History of Kalamazoo county, Michigan, Part 4

Author: Durant, Samuel W. comp
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Philadelphia. Everts & Abbott
Number of Pages: 761

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They remained for a month with the Senecas, when an Indian from the village of Ganastogue, an Iroquois colony at the head of Lake Ontario, offered to conduct „them thither, assuring them they would find there what they sought. Leaving the Genesee, they coasted along the southern shore of the lake, passing within hearing of the great cataract of Niagara, and reached Ganastogué in five days. They were received in a friendly manner, and La Salle was presented with a Shawanese prisoner, who in- formed him that the Ohio could be reached in six weeks, and offered to guide them thither.t

When on the point of starting with the new guide, they heard of the arrival of two Frenchmen at a neighboring village. One of these was Joliet, who was on his return from a fruitless expedition to the copper region of Lake Su- perior, whither he had been sent by Talon, as mentioned on a preceding page. He had returned via the Detroit River and Lake Erie, and had been led by an Indian guide across the country from the mouth of Grand River to the head of Lake Ontario, through fear of the Iroquois around the portage of Niagara Falls.

Joliet showed the priests a map of such portions of the upper lakes as he had visited, telling them at the same time of the Pottawattomies, and other Indian nations of that region, who were in great need of spiritual instruction. This information determined the priests to abandon the Mississippi scheme and turn their attention to the Indians. The remonstrances of La Salle, who urged that the Jesuits had already occupied the field, availed nothing. The In-

* Cavelier was the family name, and La Salle the title of its estate or seigniory. His full name and title, according to the parish record, was Rene-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de la Salle.

From the length of time mentioned as necessary to reach the river, it is evident the savages meant the Mississippi River.

LA SALLE.

dians were in need of spiritual succor, and nothing could persuade them from their purpose.

La Salle was attacked by a violent fever after reaching the head of Lake Ontario, and he told his colleagues he was in no condition to proceed with them, and would be obliged to leave them. Inwardly, he was so disgusted with them that he was glad of any excuse for parting company with them. On the last day of September they parted, the Sulpitians and their party descending the Grand River towards Lake Erie, and La Salle and his companions, in- cluding Joliet, as they supposed, taking their way back to Montreal.

The priests, as before seen, were compelled to winter on Lake Erie, from whence, in the spring of 1670, they pro- ceeded through the Straits and Lake Huron to the Sault St. Marie. From thence they soon after returned to Mon- treal, without accomplishing the design of their voyage. This, as before written, was the first recorded passage of white men through the strait where now stands the city of Detroit,-the undoubted passage of Joliet in the previous autumn never having been recorded. The first three visits to the territory of Michigan by white men would be Charles Raymbault and Isaac Jogues, in September, 1641, through the Georgian Bay and Lake Huron to the Sault St. Marie ; that of Louis Joliet, in 1669; and the passage of Casson and Galinée, in the spring of 1670.

EXPLORATIONS, 1669-73.

The whereabouts of La Salle during the next three years has never been satisfactorily explained. A somewhat ob- scure record, never published, entitled " Histoire de Mon- sieur de la Salle," said to have been taken down from La Salle's lips, has been extensively drawn upon, and the at- tempt made by sundry writers to prove therefrom that during the winter and spring of 1669-70 La Salle made a journey of exploration down the Ohio as far as the falls at Louisville.

As an offset to this statement may be quoted the story of Nicholas Perrot, that in the summer of 1670 he met La Salle hunting on the Ottawa River with a party of Iroquois. The manuscript in question goes on to relate that the great explorer in the year 1671 embarked on Lake Erie, explored that lake, and passed on north and west, and sailed over Lakes Huron and Michigan, and from the latter passed to a river flowing westward and followed it to another flowing to the southeast,-meaning possibly the Illinois, or Wis- consin, and Mississippi,-descending the last-mentioned stream to the 36th parallel of north latitude. The story of the exploration of the Ohio bears some marks of au- thenticity, since it is sustained by a memorial of La Salle addressed to Frontenac in 1677, in which he affirms that he discovered that river, and by the testimony of Joliet, who made two maps of the region of the Mississippi and the great lakes. The Ohio is laid down on both, and there is an inscription or statement to the effect that La Salle had explored it.

This part of the account is possibly correct, but the por- tion relating to the discovery of the Mississippi is a fiction, since neither La Salle nor his friends ever made such claim.

