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REYNOLDS HISTORICAL GENEALOGY COLLECTION
V
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 02289 6952
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2016
https://archive.org/details/historyoflouisia00king_0
A
HISTORY
OF
LOUISIANA
BY GRACE KING, Author of " New Orleans, The Place and The People;" " De Soto in the Land of Florida," etc.
ANI) JOHN R. FICKLEN, Professor of History in Tulane University.
REVISED EDITION.
NEW ORLEANS: The L. Graham Co., Ltd., Printers, 207-211 Baronne St. 1902.
7 8 611 6 17
-
2007183
King, Grace History of Louisiana (revised
Palm Beach
1
CABILDO (SUPREME COURT)
CATHEDRAL. JACKSON SQUARE.
DISTRICT COURT.
Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1893 BY GRACE KING AND JOHN R. FICKLEN, In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington D. C.
PREFACE.
In presenting this History of Louisiana to the people of the State, the authors find it necessary to say a word of preface. Their intention has been to write a history that would give the children of Louisiana a simple and true account of the progress of the State from the earliest times of discovery down to the present era. It is hoped, however, that the work will not prove uninteresting to older persons as well.
Every effort has been made to secure accuracy of detail; but as some errors may have erept in, the authors will be glad to receive notice of any that may meet the eye of the eritic.
It may be added that all the artistic and mechanical portion of the work was done in New Orleans-the book is entirely a home product.
The authors desire to thank the librarians of the Fisk, the Howard, and the State Libraries for uniform courtesy and kindness in putting at their disposal the rich historical treasures from which the materials of this work are drawn.
Among these treasures the authors wish to acknowledge their special obligations to the Histories of Louisiana by the Hon. Charles Gayarre and Judge Martin; to Fiske's Discovery of America; to Margry's Documents; and to the official documents relating to the French and Spanish Domination.
Grateful acknowledgment is also made to E. H. Farrar, Esq., for the privilege he kindly granted of borrowing books and maps from his valuable library.
The authors owe special thanks to Messrs. L. Graham & Son, printers, for the care they have taken in the execution of their share of the labor.
In conclusion it is proper to state that Miss King wrote the first part of the history (as far as the end of the Spanish Domination). and that Mr. Ficklen completed it.
CONTENTS.
PAGE.
INTRODUCTION
1
EXPLORATION
2
Spanish Explorers.
French Explorers.
FRENCH DOMINATION
15
Establishment. Mobile. Louisiana Chartered. Company of the West. Louisiana a Royal Province. Louisiana
Ceded to Spain. Resistance.
SPANISHI DOMINATION
123
O'Reilly. The Patriots. The Spanish Governors.
FROM COLONY TO STATE.
147
Jefferson's Purchase.
Territory of Orleans.
Louisiana
Made a State.
WAR OF 1812-15
172
The British in Louisiana.
General Jackson. The Battle
of New Orleans.
PERIOD OF DEVELOPMENT.
194
Prosperity. Sugar Refining. New Constitutions.
THE CIVIL WAR, 1861-65.
209
Secession of Louisiana.
Capture of New Orleans.
Battles
of Mansfield and Pleasant Hill.
RESTORATION TO THE UNION
237
Reconstruction. The White League.
Free Government
Restored. General Progress.
PHYSICAL FEATURES, POPULATION, ETC
253
LIST OF STATE OFFICERS. 259
CONSTITUTION OF 1898
261
MAPS. Map of Mississippi Valley 8
Map of Gulf Coast 46
Parish Map of Louisiana 147
Map of Jefferson's Purchase 156
War Map of Louisiana 215
HISTORY OF LOUISIANA.
INTRODUCTION.
Louisiana was named in honor of Louis XIV, king of France, by Robert Cavelier de la Salle, in the year 1682.
The name was then applied vaguely to all that region of the North American Continent lying between the Alleghany mountains on the East, the Rocky mountains on the west, the great fresh water lakes, Superior, Michigan, Erie and Huron on the north, and the Gulf of Mexico on the south. This is the territory drained by the Mississippi river and its tributaries, which is known as the Mississippi Valley. It is a territory which covers an area of 1,244,000 square miles, comprising the greater part of the United States.
From its source in the remote Northwest, to its mouth in the Gulf of Mexico, the Mississippi follows a course of 4200 miles. The principal tributaries of the Mississippi are the Missouri, Ohio, Arkansas and Red rivers.
