USA > Mississippi > Mississippi : comprising sketches of towns, events, institutions, and persons, arranged in cyclopedic form Vol. I > Part 76
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The leaders of the hostiles sent out parties to threaten other posts, and deceived Claiborne by a report that they proposed to attack the Easely stockade, a place far north on the Tombigbee. Before marching to that distant place, however, the general sent a message 'of warning to Maj. Beasley, who responded, writing on August 30, that he had improved the fort, and that his men, in the face of alarms, manifested a desire to meet the enemy. Some of McGirt's negroes had brought in news of the approach of a war party, and James Cornells, a half-breed, came in and reported the discovery of a fresh trail to McGirt's. The day before Beasley wrote, two negro boys, sent out as cattle herd, had run in breath- less, to tell of a large party of Indians. Capt. Middleton went out with some horsemen and finding nothing, one of the boys, was tied up and flogged. Though apparently incredible, there is strong con- firmation of the story, that when the Indians attacked, the inmates of the fort were collected about the whipping post where Beasley was about to punish the other negro boy for warning him of danger. (See letters of Hawkins).
Judge Toulmin's account of the attack is as follows: "The gate was open. The Indians had to come through an open field 150 yards wide, before they could reach the fort, and yet they were within 50 steps, at eleven in the morning, before they were noticed. The sentry then gave the cry of Indians, and they immediately set up a most terrible war whoop and rushed into the gate with incon- ceivable rapidity, and got within it before the people of the fort had any opportunity of shutting it. This decided their fate.
The fort was originally square. Maj. Beasley had it enlarged, by extending the lines of two sides about 50 feet, and putting up a new side into which the gate was removed. The old line of pick- ets stood, and the Indians, on rushing into the gate, obtained pos- session of this additional part, and through the port holes of the old line of pickets fired on the people who held the interior. On the opposite side of the fort, an offset or bastion was made round the back gate, which being opened on the outside was also taken pos- session of by the Indians, who, with the axes which lay scattered
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about, immediately began to cut down the gate. There was a large body of Indians, though they probably did not exceed 400. Our people seemed to sustain the attack with undaunted spirit. They took possession of the portholes in the other lines of the fort and fired on the Indians who remained in the field. Some of the Indians got on the blockhouse, at one of the corners; but after firing a good deal down upon the people they were dislodged. They succeeded, however, in setting fire to a house near the pick- ets, from which it was communicated to the kitchen and thence to the main dwelling house. They had attempted to do it by burning arrows, but failed. When the people in the fort saw that the Indians retained full possession of the outer court, that the gate continued open, that their men fell very fast, and that their ·houses were in flames, they began to despond. Some determined to cut their way through the pickets and escape. Of the whole number of white men and half breeds in the fort, it is supposed that not more than 25 or 30 escaped, and of these many were wounded. The rest, and almost all the women and children, fell a sacrifice to the arms of the Indians or to the flames. The battle terminated about an hour or an hour and a half before sunset. Our loss is seven commissioned officers and about 100 non-commissioned officers and privates, of the First regiment of Mississippi territory volunteers. There were about 24 families of men, women and children in the fort, of whom almost all have perished, amounting to about 160 souls. I reckon, however, among them about six families of half breeds and seven Indians. There were also about 100 negroes, of whom a large proportion were killed." (Toulmin's letter to the Raleigh Register, his information being derived from "a person of character and credibility, who was present during the whole scene, and who escaped through the open- ing made in the pickets." See Niles Weekly Register, Oct. 16, 1813).