In 1672, Count Frontenac had succeeded Courcelles as Governor-General of Canada, and we find that La Salle had won the confidence of the new Governor, who was greatly interested in all his plans of discovery. About this time Perrot, the Governor of Montreal, had become extensively engaged in the fur-trade, and had even sent men into the wilderness to anticipate the Indian trade, and thus divert it to Montreal. Frontenac was himself interested in the fur-trade, and this movement of Perrot seriously interfered with his business at Quebec.

FORT CATARAQUI (FRONTENAC).

In this dilemma La Salle broached a plan, which had also been recommended by Courcelles, and which immediately interested the count. He suggested the advisability of estab- lishing a fortified post at the outlet of Lake Ontario, which would not only be of great value from a military point of view, but would enable the party who controlled it to com- mand the entire trade of the upper country, and Frontenac was not slow to take advantage of it. He did not dare petition for the sanction of the king, lest the Governor and merchants of Montreal should remonstrate and defeat the object, but proceeded at once to put the design in execu- tion. Summoning the militia of the province and collect- ing a large number of Indians, he set out on his journey from Quebec and leisurely proceeded to Montreal. He had given out that he was on a tour of inspection of the prov- ince, and had invited the officers and prominent citizens to accompany him.

He had a train of about four hundred men, with one hundred and twenty canoes, and these, with the baggage, he sent from Montreal to La Chine by land, to which place he followed on the 28th of June, 1673.

From thence the passage was made mostly by water. In the mean time La Salle had visited Onondaga and invited the Iroquois to meet the Governor in a grand council. He also sent Frontenac a map of the region around Lake On- tario, and recommended the mouth of the Cataraqui, where Kingston now stands, as the most eligible site for the new post.

The expedition reached the rendezvous on the 12th of July, and the Governor found a respectable number of Iro- quois assembled to meet him.

Here, with all the pomp and ceremony he could employ, Count Frontenac held a council with the delegates from the Five Nations, making them costly presents, fondling the Indian children, and using every means to make a favorable impression upon the haughty conquerors of the wilderness. The council ceremonies were protracted through several days, and in the mean time Frontenac's engineer, Raudin, was busily engaged in tracing the lines and constructing Fort Cataraqui.

It was a large and strongly-palisaded earthwork, with ditch and bastions, and designed to mount a few light guns.

The Iroquois departed, apparently pleased with Onontio,*

* A name the Indians bestowed on the French Governors. The English Governors and principal men they called Corlear, a name at first applied to the Dutch. According to Parkman it signifies, in the Iroquois tongue, " Great Mountain,"

HISTORY OF KALAMAZOO COUNTY, MICHIGAN.

though the experience of later years proved that all his efforts had neither charmed nor frightened the descendants . of At-o-tar-ho.

Frontenac placed a garrison in his new fort, with provis- ions for one year, and left on his return to Quebec, highly pleased with the success of his expedition.

Thus was the strong point d'appui to the vast lake re- gion of the West established,-a position which the French held with great tenacity until 1758, when, in an unguarded moment, while Montcalm was confronting the decimated army of Abercrombie on Lake George, Gen. John Brad- street descended upon it with a Provincial army, and almost obliterated what had then become a regular fortress.

La Salle was deeply interested in this arrangement, and Frontenac, who feared the king might not sanction his bold move, was willing to advance any scheme which La Salle might adopt that would insure the permanency of Cataraqui as a military post.

It was finally arranged between them that La Salle should present two petitions to the king,-one for a patent of nobility for his services as an explorer, the other for a grant in seigniory of Fort Frontenac, which name he was to give the new post, in honor of his patron.

Armed with letters of strong recommendation from the count, he proceeded, in the autumn of 1674, to France and presented his petitions at court. He was well received, and his petitions were granted, upon condition that he should repay the king the ten thousand francs which the fort had cost him ; maintain it at his own charge, with a garrison equal to that of Montreal, with the necessary laborers ; gather a French colony around it; build a church when the inhabitants should reach one hundred ; support one or more Recollet friars; and form a settlement of domesti- cated Indians in the neighborhood.

" He was raised to the rank of the untitled nobles, received a grant of the fort and lands adjacent, to the extent of four leagues in front and half a league in depth, together with the neighboring islands, and was invested with the government of the fort and settlement, subject to the orders of the Governor-General."*

This good fortune so pleased his family that they made him large advances in money to enable him to pay the king, and also to rebuild the fort substantially with stone.

