Augustine, Florida, which was then a unit of the Captaincy General of Cuba.
Barrios was a small landowner engaged in the production of snuff in the town of Santiago del Prado, where the El Cobre cathedral was located.
Bartolomé took up residence there and adopted local folk customs, one of which was devotion to the Virgen Morena, Our Lady of Charity, namesake of the cathedral and linked to Cuban religious tradition.
After serving as commander in Florida, Bartolomé settled there in 1790 with his daughter Rita and infant grandson, Félix Varela.
Félix refused, saying that his vocation was not to kill people, but to save them, and asked permission to enter a seminary to become a priest.