The history of Louisiana is, in the beginning, therefore, the history of the discovery of the Mississippi river and valley, and the struggle for its possession by the three great Euro- pean powers, Spain, France and England.
2
HISTORY OF LOUISIANA.
EXPLORATION.
CHAPTER I.
SPANISH EXPLORERS.
Louisiana first became known to Europeans through its southern boundary, the waters of the Gulf of Mexico.
Christopher Columbus. 1492 .- Christopher Columbus, sailing west on his immortal voyage of discovery, touched the land of the New World on the islands which lie between the Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico. He did not penetrate into the gulf itself, and knew nothing of the vast, beautiful country which, with its great central river, lay on the other side of it. On the return of Columbus to Spain, with the news of his great achievement, emulators and imitators arose in all the seaports of the kingdom, eager to reap wealth and fame also, by leading expeditions across the Atlantic to the New World beyond.
Americus Vespucius. 1497 .- On one of these expeditions sailed the celebrated astronomer and pilot,* Americus Ves- pucius. It is most probable that, voyaging around the An- titles and into the blue expanse of the Gulf of Mexico, he saw the southern shore line of North America from Central America to Florida; just as afterwards, voyaging in the Atlantic Ocean, he saw the shore line of South America.
Mississippi, 1502 .- On an old map dated 1502, which has been traced to a Spanish chart of this voyage, the re- sults of such an exploration by an early pilot have been preserved. In quaint, rude outlines the gulf shore and Florida are distinctly traced upon it; and cutting through the land and flowing into the gulf are the familiar three channels of the mouth or delta of the Mississippi.
* It was the first of the four voyages of exploration made by Americus Vespucius, the written description of which attached his name to the country.
3
SPANISH EXPLORERS.
Bimini. 1513 .-- This voyage of Vespucius was not followed up. The tide of exploration was turned toward South Ameri- ca and Florida. The Gulf Coast and the great river dropped back into the unknown. But the Indians of Cuba, pointing across the gulf to where the peninsula of Florida ran out into the blue waters, would tell their Spanish masters of a wonderful island over there, called the Island of Bimini. Upon it they said were great and splendid cities, vast riches of gold and silver, and, most strange of all, a fountain whose waters restored the aged to youth ; " the fountain of youth " they called it.
Ponce De Leon. 1513-1521 .- A Spanish cavalier, a friend of Columbus, obtained from the King of Spain per- mission to conquer it and make its wondrous possessions his own. He was beginning to get old, and, more than the riches of Bimini, he coveted the waters of the fountain which would make him young and keep him so. He sailed thither in the year 1513, with three brigantines. It was during the spring- time. Either from the quantities of beautiful flowers that met his eye when he came within sight of the coast, or from the day, Easter, " Pascua Florida," in Spanish, he named the country Florida. He explored the coast and traveled inland some distance, but found neither the fountain nor the riches, nor any of the wonders promised by the Indians. Ile returned to Cuba, disappointed but not discouraged. Nine years later, in 1521, he sailed over there again to make another attempt, but the Indians fiercely drove him off, and gave him a wound, from which he died shortly after, in Cuba.
Pineda. 1519. Mississippi River .- Between Ponce de Leon's two voyages to Florida, Alvarez de Pineda, coasting along the Gulf of Mexico, entered the mouth of a great river, supposed to-day by historians and geographers to be the Mississippi. He called it the Espiritu Santo, River of the Holy Spirit. He is probably the first European who ever
4
HISTORY OF LOUISIANA.
entered it. He found the Indians friendly and eager to trade. They lived in great towns composed of many small villages, and wore ornaments of gold.
Pamphilo de Narvaez. 1528 .- The reports of these great Indian villages and the gold ornaments excited the greed and cupidity of Pamphilo de Narvaez. He saw in Florida a country rivaling Mexico and Peru for rich plunder. With four hundred men and four ships he set sail for it from Cuba. He landed at Appalachee Bay and marched inland, ordering his fleet to remain on the watch for him in the gulf. At first they found fields of corn and Indian villages ; but afterward they journeyed for days through forest solitudes. Their cruelty to the Indians who fell into their hands kindled the fiercest retaliation against them. They were compelled to fight every step of their way forward. Their food gave out, and they suffered the tortures of famine. Some of their captives, forced to act as guides, led them only into the thickest of swamps and forest, out of which they had barely strength to extricate themselves. Their search was now, not for gold, but for food. Finally, weak, faint and dispirited, they returned to the seashore. Their ships were nowhere in sight. After wandering along the coast aimlessly they, in despair, set to work to build boats to get away from their terrible condition. They constructed a bellows and forge. All their iron, even spurs and stirrups, were made into hatchets and nails. Their shirts they made into sails. Cordage was twisted from their horses' hair and palmetto fibre. They made pitch of pine rosin and oakum of palmetto bark. Every man joined in the work. Every three days a horse was killed for food. At length, five vessels were finished and all embarked, crowding the boats to the water's edge. After six weeks they came to a river so great that it freshened the sea water into which it flowed, so that they could drink it. It was the Mississippi, the Espiritu Santo, of Pineda. In the rough water off its mouth, two of the boats capsized and all on board drowned,
5
SPANISH EXPLORERS.