It was a matter of record that La Salle was to share with Frontenac and other parties the great profits which would accrue from the immense trade that must centre and be controlled at this point.

Though La Salle had a firm friend in Count Frontenac, who assisted him in every possible manner, and though the Sulpitian priests at Montreal and on the Bay of Quinte were well disposed towards him, yet he had in some way incurred the enmity of the Jesuits, who put forth every effort to op- pose his plans and destroy his growing trade. From 1674 to the day of his death there was a continual quarrel between him and them, and no doubt this was the principal cause of his misfortunes. He was too independent in spirit to be controlled by the haughty priesthood, who with a strong hand undertook to sway the destinies of Canada. Every- thing was thrown in his way that could impede his plans of discovery, and even his brother, the Abbé Cavelier, in a

small way interfered with him to his great annoyance. Attempts were even made to poison him.

FIRST VESSEL ON LAKE ONTARIO.

But notwithstanding all the difficulties which surrounded him La Salle kept steadily at work, with the one grand aim always in view of conducting a great exploring expedition through the Mississippi Valley, and thereby adding vast regions to the power of France. He built four small decked vessels on Lake Ontario for purposes of trade and exploration, and within two years-1677-78-had rebuilt Fort Frontenac with hewn stone, with the exception of the water-side, which was constructed of strong stockades. The regular garrison consisted of two officers, a surgeon, and ten or twelve soldiers ; and forty or fifty mechanics, laborers, and canoe-men were also maintained. There were in addi- tion two Recollet friars, Luc Buisset and the noted Louis Hennepin. Barracks, a mill, a bakery, a well, and clusters of houses were constructed, and the Recollets had a house and chapel.

REVISITS FRANCE.

In 1678, La Salle again visited France for the further- ance of his scheme of exploration. As on a former occa- sion, he bore strong commendatory letters from Frontenac, and though denounced in advance as a madman by his enemies, he won the confidence and support of the king and his prime minister, the famous Colbert, and was author- ized to go on with his discoveries, plant settlements, build forts, and carry on trade with the natives.

In July, 1678, La Salle returned to Canada, bringing an addition of thirty men,-sailors, carpenters, and laborers,- with abundant stores, tools, and merchandise ; in short, everything necessary for his enterprise. With him came Henri de Tonti (or Tonty, as Parkman writes it), an Italian officer, one of whose hands had been blown off by a grenade. His father, who had been Governor of Gaeta, but who had subsequently settled in France on account of political troubles, was the originator of the plan of life insurance known as the Tontine.

The Prince de Conti, whose protege Henri de Tonti was, had recommended him to La Salle, and the latter made him his lieutenant. De Tonti afterwards became almost as noted for his voyages and explorations as La Salle himself. He was undoubtedly a most remarkable man, a brave soldier, a most skillful leader, true as the needle to the magnet, and indefatigable in the discharge of his duties, whether as commander of the fortified post, the wilderness stockade on the Rock of the Illinois, or as leader of an exploring band in the forests of the Mississippi.

Late in the season of 1678, De Tonti was sent forward by La Salle to build a fort near the cataract of Niagara, which La Salle, in honor of the prince, named Fort Conti.t

Two other prominent friends of La Salle were the Sieur

t La Salle, in a letter to the Prince de Conti, under date of Oct. 31, 1678, in speaking of Tonti and the new fortification, uses the follow- ing language : " Nevertheless, his energy and address make him equal to anything; and now, at a season of the year when everybody is in fear of the ice, he is setting out to begin a new fort two hundred leagues from this place. It is situated near that great cataract, more than a hundred and twenty toises in height, by which the lakes of higher elevation precipitate themselves into Lake Frontenac.".

* Parkman,

LA SALLE.

de la Motte and Father Louis Hennepin,* a member of the Récollet order of the Franciscans, who met him at Quebec.

Early in November, La Salle and his party arrived at Fort Frontenac, from whence he immediately sent fifteen men in canoes to the region of Lake Michigan, to open trade with the Indians and collect provisions for future use. This party probably went via Lake Erie, the straits of De- troit, and Lakes Huron and Michigan to Green Bay, where La Salle met a portion of them in the following year.

FORT AT NIAGARA.

Soon after his arrival at the fort, La Salle, Hennepin, and La Motte, with sixteen men, set sail on Lake Ontario (which La Salle called Lac Frontenac) in a small brigan- tine, or sloop, of ten tons burden, for the post of Niagara, or Fort Conti. It was past the middle of November, and they were eight days working up the tempest-tossed lake to the Indian village of Tai-ai-a-gon, near the site of the modern city of Toronto, where they ran into harbor and were frozen in.

