USA > Mississippi > A history of the Mississippi valley, from its discovery to the end of foreign domination. The narrative of the founding of an empire, shorn of current myth, and enlivened by the thrilling adventures of discoverers, pioneers, frontiersmen, Indian fighters, and homemakers > Part 10
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It is especially important to note that the raids against New England were not made to preserve Can- ada from invasion; the British colonies had no thought of pushing settlements to the Canada line at any time
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Mississippi Valley.
before or during these raids. The raids were made solely to protect a trade that in a moral point of view was robbery; and they were made at times when the French and British kings were nominally at peace. Therefore to drive the French from the region west of the Alleghenies was an act of self defence. Let it be repeated for the sake of emphasis, that during fifty years the French had relentlessly pushed their inhuman warfare, and the British were then justified in sweep- ing such neighbors from the continent.
With his sympathies excited by the magnificent achievements of La Salle, and his prejudices aroused against the British for the arrogance and oppression with which they treated the United States, more than one American writer has said the Mississippi Valley was rightfully the property of the French, and that predatory aggression took it from them. But it is not so. For, even though it be allowed that the Great Basin was rightfully French land, it was not predatory aggression that took it. It was an aggression in self defence.
In fact, as shall appear, the French shifted the war from New England to a point back of the Alleghanies. They made an attack on British traders who were in the Ohio country, where they had a right to be under the treaty last made by the two nations (Utrecht). It shall further appear that when the British colonies ex- pressed a fear that if French posts were established west of the Alleghanies, the raiding that had been done in New England would be continued in Pennsylvania and Virginia, the fear was fully justified. The truth is that in the state of civilization then prevailing the con-
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A History of the
tinent was not large enough to hold the two peoples, and a war that would expel or subjugate one of them was unavoidable.
In a larger view this war was but an incident in a prolonged conflict between rival races which is yet waged, though at present not with guns.
The first French move into the Alleghany region was made in 1749. On June 15 Monsieur Celoron de Bienville (commonly called Celoron only), left La Chine with a party that included fourteen officers, twenty regular soldiers, 180 Canadians, a band of In- dians, and a priest, all in twenty-three canoes. Going to the mouth of the creek that empties into Lake Erie, near Westfield, N. Y., they passed over to Lake Chau- tauqua, and thence to the Alleghany river, which they reached on July 29. There Celoron began the particu- lar work of his mission. Drawing his forces up in lines he buried a plate of lead in the south bank, and further down the stream he attached the royal coat of arms (painted on tin), to a tree. After that was done a notary public, brought for the purpose, made a formal written statement of what had been done.
The lead plate was inscribed as follows (transla- tion by Parkman) :
Year 1749, in the Reign of Louis Fifteenth, King of France, We, Celoron, commanding the detachment sent by the Marquise de la Galissonnière, commanding general of New France, to restore tranquility in certain villages of these cantons, have buried this plate at the confluence of the Ohio and the Kanaouagon (Conewango), this 29th July, as a token of renewal of posses- sion heretofore taken of the aforesaid River Ohio, of all streams that fall into it, and all lands on both sides to the source of the aforesaid streams, as the preceeding Kings of France have en-
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84
83
82
J0
15
45
30
15
45
30
45 30
15
45
30
15
4.
30
15
45
Pointe, aux Piss
AR aux Pommes
10
"marque les endroits ou l'on a enterre' les lamcs deplomb
+ Marque les latitudes observées
Baye
8
5
Dans lechelle des latitudes croissantes les chiffres qui sunt dehors marquent les degre's do latitude ceux qui sont en dedans
Laux Cignes.
Pointe Pellee.
ERIE
la Taille coupeet àsarannoungar
Isles aux Serpentes.
20-42
12
20 marquent les lieues de 20 au degre'
Le degré's enlongitude sont marques par les chiffres qui sont en dehors
et les minutes de de degre pas-
R.aux Boeufs
ceux qui sont en dedans.
Village de Loups
10
Fort des miamis
- R.au Fiel
5
5
R.au Vormillion
Ancient Village des Chaquarters Antigue
Village de Chingue
15
a Village de Loups
La Demoiselle
R.Kanonouaras
5
FELLE
20
R. Yenanguekonan
15
R
CARTE DUN VOYAGE FAIT
10
DANS
LA
*R.Chinonabichta
.R. Blanche Le le Baril
R. de Sinhioto
Par le Rever erend Pere Bonnecamps Jesuitte Mathematician
On apris pour Premier meridien celuy de l'observatoire Royale de Paris
15
Photo. Eng Co. N. Y.