among them, Narvaez. The other three boats were driven ashore somewhere on the coast of Texas. Ten years after- ward, Alvaro Nuñez, surnamed Cabeza de Vaca, treasurer of the expedition, with three other gaunt, haggard men, look- ing more like animals than human beings, arrived in Mexico. They were all that had survived of the Narvaez expedition.
Hernando de Soto. 1539 .- The last and most celebrated of the Spanish explorers of Florida was Hernando de Soto. De Soto had been with Pizarro in Peru, and had seen the vast wealth of the Indians. Like Pamphilo de Narvaez, he thought what Pizarro could plunder in Peru, he could plun- der in Florida. He set sail from Havana in 1539, with 570 men, and 233 horses, in nine vessels. Never had so brilliant, so well armed, so well provided an expedition started from Spanish shores.
They landed at Tampa Bay, then called the Bay of Espiritu Santo. IIere, with great pomp, De Soto took possession of the country for the Spanish king, and pitched his camp, confident of his future triumphs and booty.
But before daylight, the Indians, who had been se- cretly watching him, at- tacked him in vast numbers, with terrific yells. Many of his men were killed before HERNANDO DE SOTO. he could retreat to his boats. He commenced his march. The Indians, with the cruelty of Narvaez fresh in their memories, met the new invaders with all the fierceness of their savage nature. Learning that one of the men of the Narvaez expedition was a slave in a
6
HISTORY OF LOUISIANA.
neighboring tribe, De Soto obtained possession of him as in- terpreter and guide.
But Florida held no better fate for him than for Ponce de Leon and Narvaez. The country was poor. Instead of great Indian cities, with temples filled with treasures to sack, he found only moderate-sized and sparsely scattered Indian villages, and in the naked, poorly-armed Indian tribes he found the most vindictive of foes, who fought like demons, and neither gave nor sought quarter. More than once, De Soto's coolness and courage alone saved his own life and the lives of his army from utter destruction. Hoping always to find the gold and treasures and triumphs further north, he marched day after day, on and on. Through the wild terri- tories of the present States of Georgia and South Carolina he led his band, until they reached the Tennessee river. Turning then, upon his steps, he countermarched and jour- neyed toward the south, until the great village of the Mauvilla or Mobile Indians rose before him. In a fierce battle here his men were killed in great numbers.
But almost as deadly as the Indian arrows, were the fevers that broke out in the army and thinned his ranks day by day. Leaving Mobile behind him, he pushed forward again to the northwest, opening his way through thickets and forests, climbing over steep hills, fording morasses, and crossing innumerable streams that cut through the country.
The Mississippi. 1541 .- At length, after three years, he came to the banks of a mighty stream, over a mile wide, whose swift, turbid currents carried down great forest trees, which they had uprooted and torn away from their native soil. It was such a river as none in the army had ever seen before.
De Soto named it El Rio Grande de la Florida ; the great river of Florida. He crossed it on rafts, at some point above the Arkansas, and led his army still forward toward the west. But he found in the west only what he had found
7
SPANISH EXPLORERS.
in the east and in the north and in the south ; sickness, misery, hardships, and Indians who pursued him like wolves. He came at last to the end of his hope and endurance. Re- treat was ordered. Once more the Spaniards turned ; and they marched until they came again to the banks of the Mis- sissippi. De Soto could march no further. The iron will. and constitution which had seemed superhuman sank under the accumulated hardships, disappointments and ill health. Seized with a fever, he expired surrounded by the gaunt, worn men who had followed him so trustfully and loyally.
