USA > Indiana > Indiana, a redemption from slavery > Part 3
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2 Discourse on the Aborigines of the Ohio Valley, in Ohio Hist. Coll., p. 250; same in Fergus Hist. Series, No. 26, p. 32.
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earth, his credit shattered, his means dissipated by dis- asters of flood and field, this man calmly reconstructed his plans, and prepared to renew his enterprise on a more extended basis than before. He determined to refound his colony on the Illinois, and surround it with a confederation of the Northwestern tribes that would be strong enough to repel any army the Iroquois could bring against it. His first converts were the warriors of a little band of Abnakis and Mohegans, driven from their New England homes in the border wars of the English colonists, who had found no resting-place till they reached the clear waters of the St. Joseph's. These gladly allied themselves to the white chief who promised to interpose the strong arm of the French king for their protection. Scarcely were they won when a Shawnee chief, from the village on the Ohio, appeared and asked protection from the Iroquois. La Salle with easy confi- dence promised what was asked : "The Chaouanons are too distant ; but let them come to me at the Illinois and they shall be safe." The chief promised to join him in the succeeding autumn, and kept his word.
As soon as the weather began to moderate La Salle started west on foot, with twenty men, to seek communi- cation with the Illinois, who were necessary factors in his plan. The first Indians found were some Outagamies, from whom he received the glad tidings that Tonty was safe with the Pottawattamies near Green Bay. Soon after they found a band of Illinois, to whom La Salle, after making presents and lamenting their misfortunes, submitted his plan. They heard him with satisfaction, and departed to carry the proposal to the remainder of the tribe. Membre says that La Salle visited other tribes at this time, but he does not name them. His
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journey was not long, for early in the spring he was at Fort Miamis, and, taking with him ten men, went from there up the river to the Miamis, at the village above the portage. It was a propitious season for approaching them. In the late conflict they had remained neutral, but they were now beginning to realize that the inten- tions of the Iroquois toward them were none of the best. They had murdered a band of Miamis the preceding summer, and not only had refused to make reparation, but also had stationed parties of warriors in the Miami country, who assumed the air of conquerors and held up to contempt the power of the French. La Salle found one of these bands of Iroquois at the village. He at once confronted them, threatened them with punishment for their attack on Tonty, and challenged them to repeat in his presence their insults to the French. The Iro- quois had not forgotten the former commander of Fort Frontenac, and in his presence their courage oozed away. During the following night, much to the aston- ishment of the Miamis, they stealthily left the village. With so much of prestige, and by the aid of a band of refugee Indians from the East who were wintering at the point and who at once made alliance with La Salle, the Miamis were easily won. On the second day after the flight of the Iroquois they declared their determina- tion to become brothers of the Illinois and children of the French king, and celebrated the new order of things with feasting and dances.1
In May, La Salle started for Montreal, where he appeased his creditors and secured additional advances. In November he was at Fort Miamis again, and during that winter and the following summer made his explora-
1 Disc. of Great West, chap. 20.
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tion of the Mississippi. In the fall of 1682 he had reached Michilimackinac on his proposed return to France, when he received word that the Iroquois were on their way to attack his Indian allies, and thereupon he turned back to the Illinois. His first mission was to the Mia- mis. For more than a year they had been kept in a state of irresolution concerning their promised alliance. The Iroquois had threatened vengeance if they abandoned neutrality, and, in order to terrify the wavering tribe, had made several attacks and committed depredations on them. At length the Miamis sent ambassadors to Montreal to talk with Onontio in person.1 Frontenac received them, with delegations of the Ottawas and Kiskakons, on August 13, 1682, and after the others had made their complaints, " one of the Miamis, having taken up the word, stated that they likewise were daily slaughtered by the Iroquois. The count having an- swered that this was the first news he had of it, and having afterwards inquired how many of his men the Iroquois had killed, and at what place, the Miami re- plied that he came not to complain nor to demand satis- faction. The count rejoined, Were there not French- men in his country - did not M. De la Salle, who had made an establishment there, exhort them to build a fort to defend themselves against those who should at- tack them, and even to-unite themselves with the Illi- nois? The Miami, concurring therein, also confessed that the Iroquois had told him to retire from their war- path, as they had nothing to say against him, but against the Illinois ; nevertheless they failed not, on four occa- sions, to kill him, and to seize some of his people, for