30:
15
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45' 30, 15' .79 45 30.
MAP OF CELORON S EXPEDITION, 1749.
Raux Centres. 15
Lac Tjadakoin
£ Marque les Villages
Donanguisse
Raux
Raisins
LAC
Toute cette partie du Lac m'est inconnue
a Village de Loups5
15
.Portage de la Demoiselle aux miamis
10
Roche.
ala
L'OHIO
LA BELLE HIVIERE EN LA NOUVELLE FRANCE M.DCC XLIX
Longitude Occidentale
Mississippi Valley.
joyed or ought to have enjoyed it, and which they have upheld by force of arms and by treaties, notably those of Ryswick, Utrecht and Aix-la-Chapelle.
DE LOVIS
XV ROYAL
FRANCENOVS" CELORON
COMMANDANT D.VN ...
IS
TACHEMENT ENVOIE PAR
MONSIE'VR LE
LA
CALISSONIERE COMMANDANT GENERAL
DE LA
NOVELLE FRANCE POVR RETABLIR
LA TRANAVILLITE
DANS YELIVES VILLAGES SAUVAGES DE - CES CANTONS
AVONS ENTERRE CETTE " PLATVE . A LENTREE DELLA
RIVIERE CHINODAHICHETHA LE IR AQUST
PRES DE LA RIVIERE OYO
AUTREMENT BELLE
RIVIERE POVR MONVMENT , DV RENOVVELLEMENT DE.
POSSESSION AVE NOVS?
AVONS PRIS TE DE LA DITTE
RIVIERE OYO ET DE TOVTES CELLES AVI Y TOMB
ET DE TOVE'S LES TERRES DES DEVX COTES IVSAVE
AVX SOVRCES DES. DITTES RIVIES VINSI AVEKONT
TOVÝ NOVE DV JOVIR LES PRECEDENTS, ROKS DE
FRANCE
ET IVILS SISONT MAINTENVS PAR LES ARMES GET
PAR LES TRAITTES SPECIALEMENT
PARECENX DE
RISVVICK , DVTRCHT ET DAIX LA CHPELLE
THIS SHOWS THE INSCRIPTION ON ONE OF THE TWO PLATES WHICH HAVE BEEN FOUND.
It was by such idle displays as this that the French then expected to stop the onflow of British settlers.
Celoron was under orders to expel all British tra- ders that he might find, but the further they travelled down the river, the more threatening became the bear- ing of the Indians, who had found British goods better as well as cheaper than those supplied by the French.
On reaching the Scioto the expedition turned north, and at the mouth of the Laramie creek had a talk with a chief the French called La Demoiselle, though he was known to the British traders as "Old Britain," because of his friendship for all things British. Old Britain accepted the presents offered, but when asked
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LAN :1)49DV. REGNE
A History of the
to remove his people to their former dwelling place, near a French post on the Maumee River, he said he would do so "at a more convenient time." What he did do was to increase the population of Pique Town, or Pickawillany, as his village was called, and make it a stronghold for British traders. This village gave its name to the modern town of Piqua, Ohio, which, however, stands some distance south of the mouth of Laramie creek.
At the head of the Scioto, Celoron burned his ca- noes, and marched overland to the Maumee, whence he returned home by way of the lakes. He had accom- plished nothing but to give the British warning that the French were going to claim everything back of the Alleghany mountains.
In view of this warning, the attitude of the British colonists in the three years after 1749 was most re- markable. Not only did they ignore the threat of French occupation of the lands claimed by Virginia and Pennsylvania; they even neglected the Indians on those lands, and allowed "the chain of friendship to rust; and then to break."
Several causes united to create this singular atti- tude. In Pennsylvania the people and the proprietors were quarreling over the expenses incidental to Indian affairs. The assembly wished the proprietors to bear part of the expense and the proprietors refused. It was a question of principle rather than of cash appar- ently, for the Quakers, who refused to vote money when they thought the proprietors ought to give it, were always ready to give liberally, and their time also when treaties were to be held with the Indians.
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Mississippi Valley.
In other colonies, too, the people were too busy with a growing struggle they were maintaining against the encroachments of their governors, to give adequate attention to either the Indians or the French.