With his dying breath he appointed as successor Louis de Moscoso, his faithful lieutenant. To insure the dead body of their leader from Indian outrage, his followers wrapped it in skins, enclosed it in a hollow tree trunk, and in the silence and darkness of midnight they conveyed it to the middle of the mighty stream and sank it into the depths of the yellow currents. *
Moscoso made an attempt to reach Mexico by land. Strik- ing out towards the West, he marched vigorously forward, through the Red River country and into the great plains of Texas. There, supplies of food failing him, he turned his men and hurried back to the Mississippi. At the village of Aminoya (below Red River) they built boats, in which, when summer came they embarked for the mouth of the river, whence they set sail for Mexico. After two months of toil and hardship, they came to a Spanish port. Less than a third of the original expedition had survived.
QUESTIONS.
How did Louisiana first become known to Europeans? Did Co- lumbus know anything of the Mississippi? Who was Americus Ves- pucius? What coasts did he probably explore on the first voyage? When is the Mississippi first seen on a map? Was the exploration of Florida followed up? What was Bimini? Relate Indian stories about it? Who was Ponce de Leon? Why did he call the country Florida?
* The precise locality has never been determined, but it is supposed to be near the mouth of Red river
8
HISTORY OF LOUISIANA.
Relate his voyage? Who was Pineda? What did he name the Mis- sissippi? Give an account of the expedition of Famphilo de Narvaez? Who was Hernando de Soto? What did he hope to gain in Florida? Give an account of his march? When did he come to the Missis- sippi? What did he name it? Continue his march? Who was his successor? How was De Soto buried? What of Muscoso?
CHAPTER II.
FRENCH EXPLORERS.
Re-discovery of the Mississippi. 1669 .- One hundred and thirty-two years the Mississippi flowed over the body of De Soto, before another white man came into touch with its history. The fact of its existence passed from men's mem- ory, and lived only in old charts and records stored in Spanish archives.
And now its chronicle takes us to a different country, and to a different nation. Instead of Spain and the Spaniards, we have to do with France and the French, and instead of Cuba and the Gulf of Mexico, we must start from distant Canada and the Great Northern Lakes of America.
Let us study it on the map.
It will be seen that the French had entered and taken pos- session of the St. Lawrence river. They had founded the cities of Quebec and Montreal upon it, and made settlements in the neighboring regions. Little by little their missionaries and pioneers were advancing west, planting the cross and the standard of France in the territory of the great lakes, Ontario, Erie, Huron, Michigan and Superior. From the Indians that visited these mission houses and trading stations came the account of the vast country lying still further west and south ; a country unknown and unexplored yet by the white men. The accounts were not those which had aroused the cupidity of the Spaniards, and lured them to
9
FRENCH EXPLORERS.
disaster. These Indians described no fabulous kingdom filled with gold and silver and precious stones. They spoke only of the wonders of nature; grand scenery, gigantic mountains, huge cataracts, immense forests and prairies, and boundless hunting fields swarming with game. But above all, they described a great river that they crossed to come to Canada, a river they called the Mississippi, which they said flowed the entire length of the continent, through a valley surpassingly fertile, and peopled with innumerable savage tribes to convert to the Christian faith and subdue to France. These stories, drifting to Montreal and Quebec, came to the ears of the Governor of Canada and of his intendant. But before reaching Montreal the stories had to pass through the settlement of the most celebrated pioneer France ever pos- sessed in this country, Robert Cavelier de la Salle.
La Salle. 1669 .- Robert Cavelier de la Salle was born in the city of Rouen, in Normandy, France. He was educated in the religious schools of the time, and came to Canada at the age of twenty three, determined to make a name and fortune in New France, as it was called. He obtained a large grant of land on the St. Lawrence, a few miles above Montreal. Here clearing the forests and su- perintending the building of houses for his settlers, he LA SALLE. would, at the close of the day, look out to that part of the heavens bright with the rays ' of the setting sun, and he would think about the vast un-
10
HISTORY OF LOUISIANA.
known region that lay between him and the west, and about the Indian stories of the great river that flowed through it to the sea on the other side of the continent ; a river so long, the Indians said, that it would take nine months to reach the end.
As La Salle, like most men of his day, thought that China lay just on the other side of this continent, he believed that any river flowing straight west to the sea would furnish a new, short and easy route between Europe and Asia. To be the first explorer of this route would indeed gain him fame and fortune.
