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PART V

INTERCOLONIAL, 1689-1764

CHAPTER XVII-THE FRENCH COLONIES

109. Foundation of Louisiana (1700-1703)
BY BENARD DE LA HARPE (1723)

(TRANSLATED BY B. F. FRENCH, 1851)

La Harpe, supposed to be the compiler of this narrative, was a French officer of distinction who came to Louisiana in 1718; later he served under Bienville. — Bibliography: Winsor, Narrative and Critical History, V, 63-85; Channing and Hart, Guide, § 91. — On earlier French discoveries and colonies, see Contemporaries, I, ch. v.

ON

N the 28th May [1700], M. d'Iberville set sail for France, and on the same day M. de Bienville took command of the fort on the Mississippi. On the 29th he dispatched M. de Saint Denis to explore the country in the Red River, and to watch the Spaniards. On the 30th May [1701], the Enflammée of twenty-six guns, commanded by M. de la Ronde, arrived at Ship Island. Among the passengers was M. Sagan, a traveller from Canada, who had presented a memoir to the minister, M. de Pontchartrain, assuring him that he had travelled all over the Mississippi, and had found mines of gold on its banks; and that the Indians had worked them. The minister, putting faith in his statements, granted to M. Sagan some privileges, and ordered M. de Sauvolle to supply him with twenty-four pirogues and one hundred Canadians, to accompany him to the Missouri.

On the 22d August, M. de Suvolle died at Biloxi, and M. de Bienville was left sole commander of the colony.

On the 16th September, a party of Chactas arrived at Biloxi to demand of the French some troops to assist them to fight the Chicachas. The Chactas nation contained forty villages, and over five thousand warriors. On the 25th October, twenty Mobileans arrived at Fort Biloxi. This

nation was situated about one hundred and forty leagues up that river, and contained about four hundred men. On the 18th December, a shallop arrived from Pensacola with the news that MM. d'Iberville and Serigny had arrived there with the King's ships, the Renommée of fifty guns, and the Palmier of forty-four guns. This news spread joy in the garrison, as it had then been living on corn for more than three months. It had lost by sickness upwards of sixty men, leaving only one hundred and fifty persons in the colony.

M. de Bienville received orders by the shallop to evacuate Biloxi, and remove to Mobile river. On the 5th January, 1701, M. de Bienville took up his march for Mobile river, leaving but twenty men under the command of M. de Boisbriant to man the fort. At Dauphin Island, M. de Bienville had an interview with MM. de Serigny and Chateaugué, who had arrived there with a detachment of sailors and workmen, to build a magazine for the reception of the goods and provisions which had been brought from France. On the 16th M. de Bienville commenced a settlement on the Mobile river, about eighteen leagues from the sea. On the roth M. le Sueur returned from his expedition to the Scioux, with two hundred thousand pounds weight of copper ore. The following is an extract taken from his Journal : —

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Having arrived in the colony in December, 1699, with thirty workmen, he set out for the Tamarois in June, 1700. He stopped at the mouth of the Missouri river, and from thence proceeded to the Illinois river, where he was joined by three Canadian travellers, who brought him a letter from Father Marest, a Jesuit from the mission house of 'L'Immaculée Conception de la Sainte Vierge aux Illinois.'

"At twenty-two leagues above the Illinois, he passed a small river, which he named the Buffalo and on going nine leagues further he met a party of Canadians descending the Mississippi, returning to the Illinois. On the 30th July, he met seventeen Scioux in seven canoes, going to avenge the death of three Scioux by the Illinois, one of whom had been burnt, and the other two killed at Tamarois, a few days before his arrival at this village. He promised the Chief of the Illinois to pacify the Scioux if they should come to make war on him. He presented to the Chief of the party some merchandise to induce him to return to his nation. He told him that the King of France did not wish them to make war, and if he would desist he should be supplied with every thing necessary. The Chief accepted the presents, and promised to obey the King. . .

"On the 1st September, he passed the Ouisconsin river, which is

about half a league wide at its mouth. On ascending this river about forty-five leagues, he found a portage of more than a mile in length, consisting in part of marshy ground, from which a little stream took its rise and flowed into the Puan bay, inhabited by a great number of Indian tribes, who trade in furs to Canada. . . .

"From the 10th to the 14th, M. de Sueur travelled seventeen leagues and a half, passed the river Raisin, and also on the same day a great river coming from the North called the Bon-Secours, on account of the great number of buffalo, deer, bears and roebucks found there. Three leagues from the banks of this river is a lead mine, and at seven leagues above, on the same side, he passed another river, in the neighborhood of which he discovered a copper mine, from which he took sixty pounds of ore in a former voyage: but to make it of any value, a peace must first be made between the Scioux and the Outagamis. At a league and a-half further to the North-West is a lake, six league's long and more than a league in width, called Lake Pepin.

"... On the 15th he passed a small river, and saw several canoes descending, filled with Indians. He heard them make a noise similar to that just before they are going to fall upon their enemy; and, having placed his men behind some trees, he ordered them not to fire until the word of command was given. The chief of the party, after making some observations, advanced with the calumet, (which is a sign of peace among the Indians,) and said that, not having seen before any Frenchmen navigating the Mississippi in boats like theirs, they took them to be English, and raised the war-cry.