1 Onontio was the title given the governors of Canada among all the Indian tribes.
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which he was not asking satisfaction of Onontio. But his air and tone indicated that he intended to obtain it and to avenge himself." 1
After two days a deputation of the Hurons arrived and a general council was held, in which it was an- nounced that all the tribes represented had formed an alliance with the Ouiatanons, and in several subsequent councils all of the tribes declared their purpose to make war on the Iroquois. Frontenac tried to dissuade them from this, and urged them to try conciliatory measures, but in vain. Alimahoué, the spokesman of the Miamis, protested that they would trust the Iroquois no longer. The Iroquois while pretending to be their friends had bitten them, and he " wished not only to bite them in his turn but also to eat them, and to go in quest of them, begging Onontio to hinder him not." Much as Frontenac was interested in forwarding the projects of La Salle, he dared not precipitate a war with the Five Nations without permission from France, and he finally dismissed the representatives with permission to build forts and defend themselves in their own country, with which privileges they expressed themselves satisfied. Three weeks later a delegation of the Iroquois arrived and held council with Frontenac. They declared that they had no quarrel with the Hurons, Kiskakons, or Miamis. They admitted that an army of twelve hun- dred warriors was already prepared to depart for the west, but claimed that these intended to fight only the Illinois and La Salle, whose death they had determined to compass. The other tribes would not be molested unless they first attacked the Iroquois. Frontenac used all his influence to deter them from this expedition, and
1 N. Y. Col. Docs., vol. ix. p. 177.
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particularly warned them against molesting any of the French.1 The expedition was afterwards abandoned, but the rumor of it frightened the western Indians as well as turned back La Salle. The Miamis fled from their villages, and would not return until La Salle ap- peared in person. They were then easily induced to remove to the Illinois and take up their residence near Fort St. Louis.2
The importance of perfecting his confederation and preparing to repel any invasion of the Iroquois was now uppermost in La Salle's mind. During the winter of 1682-3 he was all through Indiana and Illinois, urging the tribes to unite and join him at Fort St. Louis, and chastising those who failed to keep faith with him ; & he extended this crusade beyond the Mississippi and far to the south. In April he wrote that "with twenty-two Frenchmen he had obliged more than forty villages to apply to him for peace, and chastised those who have violated the promise they had given him. . . . That the Chaouanons, Chaskpe, and Ouabans have, at his solicitation, abandoned the Spanish trade and also nine or ten villages they occupied, for the purpose of becom- ing French and settling near Fort St. Louis." 4 In June he expresses his fear that the Miamis may be terrified into fleeing from their new homes on the Illi- nois, " and so prevent the Missouries from coming to settle at St. Louis, as they are about to do." 5
The establishment of this colony of confederated
1 N. Y. Col. Docs., vol. ix. p. 191.
2 Disc. of Great West, p. 294.
8 Shea's Le Clercq, vol. ii. p. 201.
4 N. Y. Col. Docs., vol. ix. p. 799.
6 Disc. of Great West, p. 295.
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INDIANA.
tribes depopulated Indiana entirely, for all of our In- dians joined it. Fort St. Louis was located on what was then called Le Rocher, now Starved Rock, on the south side of the Illinois River, opposite the town of Utica.1 Perched on this lofty and almost inaccessible sandstone cliff, the little stockade fort of the French seemed a protection to the neighboring villages which in fact constituted its best defense.2 South of it, at a distance of about half a mile, was the village of the Shawnees, flanked by two ravines and further protected by an earthwork, containing two hundred warriors. On the north side of the river, opposite the fort, were the Illinois, numbering twelve hundred warriors. West of these, apparently away from the river, was the village of Oiatenon (Quiatanon), afterwards so familiar in In- diana history as one of the principal villages on the Wabash. It then contained five hundred warriors. Still to the west, near the great bend of the Illinois to the south, was the village of Ouabona, with seventy warriors - probably of the Ouabans or Ouapous of whom mention has been made. East of the Illinois vil- lage, on the north side of the river, was Pepikokia, another Indiana town of later date, which was rated at one hundred and sixty warriors. Still to the east was Peanghichia, which is simply the French orthography of Piankeshaw. The Piankeshaws afterwards lived in Indiana, and this village of one hundred and fifty warri- ors probably included all of them. Across to the south
1 For descriptions see Disc. of Great West, p. 221 ; Mag. of Western Hist., vol. i. p. 213; The Last of the Illinois, in Fergus Hist. Series, No. 3.
2 In his memorial of 1684, La Salle estimates the population of his colony at over 18,000 souls. French's Hist. Coll. of La. and Fla., second series, p. 4.