He went to Quebec and laid his plans before the gov- ernor, who gave consent to the exploration but no money. La Salle, without hesitation, sold his property and with the money bought canoes and hired men. The expedition started from his settlement, which, as though it were really the first step on the road to China, received the name of " La Chine."
Louis Joliet .- They paddled up the St. Lawrence to Lake Ontario and stopped at an Indian village to get a guide to the head waters of the Ohio, which would conduct them into the Mississippi. Here La Salle met the man whose name with his own was to be inseparably connected with the Mis- sissippi. This was Louis Joliet. He was a young man of about La Salle's age, and like him full of energy and am- bition. He was a fur trader and pioneer, and was just re- turning from an expedition to Lake Superior. He also had heard of the Mississippi, but knew nothing beyond what the Indians had told him.
La Salle proceeded on his way through Lake Erie, into the Ohio river, which he explored a long distance. Then return- ing he passed through Lakes Huron and Michigan, and crossed into the Illinois river and explored it. He was gone on his expedition two years. He never reached the Missis- sippi ; but he had learned the way to get into it. He returned
-
11
FRENCH EXPLORERS.
to Canada for a larger expedition to carry out the larger schemes he had formed.
Joliet and Marquette. 1672 .- In the meantime a new governor was put over Canada; the Count de Frontenac. The intendant, relating to him all the stories about the Mis- sissippi, advised him to pursue its discovery and exploration, and named Joliet as the proper man to be employed for it. Frontenac accepted both the advice of the intendant and the man of his choice, and Louis Joliet was commissioned to dis- cover and explore the Mississippi. Father Jacques Mar- quette, a Jesuit priest at Michilimakinak, was selected to ac- company him.
Marquette. 1673 .- Jacques Marquette was one of the noblest and purest missionaries that ever came to this coun- try. Born of good and honorable family, in France, he sailed to Canada before he was thirty, to devote himself to the con- version of the savages. He learned six of their languages, and cheerfully braved all the dangers of their barbarous tem- pers, and the hardships of frontier life, to carry on his work among them. Far out on the great lakes he had advanced his missions, but an unexpected outbreak of the savages had driven him back to Michilimakinak. Here it was that Joliet found him and gave him the governor's commission. Mar- quette, in his lonely post, had also heard from the Indians about the Mississippi. As he thought over its majeetic size of the mildness and fertility of its great valley, and of the number of Indian tribes living in it, it became the dearest wish of his heart to christianize so favored a region. With joy, therefore, he consented to accompany Joliet. Their preparations were soon made. They consisted of two birch bark canoes, five men, and a supply of smoked meat and In- dian corn. They started in the most beautiful time of the year in that region ; in the spring, the month of May.
Joliet and Marquette. 1672 .- As we followed La Salle, let us follow Joliet and Marquette also on the map. They
12
HISTORY OF LOUISIANA.
journeyed around the mouth of Lake Michigan until they reached the mission of Father Claude Allouez .* Here they turned into Fox river, which led them across. Lake Winnebago, and through a vast prairie country filled with wild rice, in which great flocks of birds fed. They passed villages of Kickapoo Indians, to whom the priest and Joliet explained their expedition. The Indians stared with wonder at their temerity and tried to dissuade them from so perilous a journey, by telling them the most horrible tales of the cruelty and treachery of the Indians along the Mississippi.
The priest and the pioneer were not to be frightened, how. ever. They asked for guides and set out as soon as possible. They followed Fox river to the end, carried their canoes over to the Wisconsin, and launched them in that river.
Mississippi Discovered. - For ten days they paddled down the Wisconsin, until from their right a broad, rapid current dashed across their course. It was the Upper Missis- sippi! Into it they 'turned their canoes. It bore them rapidly along. They gazed with wonder and awe at the panorama which nature here unfolded to them, hour after hour and day after day, as they advanced. The banks, covered with gigantic virgin forests, now rose into perpen- dicular heights, now sank into undulating plains. Wild animals darted in the thickets ; along the edge of illimitable prairies, buffaloes stared at them from under their shaggy manes. They hauled up all kinds of strange fish in their nets. They no longer camped on the shores at night. Mind- ful of the Indians of the region, after cooking their supper on land, they carefully extinguished their fires, and, paddling out into the stream, anchored and slept there, with sentinels on watch. But no human being was to be seen. At last, one day, on the western bank, footprints in the mud caught their eyes. They were found to lead to a well beaten path,
*A devoted Jesuit priest, who founded as early as 1670 this mission at St Francis Xavier, as he named Green Bay.
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