Among those who escaped, according to Pickett's Alabama, were Surgeon Thomas G. Holmes, Capt. Bailey, Ensign W. R. Cham- bless, all wounded. Hester, a negro woman, shot in the breast, managed to paddle a canoe to Fort Stoddert, and give the news to the garrison there. Chambless, after wandering about for some time, with two arrow heads and a bullet in his body, reached Mount Vernon, and lived ten years afterward. Joseph Perry and one Mourrice are the only other soldiers of the Mississippi vol- unteers mentioned among the 14 who escaped. The rest of the soldiers and inhabitants, except a few half-bloods who were made prisoners and some negroes taken for slaves, lost their lives, and those who were killed by bullets were fortunate. Among those spared were the wife and seven children of Zachariah McGirth, son of a famous Georgia tory, who had fled into the Creek nation and married one of the maidens. Sept. 9, Capt. Joseph P. Kennedy, brigade-major, arrived at the ruins, with a detachment to bury the dead. According to Pickett he reported that all the bodies were scalped, "and the females, of every age, were butchered in a man-
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ner which neither decency nor language will permit me to describe. The main building was burned to ashes, which were filled with bones. The plains and the woods around were covered with dead bodies." This may have been true, but the language is not in Ken- nedy's report. He did say that his detachment collected and buried the bodies of 247 men, women and children, of the inmates of the stockade. While searching the adjacent woods for bodies they "discovered at least 100 slaughtered Indians, covered with earth, rails, brush, etc. We could not be mistaken as to their being In- dians." (Miss. Archives). This indicates that the battle was a fiercely contested one, and that the number of the inmates of the stockade is greatly exaggerated in the histories.
Fort Nogales. In 1790 the Spanish commandant at Natchez made a treaty with the Choctaws by which the British district line was confirmed, and it seems that additional land was granted for the building of fortifications on the Walnut hills, which in Spanish were the Nogales hills. This point was then 25 miles above the upper settlements in the Natchez district. The construction was in progress in May, 1791, when David Smith was there, and he re- ported to Gov. Blount, in Tennessee, that the works were extensive. He described the site as a mile and a half below the mouth of the Yazoo, on a high bluff. There were then two blockhouses and large barracks completed. Besides other laborers "about 30 United States deserters" were engaged in the work. A galley and Span- ish gunboat were lying in the river close at hand.
Gen. Victor Collot, (q. v.) visiting the country as a military spy in 1796, said, "The post of Nogales, called by way of irony the Gibraltar of Louisiana, is situated on the left of the river, near a deep creek, and on the summit of different eminences connected with each other and running northeast." The main work, on the south side of the creek, called the fort of the great battery, was an enclosure made on the river side by a wall of masonry twelve feet high and four feet thick, and on the land side a ditch four feet wide and three deep, and palisades twelve feet high. Twelve can- non were mounted in the river battery, and a blockhouse with four howitzers was placed on an eminence in the rear, included in the quadrangle, within which, also, were a powder magazine, the com- mander's house and barracks for two hundred men. On a hill, across the creek, was a blockhouse with four cannon, called Fort Sugarloaf. About a thousand yards behind these works, on a chain of small heights, was built Fort Mount Vigie, a square earthwork, with ditch and palisades, blockhouse and four cannon, and four hundred yards to the right and left two small blockhouses called Fort Gayoso and Fort Ignatius. The garrison of 80 men did not suffice to keep the works from decay.
Says the author of "In and About Vicksburg," (1890) "Old Fort Nogales stood on the high eminence about a mile and a quarter due north from the present courthouse, that is still locally known as Fort Hill. There was a graveyard near the river in front of the fort and nearly in front of the present National cemetery."
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Andrew Ellicott and his party stopped at the fort February 19- 20, 1797. Ellicott wrote that the Spaniards "have erected some considerable works. The post is a very important one, and capable of being made very strong." On the 20th at noon, Ellicott "took the sun's meridional altitude at the curtain of the lower battery, after which we dined with the commandant and his officers." This commandant was a French creole, Capt. Elias Beauregard.
Francis Baily, coming down in 1997, described the fort as "an irregular fortification, occupying a great part of the hill on which it stands, which is very high and steep." Baily, being an English- man, perversely determined not to stop and show his passports, because he thought the Spaniards had no right there after the treaty, "though perhaps their right was better than the American before the treaty." A gun was fired at his boat, but the rapidity of the stream carried him by in safety.
Fort Nogales was evacuated by Capt. Beauregard in March, 1798, after giving four days notice to Capt. Minor at Natchez, who informed Guion. The latter took no steps to occupy the works, because his orders were that Maj. Kersey should arrive with re-inforcements for that purpose. Consequently the fort was for a time vacant. When Beauregard left, Guion's courier was there, "and besides sixteen or seventeen inhabitants, particularly one Mr. Glass, that for their own interest would not suffer the Indians to make depredations." A false report that the buildings of the fort were burned, was circulated by a river trader. (Letter of Gayoso, Claiborne's Miss.)