Further than that there were jealousies between the colonies, while the French were one people with a single head, and a single purpose. There were also divisions among the Indians. Time had been when the Iroquois nation controlled all the Indians of the Ohio region, but in the middle of the Eighteenth Century the Delawares were asserting independence once more, and there was talk of making an alliance of the tribes in the West somewhat similar to the confederation of the Six Nations. Even the Iroquois were divided. The Onondagas were selling land to Pennsylvania and ig- noring the Mohawks altogether in the transaction, while the Senecas, the most warlike of the six tribes, having a natural liking for the aggressiveness shown by the French in those days, were, to a large degree, won over to the French interest.
Nevertheless the British traders kept the grass out of the trails leading to the Ohio country. More than fifty of them were found gathered at Old Bri- tain's, on more than one occasion, and they reached out for the trade of the Indians living with the French on the Wabash, the Maumee and at Detroit. This activity stirred the French to make an advance, in spite of the failure of Celoron's expedition. Comman- dant Raymond, commanding the post on the Maumee, wrote, (quoted by Parkman) :
"All the tribes who go to the English at Picka- willany come back loaded with gifts. I am too weak
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to meet the danger. Instead of twenty men I need 500. * * * If the English stay in this country we are lost. We must attack and drive them out." The time for something more than an idle display of forms had come.
An attempt to incite the Indians about Detroit to go on a raid to Old Britain's town developed the fact that they were "touched with disaffection." But Charles Langlade, a French trader at Green Bay, came down to the Maumee with 250 "Christian Ottawas and Ojibwas, and passing through the dense forest, reached Old Britain's town at 9 o'clock on the morning of June 21, 1752. The stockade gates were immediately closed by traders, and a short resistance was made, but the Green. Bay Indians triumphed. Two traders escaped. One who was wounded was murdered after the surrender. The Miamis lost fourteen killed and among these was Old Britain. And him the "Christ- ian" Green Bay Indians boiled and ate, while the French looked on without protest, if not with entire approval.
The Marquis Duquesne de Menneville had just become governor of Canada when the report of Lang- lade's victory reached the St. Lawrence. In spite of the terms of the Treaty of Utrecht he asked the min- ister to pension Langlade.
The first gun in the war that ended on the Plains of Abraham was fired, with the full approval of the French authorities, by Charles Langlade on the banks of the Scioto.
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GEORGE WASHINGTON.
This portrait was presented by Washington to his niece in 1757, when he was twenty-five years of age. Braddock's defeat was in 1755, and the surrender of Fort Duquesne in 1758.
OHIO RIVER
FORT
Mononga neta R
DU QUESNE
1755
VIII
THE FRENCH EXPELLED FROM THE VALLEY. PART II.
When the French, with Their Silks and Velvets, Came to the "Belle Riviere"-Washington's Journey into the Wilderness-Virginia's Efforts to Repel the French-Washington's First Battle-The Power of Madam de Pompadour-The Story of Braddock's Expedition-The French King Approved Indian Raids on the Home-Makers-It Was in Accordance with an Inexorable Law of Nature that the Man with an Axe Should Supplant the Vagabond with a Sword.
To follow up the successful work of Langlade on the Scioto, Gov. Duquesne, of Canada, determined to occupy all the passes of the Alleghanies, and support them by building a strong fort at the forks of the Ohio. In this plan, contrary to the usual condition of affairs in
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A History of the
Canada, the Governor was heartily supported by the Intendant, Francois Bigot. To establish new posts was to give new opportunities for enriching himself to the Intendant, and Bigot was an official with whom for- gery and perjury, for the concealment of theft, were common acts.
To further show the character of the Canadian of- ficials it must be said that Governor Duquesne appoint- ed Pierre Paul, Sieur de Marin, (described as a gruff, choleric old man of sixty-three, but full of force and capacity), to lead the new expedition to the Allegha- nies because of the charms of Madam Marin, who was much younger. At the request of Intendant Bigot the Chevalier Péan was made second in command, and Bigot made the request because Madam Péan was young and charming.
In the fall of 1752, Marin, with 250 men, went to the bay where Erie, Pennsylvania, now stands, and built a fort of chestnut logs to guard the harbor. A road over a newly-discovered portage was then cut to where Waterford, Pennsylvania, now stands on French creek, a distance of twenty-one miles. Here they built a fort and named it Le Boeuf.
Over this route they carried their baggage consist- ing of "velvets, silks and other costly articles sold to the king at enormous prices as necessaries of the ex- pedition," and then the force sat down for the winter.
It was not until the next spring, when reinforce- ments were sent up the lakes to this new post, that the English heard of the new movement. On May 15, 1753, Capt. Benjamin Stoddart wrote from Oswego to Col. Johnson saying: "Yesterday passed here thirty
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odd French canoes, part of an army going to Belle Riviere, to make good their claim there." He thought the whole army numbered 6,000. There were near 1,500 all told.