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of the river, on a small tributary, was the great Miami village, with thirteen hundred warriors. These villages, with the village of three hundred warriors opposite Ouabona, called Kilatica, constituted the colony proper. To the north, however, were the Mascoutins and their allies, who were members of the confederacy. The nearest of these was Maramech, the village of the Miami band which had for many years been separated from the remainder of the tribe. It had one hundred and fifty warriors. The most westerly village was called Kikapou, and it was probably the source of the several Kickapoo towns of this State. The aggregate of such of these Indians as were subsequently included under the name Miamis, that is, the villages of Oiatenon, Ouabona, Pepikokia, Peanghichia, Miamy, and Mara- mech, is over twenty-three hundred warriors, and there could not have been more than that number in the en- tire tribe at that time. There is no evidence of unusual decrease among them for many years afterwards, except that Lamothe Cadillac states that a short time before 1695 the Sioux made a treacherous attack on the Mia- mis, and killed about three thousand of them.1 In 1718 M. de Vaudreuil reported the Miamis, Ouiatanons, Piankeshaws, and Pepikokias, into which these villages appear to have then been united, at from fourteen to sixteen hundred warriors.2 In 1764 Captain Hutchins and Colonel Bouquet estimated the same tribes as num- bering one thousand warriors.8
In consequence of the extensive tours through the country in gathering these Indians together, the maps
1 Margry, vol. v. p. 323.
2 N. Y. Col. Docs., vol. ix. pp. 885, 892.
8 Schoolcraft's Hist. and Stat. Inf. etc., vol. iii. pp. 555, 559.
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INDIANA.
of the next few years present more correctly the coun- try between the great lakes and the Ohio than any of preceding years, and, what is somewhat singular, more correctly than any of the maps of the century follow- ing. The villages forming La Salle's colony, as given above, appear fully on Franquelin's map of 1684, which received official commendation for its correctness while in process of construction.1 The villages also appear on a map of La Salle's explorations from 1679 to 1683, by D'Anville, which M. Margry discovered in the archives at Paris.2 Though rude in construction, this latter map gives a more correct representation of the Indiana streams than any other ancient map. The Wabash is given its true course, and is marked Agous- saké, which is good evidence that La Salle furnished the information on which the map was prepared. White River is laid down and marked Ouapikaminou. Eel River and the Tippecanoe are also traced, but no names are given them. The Franquelin map is equally accu- rate except as to the courses of the streams. On it White River is marked Oiapigaminou, and the Wabash Quabach. On both the Ohio is distinguished as the main stream to its mouth. On neither map is there any mark of an Indian village or French post within the limits of Indiana, although all other known villages and posts are marked. The reason was that there were no Indians residing in Indiana. They had all removed to the Illinois. ( So far as has yet been discovered, none of them returned before the opening of the eighteenth century.
1 N. Y. Col. Docs., vol. ix. p. 205. A part of the map, cover- ing the colony, is prefixed to Parkman's Disc. of the Great West. 2 A reproduction of Margry's print of this map is in Andreas's Hist. of Chicago, at pp. 58-9.
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Time brought changes. La Salle was murdered, but his colony remained. The country of the Senecas was invaded by the French, and the Iroquois, turning on them, shifted the seat of war to the St. Lawrence, where it raged fiercely. The only recorded Iroquois invasion of the West after this time was an unsuccessful attack on Ft. Miamis, in 1695. In that year the Ouiatanons were located at Chicagou ; a part of the Miamis were at the River St. Joseph's ; and the Pepikokias had joined the Miamis of Maramech who were still in Wisconsin.1 In August, 1695, Frontenac held councils with the west- ern Indians, and insisted that the Miamis of Maramech should move eastward to the remainder of the tribe, and "make one and the same fire, either at the River St. Joseph, or some other place adjoining it." 2 Later came a fear that the English might get a foothold in the West, and Callieres and De Vaudreuil, governors after Frontenac, used all their powers to induce the Indians to come towards the east and settle about Detroit, but the tribes could not be persuaded to change their loca- tions during the seventeenth century.8
At the beginning of the eighteenth century there was a general relocation of the tribes, from French influence. After the arrival of Lemoine d'Iberville as governor, in 1698, Louisiana began to receive greater favors from the French court and to exercise control over a large portion of the Mississippi Valley.) In his memorial of 1702, D'Iberville asked possession of the lower Ohio, and that the Illinois Indians might be colonized there.