After its evacuation by the Spaniards, the name of the fort was changed to Fort McHenry, in honor of the then secretary of war. But its occupation was short, and it was finally abandoned about the close of the 18th century.
Fort Panmure. "During the summer of 1764, a large detachment of British troops occupied Fort Rosalie at Natchez, which was thenceforth known as Fort Panmure," says the historian-geologist, Wailes. Fort Rosalie, however, was at that date mere ruins, over- grown with trees, and there is a tradition that a new site for Fort Panmure was selected. It seems to be assumed that the old fort was reconstructed, and, of course, for a permanent occupation bar- racks were constructed for the troops. This occupation must have been sometime after Maj. Loftus, attempting to ascend the river to the Illinois country, was turned back by the shots of a few In- dians near the heights which afterward bore his name, the site of Fort Adams. That event was in March, 1764. The troops were withdrawn from West Florida to St. Augustine in 1768, and Fort Panmure left in the care of one man. It is not likely that the fort was garrisoned at the time of Willing's visitation, in 1778. But Natchez district was loyal to the British government, and shortly after the Willing raid, says Wailes, "Governor Chester sent Colonel Magellan to raise four companies of militia, and with orders to fit up Fort Panmure. The command of these troops was given to Lyman, Blomart and McIntosh, who were soon ordered to Baton
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Rouge in consequence of the prospect of a war with Spain, and a Captain Foster, with a hundred men, was left in command of Natchez." After this, it appears, occurred the conflict between Capt. Michael Jackson, whom the Pensacola governor sent to take command at Panmure, and Col. Anthony Hutchins and Capt. Lyman, in which the possession of the fort was contested, with some bloodshed. The fort was surrendered to Galvez, without resistance, after the capitulation of Baton Rouge, in which it was included, and at that time there seems to have been a small garri- son of regularly enrolled British soldiers, possibly "Hessians." In the revolt of 1781, the garrison under the Spanish flag was be- seiged by the Natchez district people and compelled to surrender, but the fort soon returned to the hands of the Spanish officers and Creole soldiers, and so continued until the evacuation of March 30, 1798, upon which the United States flag, that had flown for a year and a month from the camp of Ellicott or Guion, hard by, was raised over the ancient works. (See Fort Rosalie.)
Governor Williams ordered "the old blockhouse" to be torn down and the timber sold, November, 1805.
Fort Rosalie. The fort is described as an irregular pentagon, without bastions, and built of thick plank. The buildings within consisted of a stone house, magazine, houses for the officers and barracks for the soldiers. The ditch surrounding it was partly nat- ural and partly artificial, and in most places 19 feet from the bot- tom to the top of the rampart. It was built by Governor Bienville in 1716. When he was superseded by Governor Cadillac, the appointee of Crozat, M. de Bienville received the appointment of lieutenant-governor, and was ordered to take two companies of in- fantry, to place one at Natchez, and the other on the Ouabache, and to remove his headquarters to Natchez. (See French Collec- tions, 1851). La Harpe tells us in his Historical Journal that "Cadillac would not give him but thirty-five men ; although he knew that M. de la Loire des Ursins had brought the news that five Frenchmen had been killed by the Natchez, and he had barely es- caped by the advice of a chief, who had given him the means to save his life." M. de Bienville set out accordingly, and arrived at the fort on the Mississippi, (Fort Iberville) where he found MM. de Paillou and de Richebourg with the pirougues which had been sent from Mobile, laden with provisions and utensils to form the settlements at Natchez and on the Ouabache. He ordered them to proceed and join him at the Tonicas, a post which had been estab- lished a short time before on the Mississippi, about two leagues above the mouth of the Red river, on the borders of a lake." On learning that the Natchez had also lately killed two Frenchmen and plundered six Canadians, he sent an interpreter to the Natchez to solicit provisions and to bring the calumet of peace. In the nego- tiations which followed with the great sun of the Natchez and his representatives, the Indians restored the six pillaged Canadians, and surrendered the heads of the chiefs responsible for the murders. This brought about peace, and it was further stipulated that the