Cutting their way out with axes, on the 5th of De- cember they crossed the head of the lake to the mouth of the Niagara River, which they reached on the 6th after a tempestuous night, and landed at the spot since made his- toric by Fort Niagara.t

From this place Hennepin and several others ascended the river in a canoe as far as the foot of the ridge at Lew- iston, from whence they were compelled to go on foot the remainder of the distance (about seven miles) to the great fall, which they probably beheld about the 7th of December, 1678, and were perhaps the first white men who gazed upon its wonders. Hennepin's account was certainly the first in writing given by one who had actually beheld the greatest curiosity of the kind on the face of the globe.}

The Senecas were opposed to the building of a regular fort at Niagara, and to conciliate them La Motte and Hennepin made a journey to one of their villages beyond the Gen- esee River, near the modern town of Victor. They reached the place on the last day of December, 1678, and held a council with forty-two chiefs, to whom they made many presents, and tried to persuade them that the building of a fort at Niagara would not be an injury, but a positive benefit to them. The Indians took the presents, but failed to see

* Hennepin had come to Canada in 1675, in the same ship with La Salle. He had been a teacher, and on his arrival was sent to Fort Frontenac, where he set up a huge cross, erected a chapel, and in- structed the Iroquois colonized there. In the winter of 1677-78, in company with a single soldier of the fort, he made a journey on snow- shoes to Onondaga, and thence down the Mohawk River to the Mohawk castles, where he found two Jesuit missionaries. He was a noted adventurer, but a bombastic and unreliable writer.

t This name was written by Lalemant, in 1641, Onguiaahra, and by Sanson, on his map of 1657, Ongiara. Hennepin wrote it as now used.

# The first mention of the fall was made by Ragueneau, in 1648, as follows : "Nearly south of this same Neutral Nation there is a great lake, about two hundred leagues in circuit, named Erie, which is formed by the discharge of the Fresh Sea, and which precipitates itself by a cataract of frightful height into a third lake, named On- tario, which we call Lac St. Louis."-Parkman's Jesuits, p. 143.

Hennepin vastly overrated the height of the fall, which he at first estimated at five hundred feet, and in his second account, in 1697, at six hundred. Dr. O'Callaghan states that he has seen thirty-nine different ways of spelling Niagara.

the project in the same light as their visitors, and the latter returned to their camp with very little satisfaction.

In the mean time, La Salle had met with both good and evil fortune. On a second voyage, with supplies for the camp at Niagara, the little brigantine had been wrecked, and most of the supplies lost, by the disobedience of the pilot. This was the first of a series of misfortunes which seemed to persistently follow the great explorer. In another di- rection he had been more successful. He had met the Senecas, and obtained from them the privilege of construct- ing a stockaded warehouse at the mouth of the Niagara.

The loss of the vessel was a terrible misfortune, but as the anchors and cables, destined for a larger vessel to be constructed on Lake Erie, had been saved from the wreck, La Salle did not lose heart, though La Motte had returned discouraged and worn out with his winter journeyings, to Canada. Tonti and Hennepin remained, but the motley retainers were almost in a state of mutiny.

La Salle, instead of giving up to misfortune, valiantly de- termined to proceed with his enterprise. Accordingly all his supplies and materials were transported over the portage, and on the 22d of January, 1679, were deposited two leagues above the cataract, at the mouth of Cayuga Creek, on the American side of the river.

THE " GRIFFIN."

Here a camp was established, a chapel erected for Hen- nepin (who had borne a portable altar on his shoulders around the falls), and the keel of a vessel of about forty- five tons was laid, and her construction proceeded with as rapidly as circumstances would permit.

After getting everything in working order, La Salle, leaving the command with Tonti, made a journey on foot back to Frontenac, a distance of two hundred and fifty miles, through the forests and over the ice of Lake On- tario, for the purpose of procuring fresh supplies, of which his command stood in great need. Two men accompanied him, and a dog drew his personal baggage on a sled. Their food consisted of a bag of parched corn, which was en- tirely devoured two days before they reached their destina- tion. Two Mohegan Indians, who had accompanied La Salle from Frontenac, supplied Tonti and his party with nearly all their provisions in the absence of La Salle.