1 N. Y. Col. Docs., vol. ix. pp. 619, 621; Margry, vol. v. p. 123.
2 N. Y. Col. Docs., vol. ix. p. 625.
3 Ibid., vol. ix. pp. 752, 753.
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He said : "The Illinois having removed, we could cause it to be occupied by the Mascoutens and Kickapous. This would bring four hundred and fifty men upon the rivers which empty into the Illinois and Mississippi. They now only hunt the beaver which they sell at the Bay of the Puans [Green Bay] and in the country of the Illinois. The Miamis who have left the banks of the Mississippi, and gone to Chicago on account of the beaver, and those who are at Ortithipicatony, and at the St. Joseph, could readily remove to the Illinois, where they would join one hundred of their nation who are still at Ouisconsin on the Mississippi. The Miamis, Mascoutens, and Kikapous, who were formerly on the Mississippi, placed upon the Illinois or lower down will withdraw from Canada yearly a commerce of 15,000 livres." 1 Very little of these removals occurred as planned, but one band of Mascoutins came to the mouth of the Ohio and settled near the fort which had just been built there by Juchereau. These Mascoutins and this post have been persistently transferred to Vincennes by all our local historians except Dillon, and even he gives the mislocation credit as a possibility.2
The error began with Judge Law, who in 1839 undertook to fix the settlement of Vincennes at about 1710, by the following extract from a letter of Father Marest, dated at Kaskaskia, November 9, 1712: The French had established a fort on the River Ouabache ; they demanded a missionary ; and Father Mermet was sent to them. ) This father thoughit he ought to labor for the conversion of the Mascoutins, who had made a village on the banks of the same stream -this is an
1 Minn. Hist. Coll., vol. i. p. 341.
2 Ed. of 1859, p. 31.
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Indian nation using the Illinois language." 1 The fort referred to, he claimed, was at Vincennes, apparently not knowing of the Juchereau post. At the same time a correct exposition of the whole matter appeared in a review of Sparks's "Life of Marquette." 2 This was brought to the attention of Judge Law, but he still con- tended for his view on two grounds : 1. That the Mas- coutins lived on the Wabash. 2. That there was not, prior to 1712, any fort on the Ohio.8 Neither proposi- tion is tenable. Beyond question the Mascoutins lived in Wisconsin up to 1702. In 1712 they were all at Detroit.4 It has been maintained that there is no record of their residing on the Wabash prior to 1765,5 and certainly there is none indicating that they were there prior to 1712. There was a fort established at or near the site of Cairo, Illinois, by Juchereau, in the winter of 1702-3, which was abandoned some three years later. It appears on nearly all the maps of the eighteenth century, marked "Ancien Fort," " An. F. F.," " Old Fort," "Antient Fort Destroy'd," and by similar titles.6 Local writers of later date have sought
1 Law's History of Vincennes, ed. of 1858, p. 12, - quoting Lettres Edifiantes et Curieuses, Tome 6, p. 333. A translation of the entire letter is in Kip's Early Jesuit Missions, p. 191.
2 N. Am. Rev. for January, 1839.
3 Law's Vincennes, ed. of 1858, p. 46.
4 Dubuisson's Journal, in Smith's Hist. of Wisc., vol. ii. p. 315.
5 Schoolcraft's Hist. Cond. and Prosp. of Indian Tribes, vol. iv. p. 244.
6 See Popple's maps ; Bellin's map of 1757, in De La Harpe's Abrégé de L' Histoire Generale des Voyages, prefix ; Lt. Ross's map of 1772 ; D'Anville's map of 1772; Harris's Voyages (1740-50), vol. ii. p. 1, etc. The oldest map on which I have found it marked is the curious and ancient one in Breese's Early History of Illi- nois. This is entitled, " Marquette's & Hennepin's map. Drawn
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to reconstruct the exploded theory by asserting that the settlement of Vincennes was made by Juchereau in 1702, and a tablet giving this date ornaments the front of the Knox County court-house.1
This last absurdity appears to have originated with Mr. O. F. Baker, who claims to have found documents to support his statement, but who has never seen fit to produce them. There is no evidence whatever to sup- port it, and there is an abundance of evidence totally disproving it. One of the objects of the founding of the post was to keep the English from the Mississippi, and it was recognized that the mouth of the Ohio was the only point where this could be done effectively. In a letter of November 10, 1701, the directors of the Canadian Company, pointing out the danger and proposing reme- dies, say: " These remedies are, Monseigneur, to estab- lish certain posts on the routes, as at the Miamis, and at the River Ouabache, at the place where it discharges into the Mississippi ; this river will serve as a boundary be- tween this colony and that which is established on the Mississippi, for it is by it that one goes to Carolina and that the English come also to our lands." 2 In his memorial of 1702, quoted above, D'Iberville says that his plans " make it necessary to establish three posts on the Mississippi. One at the Arkansas, another at the Ouabache, and the third at the Missouri." 3 The loca-
A. D. 1687," but it has been revised to as late a date as 1720, as appears by such legends as " Route de Mr. Denis en 1716," " Natchitoches, atablissement Français, fait en 1717 par Mr. Qua- chois," and half a dozen similar instances of post-dating.