When the reinforcements reached Le Boeuf they fortified the trail and spent so much time in useless work that they did not reach and fortify the site of Venango, (on the way to the forks of the Ohio), until August. Meantime sickness had appeared among the loitering throng, and so many of them died, (including Marin), that the project of going to the forks that year was abandoned.
This irruption of the French pleased the Indians, as a whole, in spite of their previous regard for the British traders. The British colonial officials had ne- glected them. The neglect offended them. The French came with a threat of war in one hand and many presents as a reward for help in the other, and the Indians, having the character of children, grasped eagerly at the presents. The old Iroquois chief Half- King went to Marin with a protest, but Iroquois, Dela- wares and Shawnees helped the French carry their goods, (more "velvets, silks and other useless and costly articles"), over the portage, and even the Mi- amis came with the scalps of two British traders. The memory of Old Britain, boiled and eaten, was gone. Pottawattamies and Ojibways also came from the West as a part of the French force.
In spite of this ominous condition of affairs but one man in the British colonies did anything to avert the danger. Governor Robert Dinwiddie, of Virginia, wrote a letter of inquiry and protest to the commander
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A History of the
of the French forces, (for Virginia claimed all the Ohio region under her charter), and sent it by the Adjutant General of the Virginia militia, George Washington, then twenty-one years old, to the French. Christopher Gist, who had been prospecting the Ohio country in the interests of the Virginia land specula- tors called the Ohio Company, went along as guide.
The story of this journey into the wilderness- Washington's first notable public service-is told in his journal and has been so often retold that it need not be repeated here in detail. At Venango Wash- ington was received with every form of civility. He noted that at dinner wine was served in abundance, and that the French officers, (the notable Joncaire was in command), drank enough to loosen their tongues.
"They told me it was their absolute design to take possession of the Ohio, and by G- they would do it," writes Washington. They said also that the British colonies were too slow in making retaliatory move- ments to stop the French. And in this statement the French were very nearly but not quite correct.
Washington went on to headquarters at Le Boeuf, and delivered (December 11, 1753), his message. He found Legardeur de St. Pierre in command. Le- gardeur replied, "I do not think myself obliged to obey" your summons to leave the country.
Nevertheless Washington accomplished the chief object of his journey. He learned the French plans, and he brought back a statement of the number of French in the Ohio water shed, and the number of canoes built and building for use in the next forward movement. He also noted that in the forks of the
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Ohio the land lay well for the site of a fort. He reached home in January, 1754.
In the meantime a letter was received from the British King commanding Dinwiddie "to drive them (the French) off by force of arms." To obey, how- ever, was to prove a hard task. For, first of all, the colonists were not greatly interested in the matter. Even some Virginians argued that the Great Valley really belonged to the French, while others believed the anxiety of Dinwiddie to drive off the French was due to his interest in the Ohio Company that pur- posed settling lands on the Ohio river. In fact in all the Colonies the one man in official position who would make a definite move to stop the French advance to the forks of the Ohio was Governor Dinwiddie. But for him the French would have established themselves where Pittsburg now stands without any opposition other than written words. And once they had been thus established who can say when or how they would have been routed out? It was fortunate for the fu- ture of the Mississippi valley that Dinwiddie "had enthusiasm, persistence, and a hatred of the French."
By thorough, enthusiastic and persistent effort, Dinwiddie persuaded his legislature to offer 200,000 acres of land west of the Alleghanies to any men who would fight to perfect the title to it. The legislature also voted 10,000 pounds for the purpose of perfect- ing that title. Meantime Dinwiddie raised 300 militia -"raw recruits." Joshua Fry, "bred at Oxford," was made Colonel, Washington was promoted to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel, and with half the force was sent forward to Will's creek, an upper branch of the Po-
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A History of the
tomac, (Cumberland, Maryland). William Trent, a trader, with a gang of backwoodsmen, was with Wash- ington, and when Washington stopped, under orders, at Will's creek to build storehouses for a base of sup- plies, Trent's men went on to the forks of the Ohio and began to erect a fort on the point between the rivers. Here the command devolved upon Ensign Ward, who began work on the fort on an unnamed day, early in April, 1754.
Dinwiddie had hastened forward this force because he believed the French would come down from Ven- ango, early that spring, and his belief proved well founded, for on April 17, six flat boats, carrying eight- een cannon, and 300 canoes, came down the Allegha- ny river, bearing 500 Frenchmen under Captain Claude Pecaudy de Contrecoeur.