"M. le Sueur told them that the King of France, of whom they had heard so much in Canada, had sent him to settle in the country, and he wished all the nations who inhabited it, as well as those under his protection, to live in peace. . .

"... He then entered Blue River [Minnesota], so called from some mines of blue earth which he found on its banks. At this place he met nine Scioux, who told him that this river came from the country of the Scioux of the West. He built a post here, but finding that his establishment did not please the Scioux of the East as well as the neighboring tribes, he had to tell them that his intentions were only to trade in beaver skins, although his real purpose was to explore the mines in this country, which he had discovered some years before.

"He then presented them with some powder, balls, knives and tobacco, and invited them to come to his fort, as soon as it was con

structed, and he would tell them the intentions of the King his master. The Scioux of the West have, according to the accounts of those of the East, more than a thousand huts.

"They do not use canoes or cultivate the land, but wander in the prairies between the upper Mississippi and the Missouri, and live by hunting. "All the Scioux say they have three souls, and that after death the good one goes to a warm country, the bad one to a cold country, and the third watches the body. They are very expert with their bows. Polygamy is very common among them. They are extremely jealous, and sometimes fight duels for their wives. They make their huts out of buffalo skins, sewed together, and carry them with them. Two or three families generally live together. They are great smokers. They swallow the smoke, but some time after they force it up from their stomach through their nose.

"On the 1st December, they invited M. le Sueur to a great feast which they had prepared for him. They made a speech, and presented him with a slave and a sack of oats. . . ."

On the 18th March, 1702, M. d'Iberville arrived at Dauphin Island, in the frigate "Palmier," which he brought into port without any difficulty, there being twenty-one feet or more of water at the pass. On the 19th, M. de la Salle arrived with his family at For[t] Mobile, which had just been finished, and the head-quarters of the colony about to be removed there from Dauphin [Massacre] Island. On the 25th,

M. de Tonty, who had been sent by M. d'Iberville on a mission to the Chactas and Chicachas, arrived at Mobile, bringing with him some of the principal Chiefs of those nations, to make a treaty of peace. By presents and entreaties M. d'Iberville made them agree to live in peace together. On the 27th, M. d'Iberville returned to Dauphin Island, and from thence he went to Pensacola. On the 13th April, M. Dugue arrived with a transport ladened with provisions. On the 31st, M. d'Iberville and de Serigny departed for France. On the 12th May, eight Alibamon Chiefs arrived at Mobile to consult with M. de Bienville whether they should continue to war with the Chicachas, Tomes, and Mobilians. He advised them to make a peace, and gave them some presents for this purpose. On the 24th June, a Spanish shallop arrived from Pensacola, on board of which was Don José de Roblas, Captain of Infantry, and a son of the nurse of Count de Montezuma, bringing a letter from Francisco Martin, Governor of Pensacola, asking to be supplied with some provisions, which M. de Bienville granted.

On the 10th August, M. de Bienville was informed that M. St. Denis and some Canadians had invaded the territory of our allies to capture slaves, which he ordered to be restored.

On the 1st October, M. Davion, missionary, and Father Limoge, a Jesuit, arrived from the Mississippi, to give notice that one of their brethren and three Frenchmen had been murdered on the Yasous river, by two young Courois, who had acted as their guides.

On the 11th November, Don Francisco Martin arrived from Pensacola, with the news that France and Spain were at war with England, and asked for a supply of arms and powder, which was given him.

On the 28th, two shallops, with two Spanish officers, arrived at the fort from St. Augustine, Florida, and brought a letter from Don Joseph de Souniga y Serda, Governor of that place, informing M. de Bienville that it was besieged by fourteen English vessels and two thousand Indians. He further requested that a small vessel might be sent to the Viceroy of Mexico, informing him of what had happened. M. de Bienville sent him one hundred muskets and five hundred pounds of powder. Bénard de la Harpe, Historical Journal of the Establishment of the French in Louisiana, in B. F. French, Historical Collections of Louisiana (New York, 1851), Part III, 19–28 passim.

110. Danger from the French Mississippi Settlements (1718)

BY LIEUTENANT-GOVERNOR ALEXANDER SPOTSWOOD

Spotswood was an efficient governor of Virginia; his letters and state papers are of great historical value. — Bibliography: Winsor, Narrative and Critical History, IV, 196-202; Channing and Hart, Guide, § 90.

HA

AVING of a long time endeavour'd to informe myself of ye scituation of the French to the Westward of Us, and the Advantages they Reap by an uninterrupted Communication along ye Lake, I shall here take the Liberty of communicating my thoughts to Yo'r Lord'ps, both of the dangers to w'ch his Majesty's Plantations may be exposed by this new Acquisition of our Neighbours, and how the same may be best prevented. I have often regretted that after so many Years as these Countrys have been Seated, no Attempts have been made to discover the Sources of Our Rivers, nor to Establishing Correspond

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