1 Hist. Atlas of Ind., p. 248; Potter's Am. Mo. vol. xii. p. 165 ; Hist. Knox Co. p. 15.
2 Margry, vol. v. pp. 178, 361.
3 Minn. Hist. Coll., vol. i. p. 343.
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tion of the post is recorded, contemporaneously with its founding, in the Journal of La Harpe for 1703, as fol- lows : " On the 8th February, a pirogue arrived from the Ouabache, and brought the news that M. de Juchereau, lieutenant-general of Montreal, had arrived there with thirty-five Canadians to form a settlement at its mouth, and to collect buffalo skins." 1 Juchereau died a few months later.2 In 1704, war having broken out among the Indians, M. de Lambert, who commanded after Juchereau's death, abandoned the post and went to New Orleans. It was never reoccupied, and never mentioned afterwards except as a matter of history.8
The story of the controversy between Father Mermet and the Mascoutin medicine-men is also recorded by Father Charlevoix, who made his voyage down the Mis- sissippi in 1721. He says: "The labors among the Mascoutins met with less success. The Sieur Juchereau, a Canadian gentleman, had begun a post at the mouth of the Ohio, which empties into the Micissipi, consti- tuting the shortest and most convenient communication between Canada and Louisiana, and a great many of the Indians had settled there. To retain them he had per- suaded Father Mermet, one of the Illinois missionaries, to endeavor to gain them to Christ; but that missionary found an indocile tribe, excessively superstitious, despoti- cally ruled by medicine-men." 4 It has also been stated
1 French's Hist. Coll. of La., pt. 3, p. 29; N. Y. Col. Docs., vol. ix. p. 487.
2 Margry, vol. v. p. 368.
3 French's Hist. Coll. of La., pt. 3, pp 32, 33, 116 note.
4 Shea's Charlevoix, vol. v. p. 133. The original words as to the location are: "Le Sienr JUCHEREAU, Gentilhome Canadien, avoit commencé un Etablissement a l'entrée de la Rivière Oua- bache, qui se décharge dans le Micisipi, & fait la communication la
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INDIANA.
that Juchereau left a garrison at Vincennes as he went down the Wabash, and afterwards located his principal post at the mouth of the Ohio. This, too, is bald asser- tion. Juchereau did not come down the Wabash. He went by Lake Michigan and the Wisconsin River to the Mississippi. He was met at the mouth of the Wisconsin by Le Sueur, who had been exploring the upper country, and the two journeyed together down the Mississippi.1 Although the Indian tribes were returning to the Wa- bash about the year 1702, and though white traders may have accompanied them, Sieur Juchereau had nothing to do with our territory or our settlements. He belongs to Illinois. Our posts were founded after he was buried and probably after he was forgotten.
plus courte et la plus commode du Canada avec la Louisiane." Paris ed. of 1744, Tome 2, p. 266. The anecdote follows, as re- lated by Father Marest.
1 Margry, vol. v. p. 426.
CHAPTER II.
THE FRENCH POSTS.
THE history of the eastern portion of the Mississippi valley during the eighteenth century is in the main a history of a series of Indian wars, and yet these were wars in which the Indians had little real interest. Those of the first two-thirds of the century were caused by the giant struggles of England and France over the political questions of Europe. Those of the latter part of the century grew out of the American determination to be independent, and to control the lands south of the great lakes. In the earlier period some minister would pen a few lines in his luxurious chambers beyond tlie Atlantic ; a few weeks later some commandant in the depths of the American wilderness would assemble the neighboring tribes, give them some powder, some blan- kets, and some rum, and inform them that the Great French Father, or the Great English Father, had dug up the tomahawk, and now directed them to strike it in the heads of his enemies ; after another interval the night would be lightened by burning wigwams or frontier cabins, and the forests would resound with the shrieks of dying women and children. This would be but a beginning. Weeks might pass, or months, or years, but the day of retaliation would come, and the conquering tribe would see its villages destroyed, its fields laid waste, its warriors burned at the stake or boiled and
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