By the opening of spring, Tonti had nearly completed the vessel, which was named the " Griffin," in honor of the armorial bearings on the arms of Frontenac. She was towed up to Black Rock and made fast, and her equipment completed. Her armament consisted of five small guns placed in as many ports along her deck, and on her prow was carved in wood a figure of the allegorical animal after which she was named.

THE VOYAGE.

Long and anxiously Tonti and his companions awaited the return of La Salle. The winter was succeeded by spring, and this by the fiery months of summer, before he made his appearance. At length, in the beginning of August, he arrived, accompanied by three more friars. He brought unwelcome news: his creditors had seized his property and tried in every way to break up his expedi-

HISTORY OF KALAMAZOO COUNTY, MICHIGAN.

tion ; but he was undaunted, and, as if hurried on by a mysterious fate, boldly determined to advance into the western waters, and on the 7th of August, 1679, set sail upon the bosom of Lake Erie. The " Griffin" was the first vessel built by Europeans and navigated upon the ninety thousand square miles of fresh water spreading, like the ocean, westward and northward from the fall of Niagara.

There were in all thirty-four souls on board the little craft, and for three days they bore southwestward on the waters of Lake Erie; turning north, and probably coming in sight of the low-lying shores of Michigan about the tenth of the month, in the vicinity of where now stands the town of Monroe. Passing through the strait and across the expanse of waters which they called Lake Sainte Claire,* they still bore north through the strait beyond, and soon beheld opening before them-a vast ocean of waves-the broad waters of the " Mer Douce," the " Fresh-Water Sea of the Hurons."

On the tumbling billows of Saginaw Bay a furious tem- pest tossed them like a cork, and the frightened adven- turers believed themselves surely lost, for they had seen nothing like it since they braved the dangers of the At- lantic; but the winds abated, the billows gradually sub- sided, and the little craft gallantly bore on her way, the pioneer of unnumbered thousands that, ere two centuries should roll away, were to whiten with the sails of a peace- ful commerce all these mighty inland seas.

AT MICHILIMACKINAC.

Passing the clustering islands of Thunder Bay, they sailed along the far-extending waters, and soon came in sight of the wooded shores of Bois Blanc and Mackinac and the dense forests sweeping down on either side of the narrow strait which unites Lakes Huron and Michigan, and divides the shores of the upper and lower peninsulas. We quote a few interesting sentences from the historian Parkman :

"And now her port was won, and she found her rest behind the point of St. Ignace of Michilimackinac, floating in that tranquil cove where crystal waters cover but cannot hide the pebbly depths beneath. Before her rose the house and chapel of the Jesuits, inclosed with palisades; on the right the Huron village, with its bark cabins and its fence of tall pickets; on the left the square, compact houses of the French traders; and, not far off, the clustered wigwams of an Ottawa village. Here was a centre of the Jesuit missions and a centre of the Indian trade, and here, under the shadow of the Cross, was much sharp practice in the service of Mammon."

The guns of the "Griffin" thundered a salute, to the wonder and astonishment of the Indians, and her crew landed and marched, under arms, to the chapel in the Ottawa village, where they heard mass. On their return the Hurons gave them a salute of musketry, and the Indian canoes clus- tered by the hundred around the " Griffin," which the savages called the " floating fort."

At Michilimackinac La Salle learned of more trouble awaiting him. Tonti had been sent forward with canoes from Niagara, in advance of the "Griffin," to look after the fifteen men dispatched by La Salle the autumn before to purchase furs and prepare for his coming. Tonti found that they had squandered the goods or used them in trad-

ing on their own account, and had scattered in various directions. La Salle found four of them at Mackinac, t whom he arrested, and sent Tonti to the Sault St. Marie to look after others.

Before Tonti had returned from his last-named expedi- tion, early in September, La Salle set sail from Mackinac, and proceeded to the islands at the entrance to Green Bay. Here he found a party of his advance men who had re- mained faithful, and collected a large store of furs. A. prominent Pottawattomie chief was also very friendly. La Salle now resolved to load his vessel with furs, and send her back with something tangible to satisfy his creditors. Accordingly, on the 18th of September she departed in charge of the pilot, who had orders to unload her at Ni- agara, and immediately return with her to the Illinois country.

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History of Kalamazoo county, Michigan, Part 4

Author: Durant, Samuel W. comp Publication date: 1880 Publisher: Philadelphia. Everts & Abbott Number of Pages: 761

Author: Durant, Samuel W. comp
Publication date: 1880
Publisher: Philadelphia. Everts & Abbott
Number of Pages: 761