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Natchez should furnish posts and lumber to build the fort which was needed for the protection of the French, and to prevent further aggressions on the part of the Indians. The work was commenced in June, 1716, under the direction of M. Paillou, who was appointed commandant. The Indians supplied the timbers and did the labor on the earthworks, and the fort was completed by the soldiers of Bienville, who arrived the following August. It was named Rosa- lie in honor of Madame la duchesse de Ponchartrain. (La Harpe, French Coll., 1851, pp. 46 and 84). Dumont states that before any concessionary had arrived in the province, two Frenchmen, Hubert and La Page, had established themselves as settlers near the site of the fort. Of Hubert he says: "He was a man of talent, and of all that part chose a league from the bank of the river, what he deemed the most excellent spot, where he raised a house, which he called
St. Catharine's. After his death St. Catharine's was sold to the Sieur de Koly, and passed into his hands. As the soil at Natchez is excellent, many Frenchmen, soldiers and workmen, after obtaining their discharge, went and settled there, and new dwellings were built. Most bought their lands from the Indians of the place, who lay more than a league and a quarter from the river bank, in five villages half a league apart. That called the Great Village, the residence of the great chief of the tribe, was built along a little river called White River, St. Catharine's Creek. West of this village the French built a fort on a hill and called it Fort Rosalie. It was merely a plot twenty-five fathoms long by fifteen broad, inclosed with palisades, without any bastion. Inside near the gate, was the guard-house, and three fathoms off along the palisade ran the barracks of the soldiers. At the other, opposite the gate, a cabin had been raised for the residence of the command- ing officer, and on the right of the entrance was the powder mag- azine. At this post the company maintained a company of sol- diers. South of the fort was another little Indian tribe called the Tioux, who willingly traded with the French, but some years after abandoned their village to go and settle elsewhere, and before leav- in sold their ground to one of the richest settlers in the country, the Sieur Roussin." (Historical Memoirs of M. Dumont, French Coll., 1851).
The fort was destroyed by the Natchez Indians at the time of the Massacre of the French in 1729, but a new fort and buildings were promptly erected by the French under Loubois, who had forced the Natchez to flee across the Mississippi. There has been considerable controversy concerning the exact location of the sec- ond fort and both Monette and Claiborne clearly state that it was not built on the same site as the original fort. Monette declares that the first fort was at some distance from the bluffs, probably near the eastern limits of the city. Claiborne states that the origi- nal fort was some 670 yards from the river. Bernard de la Harpe states that it stood on the summit of a hill about 670 yards from the shore of the river, and about 180 feet above its surface. (See His. Coll. of La., p. 84, part III). Dumont in his Memoirs states that
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after the Natchez Indians had abandoned their fort, it was fired, "and the whole army decamped and returned to the spot where Fort Rosalie had been. There they began to raise a new fort of earth, with barracks for the soldiers and houses for the officers." There is no doubt that the second fort was built on the brow of the bluffs, the remains of which were visible when Monette wrote, and largely effaced by the great landslide, though some traces still remain below the Natchez compress. (See Gerard Brandon, History of Adams County). When the English took possession of this fort in 1763, the name of Fort Rosalie was changed to Panmure, (q. v.) in honor of the minister of George III.
It appears to have been the practice to make frequent changes in the commanders of the French forts, and the following is a list of commandants as far as it is possible to ascertain them from the contemporary records. The first commander, as we have seen, was M. de Paillou. The Sieur de Barnaval commanded in 1723, during what is sometimes called the second Natchez war. He was succeeded by the Sieur de Liette, who was, in turn, succeeded by " Sieur Broutin, who was also director of the Terre Blanche conces- sion. Broutin did not remain long at the fort, but was recalled to New Orleans, and succeeded by de Tisinet. This last officer man- aged the Indians with tact, but appears to have made one serious mistake, which Dumont records, in his Journal. To acquire the friendship of the Natchez, he showed them how to build palisade forts, in the French fashion, a knowledge they made good use of after the massacre of the French in 1729. This commander re- mained about a year, and was succeeded by M. de Merveilleux, who made an excellent officer, and under whom the post prospered more than ever before. Unfortunately, he was recalled about 1728 and M. de Chopart assumed the command. This officer is given credit by most writers for precipitating the difficulties with the Natchez, which led up to the massacre in December, 1729. When the Chevalier de Loubois had constructed the new fort at Natchez in 1730, to replace the one destroyed in the war, he placed it under the command of Chevalier Baron de Cresnay.