Ward, having but forty men, and an unfinished fort for shelter, was obliged to leave. The French then completed the fort, (it was 120x150 feet large), and armed it with "six pieces of cannon of six, nine of two, and three pound ball." They named the fort Duquesne.
The station that Washington was building on Will's creek was 140 miles from Fort Duquesne, by the usual trail. At the mouth of Redstone creek, (a branch of the Monongahela), a point that was half way between Will's creek and Duquesne, the Ohio Company had built a stone house. Dinwiddie, on hearing of the French arrival at the forks of the Ohio, ordered his forces forward to the stone house on Redstone creek, and Washington at once began to cut out the Old In- dian trail that had been marked by the Ohio Com-
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Mississippi Valley.
pany, and made a wagon road of it. And this "was really the first wagon road into the Great Valley from the Atlantic slope." Traces of this old trail can still be found though it was abandoned in 1818, when the National Road was constructed.
Late in May, Washington reached a natural open- ing in the woods in the valley of the Youghiogany, known as the Great Meadows, and there he cleared away the brush in front of a small ravine, which he turned into a fortification. Meantime, the French had sent out thirty-three men under Ensign Coulon de Ju- monville, to attack Washington. But, finding his force too small, Jumonville hid in a dense wooded ravine to await reinforcements. While the French lay hid, Washington learned from his old guide, Gist, that the party was out, and determined to defend himself by at- tacking them. The Iroquois Half-King and others of his tribe guided Washington to the ravine on May 28, 1754. The French were surprised in their camp. They jumped to get their guns, and Washington ordered his men to fire. Jumonville and nine Frenchmen were killed, (which shows the accuracy of the British- American aim, even though Half-King did claim that his Indians did most of the killing), and twenty-two were captured. One Canadian escaped by running.
The French who for more than fifty years had been raiding the back settlements of the British colonies, slaughtering women and babies whom they dragged from their beds at night-these Frenchmen called, and yet call, the killing of Jumonville an assassination. They wrote the tale in verse, and they screamed it into all the courts of Europe.
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A History of the
Washington returned to his camp at the Great Meadows, after the attack on Jumonville, and made an entrenchment which he named Fort Necessity. It was on a small branch of the Youghiogany, in Fayette county, Pa., four miles east of Laurel Hill, and 300 yards south of the old National Road. Here some re- inforcements joined him, and here Washington learned that he was in supreme command, ( though but twenty- two years old), through the death of Col. Fry.
On July 1, 1754, Washington was attacked by 700 Frenchmen and an uncounted number of Indians, un- der the command of Coulon de Villiers, a brother of Coulon de Jumonville. Villiers had come from Canada especially to avenge the "assassination" of his brother. To defend his fort, Washington had 350 men.
The French, sheltered by forest trees standing from sixty to 100 yards from the fort, opened fire at II o'clock in the morning and for nine hours they worked their guns with "zeal and ardor." At the end of that time "the detachment was tired and the Indians sent me word that they would depart next day," as Villiers reported. Moreover, the French ammunition was al- most exhausted. The attack had failed.
But what he could not get by force of arms, Vil- liers obtained by finesse. "A cessation of arms was proposed to the English," and when the cessation had been accepted, Washington sent his Dutch-French in- terpreter, Van Braam, to learn what the French would propose.
It was now that French finesse succeeded. The French proposed that the English march out with colors flying and drums beating, and take a swivel with
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Mississippi Valley.
them. The French were to have back the prisoners taken when Jumonville was killed, and Washington was to give two hostages for the fulfillment of this condition.
This proposal Washington accepted, for he was in straits for food and ammunition and he signed a paper which purported to contain those conditions and nothing else. But the finesse of the French had gone still further. Taking advantage of the ignorance of Van Braam, Capt. Villiers had scrawled the con- ditions in a well-nigh illegible hand, and had inser- ted therein an acknowledgment that Jumonville had been assassinated in the previous fight. This paper was wet and badly blotted, as well as badly written. When he had written it, Villiers read it over to Van Braam, and there is every reason to believe that in so reading it, Villiers used the words "death of Jumonville," in- stead of "assassination of Jumonville." For Major Adam Stephen (second to Washington), in describing the paper says : "No person could read them [the words of the articles of capitulation], but Van Braam, who had heard them from the mouth of the French officer."
This acknowledgment, which was in effect a for- gery, was published and screamed throughout all Europe, and the French to this day believe the forged statement.
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