Fort St. Claude. Governor Bienville sent a detachment of thirty men in 1718, to establish a fort among the Yasous. The fort was constructed on an elevated situation about 10 miles from the mouth of the Yazoo river. It was on the left bank of the river, and only a short distance from the village of the Yasous Indians.
Writing of this fort in 1721, Father Charlevoix says: "I was obliged to go up it (the Yazoo river) three leagues to get to the fort, which I found all in mourning for the death of M. Bizart, who commanded here. He had chosen a bad situation for his fort, and he was preparing, when he died, to remove it a league higher in a very fine meadow, where the air is more healthy, and where there is a village of Yasous, mixed with Curoas and Osogoulas (with) at most two hundred men fit to bear arms. We live pretty well with them, but do not put too much confidence in them, on account of the connections which the Yasous have always had with
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the English. The fort and the land belong to a society composed of M. le Blanc, Secretary of State, M. le Compte de Belle-Isle, M. le Marquis d'Asfeld, and M. le Blond, brigadier engineer. The last is in the colony with the title of director general of the company. I can see no reason why they chose the river of the Yasous for the place of their grant. There was certainly choice of better land, and a better situation. It is true, that it is of importance to secure this river, the source of which is not far from Carolina ; but a fort with a good garrison, to keep under the Yasous, who are allies to the Chicachas, would be sufficient for that purpose. It is not the way to settle a colony on a solid foundation, to be always on their guard against the savages who are neighbors of the English." The fort and settlement at this point were destroyed by the Yasous and Curoas, (the Osagoulas were absent on the chase, and did not participate) on December 12, 1729. They were incited thereto by their allies, the Natchez, who had just engaged in the dreadful massacre of the French in the Natchez district. The commander of the post, M. de Codere, had fallen a victim to the fury of the Natchez, while there on a visit, and the little garrison of only 17 men was under the command of the Chevalier des Roches. They were surprised and all were murdered. The good Father Souel had been treacherously slain the day before, and they adopted the resolution, says Father Petit in his Journal "of putting a finishing stroke to their crime by the destruction of the whole French post. 'Since the Black Chief is dead' said they, 'it is the same as if all the French were dead-let us not spare any."
Fort Stephens, a post-hamlet in the northern part of Lauderdale county, about 16 miles from Meridian. Population in 1900, 35.
Fort St. Stephens. This was originally a fortification made by the Spaniards after their conquest of West Florida in 1781, located on the Tombigbee river, at the head of sloop navigation, a little north of east of the present town of Bucatunna, Miss. The fort was built about 1789, and, says the author of "Colonial Mobile," "the earthwork can still be distinctly traced, and Collot represented the fort as a formidable work." It was a severe blow to the Span- iards to find this fort on the American side of the line of demarca- tion in 1798. It was surrendered to Lieut. John McClary, who marched there from Natchez with a small body of soldiers, in May, 1799. The United States troops did not garrison the fort, but con- structed a new one near the line, called Fort Stoddert. St. Stephens survived however as a town, and was the seat of the gov- ernment trading house for the Choctaw Indians, established by Joseph Chambers in 1803. His successor, George S. Gaines, con- tinued to trade at this place for many years. It was the center of American influence with the Choctaws.
Forthcoming Bond law, see Holmes Adm., territorial.
Forts and Districts Under the French. As early as 1722, the Province of Louisiana, which included the present territory of Mississippi, was divided into nine civil and military districts. Three of these were in Mississippi, to-wit: Biloxi, Natchez and
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Yazoo; the remaining six were Alabama, Mobile, New Orleans, Illinois, Arkansas and Natchitoches. Each district was protected by a fort, and was under the jurisdiction of a commandant and judge, who administered the military and civil concerns of each, and from whose decisions, an appeal might be taken to the Su- preme Council of the colony at New Orleans.
The district of Alabama was defended by Fort Toulouse, built by Captain de la Tour in 1714, acting under the orders of Gover- nor Cadillac. It was built on the east bank of the Coosa, four miles above the junction of that river with the Tallapoosa. It was kept constantly garrisoned, and served as the French outpost against English encroachments from Carolina and Georgia. After the peace of 1762, it was occupied by the English. Fort Jackson was built on its ruins in the War of 1812.
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